things kevin hates

I’ve been an American Idol fan for the last couple years, but some years I’m busier than others, and I don’t always pay a lot of attention to it. DVR helps, but between being busy and watching the Olympics, I’d put Idol on the back burner. I finally got back into watching it last week and I was less than impressed on a number of levels. The contestants weren’t great and neither were the judges. I think Ellen DeGeneres is hilarious, and I absolutely loved her 2009 commencement speech at Tulane.

But I’m not totally sold on Ellen as a judge. I love her jokes, but her comments on the contestant’s performance are often a little too nice. And what music background does she have, anyway? She’s a stellar comedienne, but that’s no qualification for this show. And Kara DioGuardi is still less than outstanding. She’s not bad, but she’s not great, either. The bottom line is that the two of them combined can’t replace Paula Abdul and her drug-addled ramblings. And once Simon leaves, I fear the show will be headed way downhill. I’m sure they’ll try to pick up some curmudgeonly Brit to replace him, but I doubt it’ll work.

The problem I have with the judges is that their advice constantly contradicts itself. It’s always been a problem, but this year, it seems ten times worse. Contestants who sing a song with an arrangement close to the original are told, “You didn’t make the song your own.” If they change it up and don’t do a good job, they’re told, “When you sing a great song like that, you don’t need to make all those sorts of changes. Just sing it!” The judges are usually right when it comes to knowing if the contestant gave a good performance or not, but their advice is all over the place. They figure out whether they like a performance or not, then they have to think up reasons for it. Art is always somewhat subjective, so even for professionals in the music business I’m sure it’s difficult to put a finger on exactly what works or doesn’t work about a particular singer or performance. The judges will praise someone for being unique, then criticize another contestant for being too old-fashioned—that is, they don’t fit into the mold of a modern pop singer. But being old-fashioned makes them unique! Katie Stevens, for example, kept getting advice to sing a younger, newer song. She did that this week and gave a mediocre performance of a boring Kelly Clarkson song. Then the judges criticized her. The main thing they kept saying was that she didn’t know what sort of artist she was, which I guess is a valid complaint, but when her earlier choices were criticized, what can you expect? She probably shouldn’t have gone anywhere near that Clarkson song, but she felt obligated to do so after what the judges had told her. And there’s no point if having the judges give advice if their advice is bad. They don’t have a direct say in who advances from here on out, so why have them around if they aren’t going to coax better performances out of the competitors?