'Idol:' I got my first real six-string...

Sorry, all that Bryan Adams music is getting to my head. I'm not sure why the Canadian has so much pull over "American Idol" contestants; maybe it's just the idea that a sensitive power-ballad will set the judges aflutter. But I can't imagine Simon was anywhere near heaven during Hollywood Week, despite the fact that these were THE BEST CONTESTANTS EVER and that they were heading inexorably toward THE BEST TOP 24 YET. Ryan said it about 50 times, so it must be true.

Or maybe the horn-tooting was a way to hide the fact that this revised Hollywood format was pretty boring. Gone was the guaranteed drama of the group-sing rounds, replaced by the anticlimactic display of singers accompanying themselves. (Except for one guy's fascinatingly bad performance on the drums, that idea was a total bust.) After that, it was just lines of singers, blah, blah, blah. Many of the folks who had and lost recording contracts are getting another shot. Some of the most annoying first-round contestants got the shaft, including Amy, the teenage dance captain from Charleston who lectures other kids on abstinence, and got her parents to pay for a vocal coach to accompany her to Hollywood. In addition, we learned that acting cutesy while arguing with Paula does not do you any favors. We learned that being a noble and likable single parent doesn't help you past the first-audition rounds. We learned that being a cute and wholesome 17-year-old boy helps a lot. The "Idol" powers clearly learned from their Sanjaya experience.

The biggest mystery? Josiah, the slightly-touched 18-year-old with the keyboards, who made the judges gush in the early rounds and then couldn't figure out how to sing "Stand By Me" in time. He "dismissed" the band, sang terribly, then declared that his performance "took a hell of a lot of guts." Simon, Paula, and Randy put him through on the strength of his past supposedly-charming weirdness. But how will he survive a day of real "Idol" if he can't sing along with the band? Perhaps he'll get the boot in Wednesday night's long parade of elevator rides.