The Top 10

Songs of the 21st century tonight. We have only an hour for ten contestants, so there should be less inane banter. I don't know what's going on with Ryan's tie-tack.

Lisa starts us off with a Kelly Clarkson song, "Because of You." Lisa sings it heavily, ponderously; she lands short of all the high notes. There's some really sour stuff near the end. Not good. Randy is unenthusiastic and Lisa looks as if she could cry. Paula doesn't really help. Simon goes in for the kill: "The song was too big for your voice."

Kellie will sing "Suds in the Bucket," which I've never heard. It's a very low-energy performance, respectably tuneful but extremely uninspiring. Randy didn't get the song choice (Amen, brother!), Paula says "You're so much better than that," and Simon just rails against the "gimmicky, rodeo, lassoing" song. The judges are not happy tonight.

Ace will sing "Drops of Jupiter," by Train, which I predict will be a disaster. He's doing all kinds of weird physical stuff, opening his shirt on "permanent scar" and raising and lowering his arms shudderingly at odd moments. Vocally it's not bad, but not great. Oh, I see, there was an actual scar there -- I couldn't see it under the lights. So it went along with touching his hair when he sang the word "hair." Very Idol.

At least Taylor is dressed better tonight, but he's extra-twitchy while he talks irritatingly about the "Soul Patrol." He sings "Trouble," a slow and pointless song that he purportedly chose in order to show off his range even though it doesn't actually require a big range. Paula, who is unaccountably sensible tonight, points out that it was nice that for once he just stood behind the microphone and sang. Simon quite liked the vocal and the song but not the clothes, which he called "very Clay Aiken," which was just bizarre.

Mandisa is doing Gospel. It's fabulous. Finally the kind of performance she's been capable of all along. Randy is still not liking the song choices tonight. Paula wants her to "color it up with a little vulnerability next time," which, I hate to say, I think I know what that means. Simon doesn't get Gospel any more than he gets country, so no big surprise there.

Ryan immediately prompts Chris to acknowledge that he was doing Live's version of "Walk the Line" last week. He sings Creed's "What If." It's a little angry and Spinal-Tap-y for my taste, but at least it's not Scott Stapp karaoke. Simon thinks Chris needs to do something different, so that next week, when he does, they can criticize him for forgetting who he is.

Katharine channels the execrable Christina Aguilera, all runs and warble and inappropriate smiling. Randy at least liked the song choice, for the first time tonight, but she didn't do anything distinctive with it. Paula has apparently found her happy juice. Simon thinks it was the best tonight -- which, sadly, is probably right -- and was "almost as good as Christina."

Bucky will sing "Real Good Man" by Tim McGraw. Was his accent that thick before? I can't think of anything to say about that performance. It was so utterly undistinguished. "Very unimpressive," Simon said.

Paris does "Work It Out," an atrocity that reminds me why I don't care for Beyonce. Paris is twirling her hair and bouncing around but not so much singing. To use Simon's favorite word of the evening, it was "indulgent." Randy loved it. Paula loved it. Simon correctly derides it as "precocious. . . . It was like a little girl pretending to be Beyonce."

Elliott will close out this dreadful night with "I Don't Wanna Be." The singing is inadequately supported, frequently flat, heavy, and breathless. For some reason Randy and Paul just love it. Simon says the arrangement was terrible (as though these contestants actually arrange their own material -- which is why the whole Chris/Live thing was so ridiculous) but the vocal was good.

Recaps: what a wasted, pointless night of half-assed karaoke. There wasn't a single genuinely good performance in the bunch. I could see just about any of them getting kicked off this week.