Click here for my latest article.

Every year on American Idol, there are two theme nights that I enjoy significantly less than others.  One theme that I dislike is "Motown night", and the other one was tonight's theme: Country.

It looks like I wasn't alone in disliking "Country night", as a number of the contestants didn't seem to be so thrilled with the theme either.

The best news from the country world has to be Kenny Rogers.  He looks really good for a man of 68! (August 21, 1938 is Kenny's birthday.)  Let's see how he performs tomorrow.

Another bit of good news for me is that we're finally down to less-than-ten contestants.  From here on out, reviewing each show will get increasingly easy.  So with that, I give you. . .

Tonight's Performances:

1. Taylor Hicks sang "Country Roads."  I don't know what Taylor was thinking.  He picked an ordinary song, and didn't do anything special with it.    Grade: C

My favorite part of Taylor's performance was when the camera cut to a group in the crowd, while showing the caption "Taylor's Grandpa and friends."  Well, I saw two younger people who could possibly have been Taylor's friends, but I didn't see an elderly man.  There was an older woman however.  Is it possible that Taylor's grandfather is a transvestite?

2.  Mandisa sang a song that may possibly be titled "Any man of mine."  Mandisa must not be reading my reports, as she wore both jeans and a sleeveless shirt. 

Mandisa sang what must be a nice country song, but it seemed that she was just trying to get through the song without messing up the words.  I'd bet that Kellie would have done a much better job with that song!  Grade: C

3.  Elliot Yamin sang "If tomorrow never comes."  I wish that the judges hadn't brought up Elliot's nervous look, because that was slated to be my most profound observation from tonight's show.

I'll say it anyway:  For some reason, Elliot looked really nervous tonight.  I wonder if he was afraid of forgetting the words.  Anyway, the song turned out alright.  The voice and the song weren't bad.  Grade: B

4.  Paris Bennett sang "How do I live without you?"  Paris had on some really cute clothes!  The beginning of this song, as well as the chorus didn't exactly sound right.  I am thinking that Paris should have sung the song a bit higher.  Grade: C

Simon had an interesting comment, disagreeing with a negative one by Paula.  I think that Simon intentionally said the opposite of what he felt just to "change things up" a little.

5.  Ace Young sang "I wanna cry."  This song sounded nice and soulful.  There were one or two rough spots, but all-in-all everything went well.  Grade: B+

6.  Kellie Pickler sang "Fancy."  Kellie was the first performer on tonight's show who actually seemed that they enjoyed the theme.  Very appropriate, well-sung song by Kellie.  I liked it.  Grade: A

7.  Chris Daughtry sang "(Unknown title)."  Chris did surprisingly well with the different genre.  He sounded like an actual country singer.  The down part about tonight's performance was that the song was a little bit boring.  Grade: B+

8.  Katharine McPhee sang the same song that Chris sang.  Katharine looked like a country singer.  The song turned out alright.  Grade: B

I wonder what Katharine has been doing to slim down since the show started.  She has been getting thinner each week.  Looked good tonight.

9.  Bucky Covington sang "Best I ever had."  Bucky sang a mellow song, but he should have picked something more exciting to end the show.  That said, the song had a couple of good spots.  Grade: C+

Tonight's best:  1) Kellie   2) Ace   3) Chris

Tonight's worst:  1) Taylor   2) Mandisa   3) Paris.  How could Paris have been so fantastic during the auditions and the Hollywood round, yet become so ordinary recently?