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  • American Idol Season 11 – Who Makes The Final 2?

    I personally thought last night was Phillip’s best night. While the judges loved Jessica and Joshua and seemingly want those two in the finale, I was impressed with Phillip more than both of them put together. If you missed the performances show, I blogged it for Popblerd.

    The show starts with the threesome singing Got To Get You Into My Life. At this point, I’m sick of duet and group performances. Let’s bring on the elimination!

    Jimmy Iovine doesn’t think Joshua had as good of a night as the judges did and even blamed himself for giving him No More Drama, but still thinks he should be in the final two.

    Lisa Marie Presley performed her new single, lip synced it, and looked extremely tired. The entire performance was just odd.

    Jimmy wasn’t sure that Jessica had that one performance that she needed to win the show. But he also said that he thought she was talented enough to sing at the Grammys.

    Adam Lambert performed his new single on stage, and let’s just say he looked only about 1,000% more into his performance than Lisa Marie did. Lambert can sing. His vocals are pretty amazing. (As is his hair.)

    Jimmy thought Phillip’s final performance was the best of the night and that he had strong performances for two out of the three.

    And the first person who makes it to the final two is none other than Jessica Sanchez. We may get a girl winner for the first time since Jordin Sparks after all.

    And, facing Jessica in the finals is Phillip Phillips. Joshua has to go home sweet home. Of course, he closed the show down with an ultra funky version of It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World.

    So we get the Jessica/Phillip showdown, which I figured was the scenario with the worst chance of happening. I thought we’d either see Jessica/Joshua like it seems Idol wanted, or the all male showdown. But I dig it.

    Joshua closed the show by bringing his mom onto the stage. It was perfect.

    Seacrest out!

  • American Idol Season 11 – Who Makes The Top 3?

    I have to apologize for not writing about last week’s elimination of one Skylar Laine. I was out of town chaperoning my son and his classmates at his science camp. But I did write a bit of a recap for those of you who came into the season late at Popblerd. I wrote about last night’s performances as well.

    Last night’s show was a separation show. It was quite easy to separate the good from the bad. Jessica Sanchez and Joshua Ledet are head and shoulders above Phillip Phillips. And Phillip is head and shoulders above Hollie Cavanagh. When America eliminated Skylar Laine last week, it screwed up the possibility of maybe the best top four in American Idol history. Thanks for that voters.

    Check out the performances from Joshua and Jessica below if you didn’t watch last night’s show:

    Those performances cemented that Jessica and Joshua are my favorite twosome from any season of American Idol. I put together a poll to see what everyone else thought. Take the poll here: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/6C2RDNL.

    Now, onto the elimination show to see our top three.

    The crew performed California Dreaming at the start of the show. Ryno is going to have to do his ultimate stretch job tonight to get us through this hour. At least Jenny Lo is performing tonight. (So is David Cook.)

    He brings up Phillip Phillips first. Ryno pulled the move on him making him believe he made it, but he wasn’t going to give out the results just yet. Poor Double P looked quite embarrassed.

    Hollie was next and Jimmy Iovine pretty much called her out for being the worst of the four. I’ve been saying that all season long. Ryno won’t spoil it. We don’t know if she’s safe or not yet either. Looks like we’re waiting until the end for all of them.

    David Cook is performing his latest song. He probably doesn’t like Adam Lambert very much. If not for Lambert, he would’ve been the only good singer doing anything from the last five years of the show. But Lambert pretty much blows him away. I hope we see Lambert between here and the finale.

    Joshua is next and Jimmy basically called his version of It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World the best of the season.

    And finally, young Jessica comes to center stage. Jimmy didn’t think her Etta James song was the right move, but thought the Jennifer Holliday song was fantastic and said that Tommy Motolla told him she was the real deal. Please, keep Tommy Motolla away from young Jessica.

    It’s Jenny Lo time. She’s singing Dance Again. Okay, she’s probably not singing live. But she’s Jenny Lo. You don’t really watch her to hear her singing. You just watch her to watch her.

    The first person to make the top three is Jessica Sanchez. The next person in the top three is Joshua Ledet. Why do I have a feeling Phillip is leaving us? Please no. Please no.

    Phillip Phillips is through! And we have the strongest top three in quite some time. Jasmine Trias, I mean Hollie Cavanagh is gone.

    Seacrest out!

  • New Video! Daniel Martin Moore and Joan Shelley “First of August”

    New Video! Daniel Martin Moore and Joan Shelley “First of August”

    ''Farthest Field'', aka ''The Duets Project''
    One of the most haunting and lovely songs of 2011 was Kentucky-born singer-songwriter Daniel Martin Moore’s cover of Appalachian folk music pioneer Jean Ritchie’s “In the Cool of the Day”, which served as the title track to Moore’s sophomore solo album. Listening to it gives me the shivers every time. I’m not as taken with Moore’s originals, but when he sings a traditional hymn, you get a strong sense of someone brushing a layer of dust off a box of hard luck memories from the attic.

    In the not quite 18 months since that album’s release, Moore has kept himself plenty busy with the launch of his own record label, Ol Kentuck, to, in his words “help release some of the beautiful projects that I saw happening all around me.” The first such project was indeed very beautiful – a collection of lullabies by a female vocal trio called Maiden Radio.

    Maiden Radio “All the Pretty Little Horses” (2012)

    Moore’s latest project is a collection of duets he put together with Maiden Radio’s Joan Shelley. It’s another quiet, intimate album full of delicate, pastoral melodies called Farthest Field and was just released earlier this week. Here’s a video for the album’s first song:

    Daniel Martin Moore & Joan Shelley “First of August” (2012)

    You can listen to the whole album below. Right now, I think my favorite track of the bunch is the bluesy simmer “Sweetly By” with its rolling melody – Lover, come sweet and slowly, Lover come sweetly by – and great lead vocal by Joan. Talk about making love in the green grass.