The Polls Are Open

Alllllllrighty then! The last performance show of the American Idol season is over, and here are my thoughts:

The show:
Darn it, Idol producers! The original songs absolutely suck! You should have opened the show with them, as they definitely left us flat at the end. I realize you want mucho royalties from these songs, but you'd do better to let someone with talent write them and split the take. And please lay off the cheesy inspirational crapola songs! Neither of these finalists do that kind of song well.

Katharine:
She picked two of her best songs of the season to encore. Good choices, I think. When she did "Black Horse and Cherry Tree" the first time earlier this season, it was better than the version on the charts. This performance was not quite as good, but close. I think it was an appropriate choice, since that song saved her on a night when she wasn't good at all. "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" was very very good. I didn't get to hear it last week, so I can't say whether she did it better this time or not, but nonetheless, great job. Especially since her monitor earphone failed.

I hate to say it, but Katharine got screwed tonight. The original single for her was just a pathetic song. It was too low and soft for her in the verses, and she couldn't hit the notes. It was so bad that Paula hated it. The composer should be taken out back and beaten, have his fingers broken, and then be kicked to the gutter and left for the dogs. It was that bad, and Idol should be ashamed of allowing the final vote to hinge on some unknown composer's bad song.

Now putting that aside, if Katharine were a better performer, she would have changed the key of the song and tweaked it in rehearsal to make it better. This is a skill she does not yet possess, however, and that's going to lose the prize for her.

Taylor:
He nearly made a bad mistake in picking "Levon" as his second song. It may be his favorite, but it's boring, and does not translate well to a "one verse and two choruses" format like you get on Idol. Luckily for him, he got the better of the two final numbers. He started off with the song he did back in the Stevie Wonder show, and it was a very good opener with good energy. The original single he got was far and away the better song when compared to Kat's. "Do I Make You Proud", was a cheesy inspirational song, just like Kat's, and I was afraid at first that it was going to be too low and slow for Taylor, just like Kat's. Taylor did what Kat couldn't, though, and made the song his own by coaxing the band to speed up and to back off of his vocals.

Let me reiterate my point here - Taylor can lead a band. He knows how to cue and coax and cajole a band (and an audience, too) to conform to his lead. This takes experience - something Kat doesn't have, and this makes Taylor the winner this season.

Prediction:
It's Taylor by a mile. I will be shocked if it isn't.

PS: At 9:30, Taylor leads on DialIdol.com with 72% busy signals to Kat's 67%.