Professor Chan's blog
Grading the Idols: April 3, 2006
Grading the Idols: March 28, 2006
Welcome back class to another exciting issue of GRADING THE IDOLS. After this week’s elimination we will be down to NINE finalists, and I will be handing out mid-term grades to all the young people that haven’t flunked out of American Idol Academy yet.
First off however, I’d like apologize to anybody that I may have offended with my previous article. Like in “1984” we have erased the past mistakes and have paved a new path of happiness and understanding into the future. I just want to say that my intention here is not to start controversy, and my message is one of humor, not hatred. So once again, I’m truly sorry, and it won’t happen again. Now on with the show...
Grading the Idols: March 21, 2006
Welcome Class to another exciting day of Grading The Idols. Last week we had the Professor of Cool, Stevie Wonder. This week we have the Professor of New York, Barry Manilow. I wonder if Barry knows how his music is universally hated and if that his name has become the epitome of lame, old fogey music. You know, when you turn on the easily listening station in the car to irritate your friend, he/she will invariably say, "What is that crap? It sounds like Barry Manilow." Nobody actually knows what Barry Manilow sounds like except that everybody knows it sounds like warmed over oatmeal in your stereo system. Same goes for Neil Diamond. Except that I think Neil is kind of in on the joke, whereas Barry isn’t. But Barry one-ups Neil in that he’s never starred in a movie remake of the "Jazz Singer" one of the worst movies of all time. And despite the title of "Jazz Singer" actually ZERO jazz was sung in the film.
Grading the Idols: March 16, 2006
Welcome back class. I hope I’m not ruining the surprise when I say Stevie Wonder night was a miserable failure on American Idol. Apparently nobody was listening the last couple weeks when Randy all but declared that the singing of Stevie Wonder songs was off limits to wannabes. So what do the producers do? Force EVERYBODY to sing Stevie Wonder songs. I guess I’m not the only one who ignores everything Randy says.
GRADING THE IDOLS
Today we have a special guest lecturer, the Dean of All Things Cool, Professor of Song, Master of Grammy, Oscar Winner Stevie Wonder will give his impressions and criticisms on each of the American Idol Hopefuls. Since Stevie listened to each of the Idols sing his songs live, in person I will take his opinion as gospel. He is Stevie Wonder, after all.
Grading the Idols: March 9, 2006
Hello Class, welcome back to Grading The Idols.
The American Idol rumor of this week is that the band Fuel asked Chris “Chrome-Dome” Doughtry to join the band as singer after his blazing performance last week. Considering that more people heard their song “Hemhorrage” that night than in all the band’s performances combined that makes a lot of sense. Of course Chris signed one of those sticky AI exclusive contracts so he’s going to be on the “American Idol Tour sings the hits of Disney on Ice” for years to come. This week Chris decided to audition for the band Seether by singing “Broken” better than the dude who actually sings it. Seether. You know it’s a sign that after The Killers got their name literally every cool band name is now taken. Seether is like the remainders pile of band names. Just a quick look in the dictionary finds “Seether” noun, - a pot for boiling things. Yeah... Named after a POT... Makes you wonder...
Grading the Idols: March 2, 2006
Hello again students, welcome back for another thrilling installment of Grading The Idols.
So the most recent AI gossip has nine (old) Female Fans of Clay Aiken who are suing him because he’s gay. Uh, yeah I’d like to see that stick in a court of law. Apparently his packaging as “wholesome entertainer” didn’t jibe with the 9 House Fraus idea of “family values.” It’s kind of like the contract I had Ozzy Osbourne sign before I bought “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath.” Imagine the disgrace when I found out years later that Ozzy wasn’t ACTUALLY the Spawn of Satan and was merely a wealthy, drug-snorting rock singer. I sued too.
Grading the Idols: February 23, 2006
Good day students, the class is back in session and the first American Idol test scores are in. I'm sure there will be controversy. Maybe not as much controversy as finding out Becky "The Evil Twin" O'Donahue did "steamy photos" for Maxim magazine. Ooh, the scandal. Excuse me but Maxim is the least "steamy" Men's magazine on the rack. Maxim is so air-brushed and sanitized for our entertainment that it doesn't even register as smut. Maxim is the magazine that 17 year old boys buy because they legally can't purchase Playboy for six more months. The whole thing is about as shocking as the discovery that Becky also appeared on Fear Factor. I frequently stumble over re-runs of Fear Factor around midnight after all the good shows go off the air. There's nothing fearful about it. Fear Factor should be re-titled "Surgically Enhanced Girls With Spiders Poured on Them." Or "Boobically Augmented Girls Forced to Eat Raw Pig Livers." I would be appalled at finding out I was ever on that show. Now THAT show is real smut.
Grading the Idols: February 16, 2006
Hello and welcome to our new column here at Vote For The Worst. I am Professor Chan. I will be your music critic each week and grade the performance of the wannabes on Star Search... I mean American Idol.
I will grade each performance on an easy to understand A through F scale, and if I want to get creative, I'll throw in a plus or minus. Feel free to disagree, but since I am the one with the column and therefore the power, my opinion will always be the most correct. What are my qualifications for judging a silly talent competition that has bamboozled-- I mean, captured the attention of millions of Americans each and every week? None, really. Except that I am smarter than Randy, Paula and Simon combined. Also I have a basic enough understanding of both music and the English language to know that "pitchy" is neither a real word, nor one that can be used to describe music. I also know that American Idol is not a "singing competition" as Simon likes to call it. If that were the case they could do it on the radio and nobody would care what the sets look like. American Idol is a popularity contest first AND THEN a semi-amateur talent competition second.
Hello Class, welcome to a special addition of GRADING THE IDOLS. Today I’m giving out mid-term grades. After 6 weeks of actual competition and a bazillion weeks of crappy singing I think we’ve started to pick out particular trends and habits of each of the 9 finalists.
I’ve averaged out my grades for the first 6 weeks of finals. I’ll talk about how each of the finalists have been doing and then I’ll make some bold predictions. I’m sure my math is suspect, so if I’m off by a couple decimal points, remember I’m grading on a curve anyways.
I would also like to pull a Pickler and apologize ahead of time if these aren’t hysterically funny. I’m sor-ree.