Blogcritics: Comments on American Idol - Motown

Comment by Mac Diva

Thu, 1 Apr 2004 23:36:45 EST

I knew what you meant, Scott. I just like to play with words having widely divergent meanings. Imagine her wearing an Afghan dog around her waist. Now, try not to laugh at the image.

Comment by Scott Pepper

Thu, 1 Apr 2004 20:53:27 EST

Af�ghan. n. 1. A native or inhabitant of Afghanistan; an Afghani. See Pashto. 2. A coverlet or shawl of wool, knitted or crocheted in colorful geometric designs. 3. A carpet of similar design. 4. An Afghan hound.

Comment by Mac Diva

Thu, 1 Apr 2004 18:15:11 EST

An afghan around her waist? I missed the show and forgot to record it. Someone please reassure the Diva that Car did not wear a dog. Or a freedom fighter from Afghanistan. Pap, Charley Pride is laughing at you. Aaron Neville is adding a snicker or two. I've covered where you are going in this entry.

Comment by robin hood

Thu, 1 Apr 2004 14:57:25 EST

Country doesn't need a twang, just an audience with a low i.q.

Comment by Eric Olsen

Thu, 1 Apr 2004 13:45:21 EST

"Country" must have a twang? Tell it to at least half of the suburban hats on the country charts, to Shania to Faith Hill, to freaking Willie Nelson for God's sake. None of these sing with a twang. What they did last week was "songs from the country tradition" - you can sing them anyway you want. You could also sing the Motown songs any way you want. There is absolutely no difference, and the judges marking someone down for not singing country with a twang would be just as absurd as marking osmeone down for not singing Motown "black enough." And Jon Stevens has only done well ONCE - last week on "King of the Road" - he has been horrifying every other time.

Comment by Pappy

Thu, 1 Apr 2004 10:51:40 EST

You are missing the point regarding country music: TO QUALIFY AS COUNTRY MUSIC, REGARDLESS OF RACE, YOU MUST SING WITH A "TWANG." Only AMY ADAMS, who never did country before this, was successful in doing that. Fantasia did not bring out a twang, yet she wasn't scolded for it. Ditto that for Latoya. Black people can do it, but they choose not to, and they didn't get ripped for it. My rant is not racist, I cannot believe you can't see that motown and soul are 99% black genres of music and favor black singers. Tell me why they didn't do "Big Band" (which they have done before, but not early on in Idol finals episodes...I wonder why) in the first week? It's so obvious they don't want Fantasia to screw up yet and are trying to get John Stevens off. My implied point is that idol should not have genres that have anything to do with race at all: How about simply 90's, 80's, 70's, 60's, 50's, or songs from certain multi-genre songwriters? EVERY SEASON OF IDOL they have had a motown week very early in the finals. I cannot believe you can't see that there is a correlation between having a motown week early and trying to make sure the black singers are not voted off. You honestly cannot tell me that you did not KNOW that Fantasia would do great in motown week and that John Stevens would utterly fail. I like Stevens and I knew this.

Comment by Eric Olsen

Wed, 31 Mar 2004 17:02:08 EST

What Scott said about the genres - and don't forget LaToya totaly rocked on her country song, so if you're counting, three of the four best "country" performances were by black singers. Regarding Motown: frankly, much of Motown was about as white bread as you can get - Motown very specifically downplayed "blackness." Re last night, I think LaToya, Fantasia, George and Jasmine were the highlights of a very thin show. Amy was okay, but after shining last week on the country she was back to just pretty good for me. Poor Jon was just grim. Great job, we missed you last week.

Comment by Scott Pepper

Wed, 31 Mar 2004 16:44:59 EST

First of all, the idea that one genre of music favors singers of a certain race is not only disgusting, it is just plain wrong. Just because a particular style of music has traditionally been performed by artists of a certain race does not mean that those of other races cannot do it just as well. Secondly, Fantasia's version of Willie Nelson's You Were Always On My Mind was just about as country as you can get, as was George Huff's rendition of I Can Love You Like That. No one "got out of" performing in the required genre. Lastly, you already posted your borderline racist rant on RC's review. Don't see why you had to poison mine with it as well.

Comment by Pappy

Wed, 31 Mar 2004 16:17:42 EST

(A repost so it gets read): You all know why they do Motown right? The same reason they started out with soul: Soul and Motown favor black singers. This has been a ploy to keep black singers on. If they had done "Big Band" last night, John Stevens, the redheaded guy with the Dean Martin sound, would get most votes, and Fantasia, who the Idol judges are trying to get into the finals versus Latoya, would be in the bottom 3 because Fantasia, the Macy Gray clone, can't do Big Band. But she can do Motown, and Soul. Even her country effort didn't sound country. The only person who really had a country sound was Amy Adams. The rest avoided it, AND WERE NOT SCOLDED FOR IT. Yet the judges won't admit that Motown favors Fantasia/Latoya and disfavors the John's. The American public needs to see that Idol is rigged to favor certain contestants. This is starting to get pathetic. One week of soul: favors black singers. Next week country: should favore the non-black singers, but the black singers get away with straying from country. Motown: favors black singers IMMENSELY. I think Jon Stevens has more fans than Camille, so I think (and hope) Camille will get the boot, but if Stevens remains, what's up next week? R&B? Hip hop? This is a joke, just like last season when Fox Execs blatantly rigged it for Ruben to win because they thought Clay was gay and didn't want an Idol winner to be gay. If it weren't a joke, the least Fox could do, with respect to voting, is have it audited by a major accounting firm the same way award shows are done.