Honestly, this finale was packed with filler so after watching a few minutes upfront, I simply fastforwarded to the end to see Nick Lachey’s team winnning. Woohoo! I at least got the winner right! And he richly deserved it.
NBC’s “30 Rock” star Tracy Morgan came in to announce the winner. Tracy Morgan? His film “First Sunday” is giving away the $250,000. Not exactly the first person — or 95th person — I’d think of to do this. And he’s wearing a turtleneck. Morgan being serious is bizarro.
Ratings last night held firm, with 8.3 million viewers compared to 8 million opening night and 7.7 million Tuesday night.
Anyway, I’ll backtrack and watch some of the performances, which at this point really don’t matter in terms of any voting. DJ Slim provides the videos, of which I’ll link to a few I liked:
The opener: Christmas carols. Patti LaBelle’s team does a rather bad version of “Sleigh Ride.” Team Bolton team does a decent version of “Silver Bells.” Team Rowland does a very clean, fun take on “Jingle Bell Rock.” But Team Lachey sounds amazingly smooth doing “Let It Snow.” Team Shelton ends with an all-over-the-place “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” with the worst choreography. Just seeing the choirs side by side proved that Nick Lachey put together the best choir.
Team Shelton’s “Celebration.” This over-played party song is so tired, I can’t muster any energy getting excited about this. The guy who sang the first verse was bizarrely off key. The line dancing was laughable. A few of the soloists were decent, at least. (Full disclosure: at age 10, I actually bought this single.)
Team LaBelle’s “No More Drama.” Very few can pull off the passion and actual drama singing this Mary J. Blige classic. And I’m sorry. Although her lead singer (who looks but doesn’t sing like Fantasia) seemed to be missing something that would have taken the song to Blige-like epic levels.
Team Lachey’s “What a Wonderful World.”: Quiet, introspective, just plain lovely. He also split the solos up, again using his team very effectively.
Team Rowland’s “Survivor”; Since Kelly’s team was ousted, she didn’t get a chance to sing her solo. She takes a Destiny’s Child classic. It’s a bit over the top but I enjoyed it.
Team Bolton’s “When a Man Loves a Woman”: Ack. Bolton singing blue-eyed soul has never done it for me. zzzz.. wake me up when it’s over.
Team Shelton’s “Boondocks”: One of the military guys got to get some solo work. It’s a perfectly passable cover of this Little Big Town hit. (Shots of Miranda Lambert every day must mean she and Blake are dating.)
Team Bolton’s “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing”: The solo singers were good on this Marvin Gaye classic, but the arrangement was fairly tepid.
Team Rowland’s “One Sweet Day”: In this Boyz II Men/Mariah Carey collaboration, the female singer didn’t quite hit the high notes but she was better than the male singer. The little deaf dad moment was sweet. It’s hard to criticize the sentiment.
Team LaBelle’s “We Are the Champions”: She chose this Queen song as a statement. The two male solos were good, especially the second dude.
Team Lachey’s “Sing a Song”: Yet more proof why Lachey’s choir won. There was party-like choreography, fine harmonies, just pure delight through and through. You must watch this!
So is this show worth bringing back once a year? Seems like perfectly harmless fun to me right before Christmas. And the ratings, while just okay, were certainly good enough for NBC to do so.
In “Idol” related news, here’s a salacious item: Vivid Entertainment is releasing the Jessica Sierra “hardcore” sex video on January 30 and has a trailer out there in cyberspace. I’m sure if you want to see it, you’ll be able to find it but I’m certainly not going to link to it! Oh, and TMZ reports she’s preggers to boot!. Merry Christmas, Jessica!
