So Jordan Sparks won American Idol, good for her.

In the break of the show there was a commercial for a new Fox TV show, New Amsterdam, about an immortal police officer in New York City.

The 12 finalists for American Idol were chosen last week. Antonella Barbara was rightly sent home, surprisingly Sabrina Sloan had to leave as well.

This week's show brought few surprises. The ladies are consistently better than the men, with LaKisha Jones and Melinda Doolittle taking the lead. Both are extremely strong singers, but I think Doolittle is more likable and has a better chance of becoming number 1.

Somehow Sanjaya Malakar made it through this week to the next round, perhaps because of his new hairstyle. He and Phil Stacey are probably next to go.

Four years ago we watched a new show on Dutch TV: Idols.

A few weeks ago the show started its 6th season in the States. It's called American Idol here and it's great fun to watch.


With Time Warner Cable's built-in recording function we can watch the show whenever we want without commercials and tonight we saw yesterday's show where the 12 female contestants performed.

With a much larger group of potential contestants than in the Netherlands the level of the candidates here is high. Most candidates are pretty good, especially in these last 24 (with some notable exceptions).

There was one exceptionally good performance: LaKisha Jones.

Here's a video clip of yesterday's show with LaKisha:

Update 2/25: Used a different video (old one stopped working).

Well.


What can I say?


Just listen to this.

Hind! Hind! Hind!

I said it now the costs of the SMSes (€ 1,60 per vote) are mentioned more detailed.

Jim's first song was a really easy one (Uptown Girl) -- he did it not bad but it was a bit spiritless. First song of Dewi: also not bad, but she was too nervous again. Jamai didn't sing very well but he definately is a showman. Perhaps it's also that the song wasn't made for him.

The second song of Hind was a bit boring -- but what a voice. Jim's second song was more difficult than the first song he did: it showed immediately because he performed it pretty bad. I liked Dewi's second song a lot. I don't know about Jamai's 2nd: not good, not bad.

My results for tonight:


1. Hind
2. Dewi
3. Jamai
4. Jim

In showbusiness the saying goes that "All publicity is good publicity". So Idols is probably not worried too much by rumours that Idols is completely pre-arranged and that the winner is already known by the production company. Always nice to read that kind of stuff ;)

My ranking for tonight is different than last week:

1. Hind
2. Dewi
3. David
4. Jim
5. Jamai

It's definately time for Jim to leave Idols if you'd ask me. Jamai gave a bad performance but he has a lot more 'spirit' and a much better performance so he can come back next week. Anyway, after Hind's performance it became clear that all the other candidates might as well go home immediately.

Well, has anybody been watching Idols?


I think Marieke did a pretty good job with "Walking on Sunshine" -- too bad she was so nervous. It's not new that I'm not a big fan of Jim, but I thought he did quite well this week. But then I heard Hind and it's just uncomparable... she's the best!

David has a great voice but I think he should have choosen a quicker song; his dancing would have shown then. The only performance I didn't like was Dewi's... a bit off-tune and boring if you ask me. Jamai is really a showman and he danced the best of all the candidates.

My ranking for today:

1. Hind
2. Jamai
3. Jim (!)
4. David
5. Marieke
6. Dewi

Of course we never watch Idols.



After two episodes (that we didn't see of course) I'm getting a bit annoyed by one of the candidates.

It's a 15-year old boy that looks very cute, but can't sing at all.

It was nice to find out that I'm not the only one.

:

My choice would be a girl called Hind.