THE DAILY MOJO by Adam Daniel

Here’s my thoughts on last night’s Motown night:

Mark Spano

Mark’s working the choreography extra hard tonight with his version of ‘You Keep Me Hangin’ On’. The song as a whole is pretty good; a little camp but the judges all respond positively. Speaking of judges, tonight they welcome back Guy Sebastian as a guest judge. I still think Guy was the best Idol winner the show has had, just the perfect combination of great voice and ready-made performer. Damien would be a close second.
Rickie-Me doesn’t forget to make it all about her, thanking Guy for his “inspiration” when she has on the show.

Sophie Paterson

She’s performing ‘Papa Was A Rolling Stone’. Guy urges her to bring out her “inner Beyonce” in the pre-song clip. I’ve got to say, the actual performance was more Bea Arthur than Beyonce. She looks gorgeous, but it’s clear she’s holding back, either from fear or lack of confidence. Marcia disagrees, saying she had “attitude.” Guy very nicely says that she sucked, whereas Dicko goes all out and says she “mutilated it”. Ouch.

Luke Dickens

Keeps growing in leaps and bounds. Tonight he does what the judges have been asking for and shows a bit more nuance with a nicely textured version of ‘My Girl’. Incidentally, my brother and I just played this at my sister’s wedding last weekend. Let’s just say I’m glad the only judges were cheery and/or nicely buzzed guests. The arrangement has a nice string section and it’s all smiles on the judging panel. Everyone’s pushing the “this week, not only did you become a father, but you became a singer” line, which is nice, but you wonder what he’s been doing the last eight weeks if that’s the case.

Teale Jakubenko

Guy nails it when he describes Teale as having a “sweet voice, just not a big voice.” It’s pretty evident during his version of ‘Ain’t No Mountain High Enough’ (and even more so in the pre-song clip when Guy busts out a two second run that surpasses anything Teale has done this whole season). Snappy looking tonight, but he’s only got a week or two left in him at most, right?
Dicko describes him as “clean, tidy, reserved”, and that pretty much sums up his appeal. Not really the adjectives of choice for publicists hyping the next big talent.
Totally unrelated – did anyone else see the moron with the “Happy Birthday Tara” sign? Andrew G approaches and asks who Tara is and it turns out it’s the girl with the sign. Huh?? Why would you make a happy birthday sign for yourself and then take it to a live taping? To see it on TV? Why? To quote Mugato, I feel like I’ve been taking crazy pills!!!

Chrislyn Hamilton

‘Get Ready’ is another Chrislyn slam-dunk, perfect for her big sassy voice. Nice to see her wearing a dress too. It’s a big bounce back after her woeful performance last week – though not deserving of the Touchdown that Guy assigns her.
At one point she approaches John Foreman and he looks anxiously over his shoulder like he’s worried she might eat him.

Wes Carr

It’s the least Motown version of ‘If I Were A Carpenter’ that I think anyone could possibly do, but it’s still golden and Wes continues his improbable run of great performances. Is there any chance he is going to drop the ball before the season is over?
I think you could take last night’s performance and play it on commercial radio and no-one would even blink. He’s totally ready to go.
Totally unrelated – the girl on that Mastercard ad got totally ripped on that couch purchase. $300 for that piece of s.?

Roshani Priddis

Guy (who my wife informs me looks like a train driver in the pre-song clips) gives Roshani some great advice regarding her bad habit of using too many vocal licks, showing her the beautiful simplicity of a great sustained note. Her performance of ‘Reflections’ is uniformly poo-poohed by the judges, but I thought it was okay – I can see where they are coming from though, as she should have owned tonight’s theme. A few bum notes, but certainly not a train wreck. Plus she looks very sexy as always. A for effort, B- for execution.

As for tonight’s verdict, I’m predicting a Teale, Sophie, Roshani bottom 3, with Teale heading home. And seriously, do I have to really sit through another Gabriella Cilmi performance tonight? Can I have a root canal instead? Or maybe light myself on fire?

Back with more thoughts on the verdict tomorrow.