Idol Top 4 and Brooke's not there!

WHAT came as a surprise was not Brooke White's exit this week but Syesha Mercado in bottom two. Before any one frowns, let me remind you that this is reality TV.

There are no rules here, only the ones drawn up in the minds of the Idol watchers at home in front of their TV.

Brooke White admittedly didn't do too well in her first song I Am A Believer. She was out of sync with the tune.

It wasn't the first time, she had to struggle with the rhythm of the song. In a way, she was out of her league.

Her second choice was I Am I Said. I thought it was going to be a repeat disaster but I was wrong.

I Am I Said was and still is one of my favourite Neil Diamond songs. So I was quite pleased when Brooke hit a home run with this number.

"Way to go, Brooke!" I shouted in front of my telly. It is generally not expected of anyone to emulate Diamond in any way. Neil Diamond is in a league of his own. He was a big name from the 60s to the 80s. That's a long stretch of 30 years.

This week, Neil played mentor for the remaining five contestants. Neil was quite polite and diplomatic in his comments about the performances of his five charges. He never uttered any disparaging remark about any of them.

When it came to Syesha's turn, she captured everybody's imagination with a heart-pumping number, Alone Again. It wasn't one of the better known tunes by Diamond but By George, did she make it memorable. I am a fan of Syesha.

She has a professional air about her and boy, can she sing.

Diamond hit the nail on the head when he said: "I thought she did a beautiful,beautiful job." Coming from an artiste who has sold more than 120 million records around the world, that's a huge compliment.
Syesha's second song was Thank the Lord for the Night scored a near perfect 10 on performance. While Randy Jackson and Paula Abdul only had nice things to say about this amazing African-American, Simon micheviously remarked that it wasn't as great as the others did. I wonder what he meant by that.

Anyway, it wasn't the first time he had been wrong. Last week, he praised Carly Smithson and it proved to be her last week. This week he half-slammed Syesha over her second song, and she sailed through.

As for David Cook, he could do no wrong this week. He began with I Am Alive. It was a bomb, as Randy would have put it. For me, it was a splendid performance without going into unnecessary superlatives.

Neil Diamond watched Cook very carefully during rehearsal. When Cook finished, Diamond said: "I got goose bumps listening to you."

Now any contestant would give his right arm to receive that kind of compliment from a legend like Neil Diamond.

If I may, Cook sounded uncannily like a very young Neil Diamond. Even his stage mannerisms bore some resemblance to Diamond when he was climbing up the charts.

Cook's second song was All I Really Need Is You. It further boosted his growing image as a top contender for the Idol title.
Cook has been receiving lots of accolades from Idol watchers of late. Mature women in general think that he has got a good chance of grabbing the top prize.

Personally, I am not so sure. I keep thinking of David Archuleta. Archuleta has got something that most contestants would sell their cars to get, and that is popularity.

Even on his less-than-impressive nights, Archuleta gets the cheers from even standing on stage, next to host Ryan Seacrest.

Archuleta wasn't amazing with Sweet Caroline, his first song. This number is uniquely Diamond's. You don't touch this song unless you can match Diamond line for line and not many people have that kind of vocal tone that Diamond takes for granted.

So Archuleta gets just a passing grade from me on this one. However, his second number America was a brilliant pick. If some of us developed high anxiety over Archuleta's first song choice, we could rest easy with his second choice.

The lyrics of America resonated with the hearts and minds of the audience and families in the north Amerian continent.

Perhaps it didn't move the earth for a lot of people, nevertheless it rekindled the feel-good warmth that came with the song. As Simon Cowell p;ut it, it was a brilliant song choice, and he laughed knowingly.

First song, not so good. Second song, a killer! Archuleta's through to sing another week, and all his girlfriends around the world are cheering their hearts out for him.

Jason Castro should have been shown the door this week but Brooke White somehow beat him to it.

Jason sang Forever In Blue Jeans, which I was totally unfamiliar with. He tried and sank steadily over the next two minutes. It was more than forgettable and scored high on the snore chart.

Song No. 2 was September Morn. That too didn't lit up anybody's life. Jason was clearly in trouble after he lost points on this number as well. I concurred with others that Jason had just earned himself a spot in bottom two.

But as fate and voters have it, that was not to be for Jason. His fan base is larger than anyone has anticipated.

This is shaping up to be another popularity contest which is not what the judges and most of us at home prefer.

If Season 7 sinks into another one of those "surprise, surprise" events like some of the past seasons' contests, the show will quickly lose steam. It's one thing to want your favourite to win, and quite another to watch mediocrity creeping into the show with a tremendous force.

No doubt the producers are already planning for Season 7 but in reality (pun intended) you can't have great contestants getting the boot year after year when it's clearly not their time to go. Let's hope it doesn't happen that way.

Personally, American Idol show has been great fun for me but it's heartbreaking to watch the truly talented ones receiving their discharge notice early, just because they are not that popular among the Idol watchers.