For my birthday, Dave got me tickets to the American Idol concert, which was really surprising since I was a fan of the show, but not a HUGE fan. I admit, however, that I’ve always been curious about the tour, and Dave managed to get some really great seats, so I was pretty excited to go.

First we had to drop off Ben, and then we headed to the Allstate Arena. I had thought that getting there 20 minutes before showtime was a good idea, but it’s been years since I’ve been to a concert, so I’d forgotten how crazy it would be. The line of cars started at the highway exit, and it took us ten minutes to just get into the parking lot. The parking lot was PACKED and there was a long line to just get into the building.

Our seats were pretty close - not on the main floor, but still pretty close. The mix of people was pretty interesting - the crowd seemed to be comprised of mostly white people, with two thirds of them over the age of 35, and the other third under the age of 15. Most were women, with about 20% of the audience being male - the males mostly under the age of 13. There were a lot of women who were all dressed up - heels, makeup, sparkly dresses, though most of the crowd was casually dressed like we were. I spied more than a dozen homemade American Idol shirts.

The most surprising thing about the show was the warm-up/introduction guy…it was Cory, the same guy who was our “clap leader” when we watched “Dancing with the Stars” last October. It was weird, it was like seeing an old, familiar face. He was playing to a couple hundred people before…now he’s in front of tens of thousands of people every night.

Then the show started, and let me tell you, when the crowd screamed, THEY SCREAMED. My ears hurt for hours afterwards. Here’s my rundown of each of the performers - each contestant had their own set, contrary to this group song lovefest that I thought it would be.

Chikezie:
“I Believe to My Soul” by Donny Hathaway
“Caught Up” by Usher
“So High” by John Legend
I was so happy to see my Easy Chickezie again. His big smile and easygoing style lit up the stage. He had some great stage presence, some nice moves, but to tell the truth, the performance was just all right. I guess there was a reason he was in 10th place.

Ramiele Malubay:
“I Want You Back” by The Jackson Five
“Love Will Lead You Back” by Taylor Dayne
“If I Never See Your Face Again” by Maroon 5 featuring Rihanna
Oh, how I wanted Ramiele to do well! The little lady with the big voice started off with a Jackson five standard which was cute, but not challenging or impressive. There were also some pretty cheesey dance moves that were incorporated. Her second song, however, showed us why she was in the competition. If she sang a song on the show half as well as she sang “Love Will Lead You Back” she would have been in the top 5. It was really impressive. Her last song was pretty forgettable, which reminded us what kicked her off the show - poor song choice.

Michael Johns:
“We Will Rock You”/”We Are the Champions” by Queen
“It’s All Wrong But It’s All Right” by Dolly Parton
“Dream On” by Aerosmith
As soon as Michael Johns’ face was brought up on the jumbotron the screams started and were deafening (though, at the time, I had no idea the level of ear piercing-ness they would reach later). He started out with the Queen medley he sang in the show, which I liked, but Dave was unimpressed. The second song was enjoyable, but nothing special. His best was probably “Dream On”, which really got the crowd cheering. He’s really great and comfortable on stage, though not as good looking as I remember him being. Before he sang Dream On he had brought out a Cubs flag and dedicated the song to them, pointing out that his dream was for them to someday win the World Series. Way to play to the crowd, Johns!

Kristy Lee Cook:
“Squeezin’ the Love Outta You” by Carolyn Dawn Johnson
“God Bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood
“Cowgirls” by Kerry Harvick
She’s a gorgeous gal, and wore an outfit that showed off her slim figure, but her songs were just ‘eh’. She showed a lot of sass and personality, but I could hardly understand what she was saying. I give her a C+.

Carly Smithson:
“Bring Me to Life” by Evanescence
“Crazy on You” by Heart
“I Drove All Night” by Cyndi Lauper
Carly had a pretty good set that showed off her strong voice. She drove all the Irish concertgoers (it sounded like there were a lot there) crazy by talking about how she’s been here for the St. Patrick’s day parade and how she loves how we turn the river green. The girl knew how to work the stage, and her last song was definitely her best.

Brooke White:
“Let It Be” by The Beatles
“1234″ by Feist
“Yellow” by Coldplay
Brook started off by rising from beneath the stage playing her piano to “Let it Be”, which she sang during the competition. Her voice sounded beautiful, and she looked amazing. She then switched to a guitar and led the crowd in what she called a silly, fun song, Feist’s “1, 2, 3, 4″. Right before singing, she urged the crowd to snap, proclaiming, “Snap is the new clap!” Dave mentioned that she reminded him of a grade school music teacher. She topped off her set with one of my favorite Coldplay songs. Brooke blew away the rest of the performers with her excellent song choices. People may not have been standing up screaming, but we all had a snappin’ good time.

Group medley, featuring the bottom 6:
“Pride In the Name of Love” by U2
Before going to the concert, I thought all of the performances at the concert would be like this - all the Idols singing on stage together. I liked it, the harmonies were pretty, and they all did a great job. I think I would have liked to see more group collaborations, but it was also nice to see each performer express their individuality.

Jason Castro:
“Over the Rainbow” (the Israel Kamakawiwo’ole version)
“Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley
“Daydream” by The Lovin’ Spoonful
Next to Brooke, I think Jason had the strongest set. When he was announced the screams were even louder than Michael Johns…then Jason began with the mellow, pretty “Over the Rainbow” song. Which was a little weird - the high pitched screams followed by such a somber song. Then came why I consider the highlight of the night - “Crazy”. I had heard that Jason did an acoustic version of the song for this AI audition, but it was never aired because they couldn’t obtain the rights to use the song on television. So when I heard him start singing the song I was pretty excited, and it became obvious why Jason was chosen to do American Idol - this song kicked ass (this rendition was previously done by Ray Lamontagne). It kicked ass so much that I gotta link to someone who filmed it:

He then finished up with Daydream, the same one he did during American Idol. I loved him then, and I love him now. Definitely my #2 for the night!

Syesha Mercado:
“Umbrella” by Rihanna
“If I Ain’t Got You” by Alicia Keys
“Listen” by Beyonce
I was excited to see what Syesha had in store for us. She came up at the top of the stage and looked incredible in this little gold dress. Unfortunately, she had mic problems and we couldn’t hear her sing. She kept on going, going through all the motions as the crowd was starting to get restless. She switched mics, and it still didn’t work - a handful of people started to boo. Finally, her mic worked, and she finished off the end of “Umbrella”, which, I’m sure if we heard the whole thing, would have been incredible. She stayed cool throughout the whole fiasco, apologizing to the audience, blaming herself for accidentally picking up Chickezie’s mic. She went into her Alicia Keys song, but the real treat was “Listen”. For all the other performers before her, the audience would stand up and applaud when they started singing, but end up sitting down after a bit. During “Listen”, Syesha’s amazing vocal stylings brought the crowd to its feet. She was telling us and the rest of the world that it wasn’t a fluke that she was in the top three - she deserved to be there.

David Archuleta:
“Angels” by Robbie Williams
“Apologize” by OneRepublic
“Stand by Me”/”Beautiful Girls” by Ben E. King/Sean Kingston
“When You Say You Love Me” by Josh Groban
As soon as Syesha announced the coming of the guy who became her “little brother”, the crowd was going apeshit. If heads could have exploded as little Eddie Munster rose from the stage playing piano, they would have. I swear I blew an eardrum with all that sound! He started out with “Angels”, which is one of my favorite songs ever, and he did it well. As he sang “Apologize”, I noticed that his stage presence was a lot better. He was more confident on stage and learned how to work the audience. I was doubtful that he could have a shelf life outside of AI, but I could see that this kid is learning the tricks. By the time he got to “Stand by Me” the screams began again, especially when he brought in the Sean Kingston “Beautiful Girls”. Man, as soon as he started singing that the girls screamed as if they were thinking to themselves, “ME!!! HE’S SINGING TO ME! I AM YOUR BEAUTIFUL GIRL, DAVID!!!” Little Archie would have gotten higher marks from me, but his fourth number was a sleeper.

David Cook:
“Hello” by Lionel Richie
“The Time of My Life” (the crappy songwriting contest winner)
“I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” by Aerosmith
“My Hero” by Foo Fighters
“Billie Jean” (the Chris Cornell version of Michael Jackson song)
Ahh, the winner!!! Although as a whole, the cheers for David C (who had a little too much eyeliner on) were louder than Archie, they weren’t as high pitched. Which lead me to believe that his fan base is probably out of puberty (maybe a few decades out of puberty). He started off with a slow paced “Hello”, and moved on to the not-so-exciting “Time of My Life”. David knew how to make the crowd scream - by taking out his own videocamera, turning on the houselights, and scanning the whole crowd. Out of the rest of his songs, I’d have to say he did the best on “My Hero” because it suited his voice the best. I was too distracted during “Billie Jean” because I was listening to the words of the song and was thinking to myself, “Damn, if I knew 20 years ago about the Michael Jackson I know now, I doubt I would have liked the song as much.” He did a fine job - I could see him going far with his career, though I wonder if he could be as popular as that bald AI guy, uh, whats-his-name. The Vin Diesel look-a-like.

Group encore:
“Don’t Stop the Music” by Rihanna
I enjoyed this group performance, especially since it was a song they did during American Idol. All the performers came out and sang portions of the song. What I found hilarious was Michael Johns’ dancing. He’s one of those guys who knows he’s not a great dancer, but dances anyway to ham it up. He was jamming with Ramielle and Carly, and totally looked like a frog in a blender.

I wish I brought my camera - on my ticket it had said that cameras weren’t allowed, but EVERYONE had cameras there. When the lights were out, aside from the occasional glowlight all you could see were the LCD’s of people’s cameras and camera phones. I don’t think it would have mattered if I did have a camera, because there was this massively tall man in the row in front of me. Some part of his body would have inevitably been in all my pictures. This guy was tall. Like Hagrid tall. But if you’d like to see some awesome pictures from someone who had a good camera and awesome seats, click on Kaidee’s photostream.

All in all, it was a really fun night. I laughed a lot, more because of the reactions of the crowd than at the singers. It was a lot better than I thought it would be - you could already see that these singers were really learning how to be performers. I’m really tempted now to go and see the “Dancing with the Stars” tour or “So You Think You Could Dance”.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008 at 2:59 pm and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.