With the Top 13 down two men, “American idol” turned into a more familiar position Thursday – targeting women.
Each of the bottom three vote recipients were women, representing the oldest and youngest finalists.
In the end it was the youngest, Shannon Magrane, 16, who was eliminated.
Safe for now were Elise Testone and Erika van Pelt, the oldest finalists (who also had their pick of the oldest songs on a week when they all sang hits from the year they were born).
Both Elise and Erika were faultless in their singing; it was a quirk of voters that they don’t like big sister types.
As for Testone, she had some of the biggest promise of the season and always went for the big song with not altogether successful results. She would have done better by playing it more safe, but it wasn’t her style. This week, she ignored suggestions from Jimmy Iovine that she do any of a number of other songs rather than a big Whitney Houston/Boyz II Men blockbuster “One Sweet Day”; she had her mind set. And though she didn’t go as wayward as she did on a big Whitney Houston number last week, “I Have Nothing,” maybe enough memories of that performance (which also landed her into the bottom three) lingered.
It was the first week of the season when judges had no power whatsoever. Last week, it was up to them to choose from the bottom three boys and bottom three girls. They chose the guy, Jeremy over Elise Testone, perhaps knowing the girls would need the boost as the voting went on.
A second guy went home unexpectedly this week when producers ousted Jermaine Jones from the roster for not telling them of his various run-ins with the law.
The results of the vote this week determines the Top 10 that will go out on the “American Idols Live” tour – a demarcation that would have come in another week had there not been two cut overall this week.
Magrane will be remembered in part as the young girl Steven Tyler hit on during auditions – right in front of her dad, a retired major league pitcher.