MiniCap: The X Factor

Spoiler alert: someone goes home. Last night’s elimination was everything that you might want in an episode of The X Factor (unless you wanted a really stellar musical performance, in which case you were out of luck): tears… sexxy, sexxy, sexiness… drama and conflict… and as little of the judges as possible.

First, the group lip synch: everyone dressed in black and white to perform “Save the World” on a Matrix-style stage. After that performance, I wanted two things: for The Stereo Hogzz to stop singing and for Drew to stop dancing. It was over soon enough, and we had our two “celebrity performances” from Willow Smith and Jessie J.

Willow did a song called “Fireball.” I think it must be like those ring tones for young people. Like maybe to young people this music sounds good, but to old people like me it sounds like raccoons got stuck inside a metal garbage can.

I liked Jessie J’s “Domino” better. She’s like what Katy Perry would have been if Katy Perry had been born in the UK and was not as attractive. Jessie J wore gaffer’s tape as a costume, so the good news is that she’s saving a ton of money on waxing this month.

30 minutes into the show, Steve Jones starts to cut people, “in no particular order.” Going through to next week are: Stacy Francis, Astro, Melanie Amaro, Marcus Canty, Leroy Bell, Rachel Crow, Josh Krajcik and Drew.

That just leaves Lakoda Rayne, The Stereo Hogzz and Chris Rene on stage. Color me surprised when Chris Rene gets put through, leaving poor Paula standing between her last two acts: her girl group of aspiring country pop stars and her smooth R&B band that has been in the bottom twice in a row.

In their fight-to-survive performance, Lakoda Rayne does a country version of Jordin Sparks’s “No Air.” I’m going to go ahead and blame the harem pants for how bad they sound. Nothing good can come from wearing harem pants, and for Hailey they made her sing off key and at a different speed from the actual music. So the beginning was pretty terrible, and the rest was meh.

The Stereo Hogzz did Michael Jackson’s “You Are Not Alone” and while the whole thing seemed like a really good school talent show performance, they sounded a whole lot better than Lakoda Rayne. In fact, they sounded better than their own performance on Wednesday night.

Judges’ decision time and Steve explains the rules to us: each judge votes to send an act home. If there’s a deadlock then whoever got the least overall votes from the night before goes home. There are too many rules for this game.

LA thought both groups struggled and that The Stereo Hogzz were better, but he never likes their song choices, so he’s going to vote to send them home. Well. What’s the point of the final performance if the judges are going to make their decisions based on performance over the entire competition?

Nicole admires both groups, but she’s all about female empowerment, so she’s going to send The Stereo Hogzz home. Paula refuses to vote and this is where things get confusing. Simon backs her up and says she doesn’t have to vote. But that means that no matter what Simon votes, The Stereo Hogzz go home. So Paula tearfully votes to send Lakoda Rayne home. But then Simon votes to send The Stereo Hogzz home. So The Stereo Hogzz go home and harem pants lives to sing another day.

And that was the show! Do you think that The Stereo Hogzz will make it big? Weren’t you surprised to find Lakoda Rayne in the bottom? I thought Chris Rene was the weak link from the previous night. And what does America have against the group acts?

While I work on the full recap, check out last week’s elimination recap by the delightfully hilarious Mrs. Snarklesbee!