"America," are you really sure about David Archuleta?

David Archuleta sings "America" and it feels a little bit like Kristy Lee singing "God Bless the USA," like he's obviously looking to garner as many votes as he can -- totally cheesy. But he sounded great, so I guess that's all that matters, right? I read an interview in which his dad says that he's David's musical consultant, which means, basically, that David's dad is choosing these songs; so I can't really blame David himself, but he sang the two most obvious songs -- the most well-known. It's like he thinks people vote for the songs they recognize -- he doesn't trust that people will vote for his voice, whether they know the songs or not. He could have really taken a chance tonight and sung a completely unknown song and made it special, but instead he played it safe, as usual. I just wonder if this is the guy we want to buy music from. It's getting to the end of this competition, and I think the winner should be the one we'd spend money on, the one we'd pay to see in concert, the one whose CD we'd spend money to buy, and for me, that person is so not David Archuleta - it's David Cook, and perhaps Jason Castro, if he made a CD with songs like "Hallelujah." So, when you pick up the phone to vote for David Archuleta, just ask yourself if you're really sure - are you really going to follow his career a year from now, 3 months from now, even?

Anyway, Randy loves him and tells him that for a young man, he's definitely in the zone, another good performance. Paula says this was the perfect song for him to sing, that his voice is so on point and some other gibberish I don't feel like rewinding for. Simon says that was a smart choice of song, that it was clever. He says he ticked the boxes, meaning it was absolutely the right choice, check, check, check (gesturing like he's checking off boxes on a checklist).


Last one of the night is Syesha, singing "Thank the Lord for the Nighttime." The song is not a ballad, so I'm loving it just because of that. But she does a great job with it - I think she's improved so much after getting to put some performance into her singing last week for Andrew Lloyd Webber week. It's like she really didn't think she could spice things up. But she was great last week, and this week is pretty good, too. She could manage to sneak up on the Davids without them even realizing it.

Randy tells her that she's finally realizing who she is, that she is also in the zone and this is the way he likes her. Paula says she didn't get to comment on her first song, so she says she loves hearing her vulnerable side, that it's her magic, but her second song shows a whole different side and it's her theatrical side. she said something else, too, but her thoughts are so jumbled, they're hard to decipher. Simon tells Syesha that what she demonstrated again is that she is a very good actress/singer. But he thinks she may be in trouble tonight. Syesha asks why and he says that there are only 5 of them left and it was a calculated guess. He just didn't think she had a really memorable second song like some of the other ones did.


Well, I think Syesha was pretty great this week - I'm actually going to keep her out of my bottom two. I think the judges badly want to get rid of Jason, so I think he may end up in the bottom two and I think Brooke White will join him. If we're being fair, I think Brooke will go home tomorrow, but you never know - the producers can alter the results any which way the want. But, I'm sticking to my guns - I say Brooke tomorrow.