sublymonal

Almost time for the second #9...

Just now, Elliott said:

I was too lazy to do a write-up, but it would’ve just been those GIFs of his workout video tbh

Also this means David Cook is our Season 7 winner! 

  9 (tie). David Archuleta

Average Score:

12.00

Rankings:

@1234567890 - 2nd

@Zoey - 9th

@*Chris - 10th

@Elliott - 10th

Public - 10th

@Solaris - 12th

@NGM - 20th

@Alex95 - 23rd

Quote

I ranked Archie 14th, which is probably higher than I would have ranked him during or after the Idol season. I definitely bought into the David vs. David hype and because I was a huge Cook fan, I felt like I couldn't like Archie. I also felt like compared to some of the older, more experienced contestants that season, Archie felt a bit amateurish at times, even if he turned in a handful of really good performances and was part of what made the season so interesting. Though, if I had my way, I would have had several contestants last longer than him.  Cue Victoria shading me for several pages again. Anyway, I've since grown to like Archie more. I like a lot of his original music and he seems like a nice guy, but I just like the contestants I ranked above him more. 

On 8/31/2020 at 10:30 PM, 1234567890 said:

 

David James Archuleta. I'm shocked this man made the finals because I thought for sure someone would cut him along the way. I am pleasantly surprised that he managed to make it the Top 24. David Archuleta was my favorite contestant from American Idol Season7 and and one point overtook Tamyra Gray as my #1 favorite contestant of all-time. I even chanced my username to David Archuleta. I was super young when American Idol Season 7 aired so naturally I had a crush on him but the boy could sing as well. He was the obvious front runner of this season and David Cook just managed to take the crown from him. They were both deserving imo. My favorite performance of David's will always be "Imagine" by John Lennon. It was such a moment for him. Since Idol he has released many albums and even had a #2 single with "Crush". He went on break to do a mission and came back with some more music and even released music this year. I've seen him the second amount in concert with the first being Kelly Clarkson. The YouTube video of him losing and those girls losing their minds will always be iconic to me maybe because at the time I could relate.

On 8/31/2020 at 9:52 PM, *Chris said:

DAVID ARCHULETA

 

Coming in #10 as a deal with Victoria, it is David Archuleta from the 7th season of American Idol aka one of my favourite season - this ranking was not difficult to make as I was a fan of David on the 7th season. In fact, I would consider David Archuleta as one of the contestant that would have been in my Top 4  which in part due to performances such as "Imagine", "Smoky Mountain Memories" and "Don't Let The Sun Go Down on Me".

 

With that being said, I'm not too sure if I would have him as high as I did especially over Trent whom I know Victoria ranked low on her end. Congrats to him & Victoria for making it this far!

On 8/22/2020 at 6:07 PM, Alex95 said:

Not sure if this is one of my better kept secrets or if literally everyone knew this, but I very much do not like David Archuleta. I found his "Aww shucks" act on the show to be phony, I think the majority of his performance are boring/mediocre, a few of them are downright awful, and then very few of them I actually enjoy. I didn't target him for the majority of the game though because Victoria has been very nice to me lol (so now she's gonna hate me ). I genuinely enjoy the other 22 contestants more and I am afraid of Archie winning this whole thing so I stand by this ranking (and I don't consider it petty!) Anyways onto his time on the show. "Angels" was probably my favorite performance of his. I hadn't heard of that song before and I actually thought it was a very beautiful performance that he connected well too and it was the best performance of the night. "Imagine" is obviously his big moment and he definitely impressed me with that performance. I never considered it to be one of the all-time great performances, but I'm certainly a fan of it and he obviously sang the hell out of it. Other than those two performances, he doesn't have a single other performance that stands out in a positive way for me. He was just extremely bland and predictable performing ballad after ballad. But I guess I can't really blame him for sticking with ballads. Because when he attempted to go upbeat with performances like "We Can Work It Out", "Sweet Caroline", or "With You"......OR LORD! So many trainwrecks! I was frequently annoyed because Archie frequently skated by week after week despite boring me to tears or just being awful. While Michael and Carly were getting robbed and Syesha was becoming a bottom three queen, Archie was doing the bare minimum and thriving. I really thought we were heading to a David Archuleta victory, so David Cook snatching the crown at the last second was the highlight of the season for me. My favorite Archie moment is easily this though:

 

 

Our two #9's are ready if you want to spam for the next page. This is post #18.

54 minutes ago, FrogLenzen said:

If you hurry you can beat Andrew and get all the Top 20 revealed before Idol

Just now, Solaris said:

 

I do, im not great at it, but ill figure it out!

Just click the photo/gif and a pop up will appear to resize it

Working on our last few writeups now.

Advancing the Idol version of Piece by Piece, as God intended

3 minutes ago, 1234567890 said:

Advancing: Sober

 

Finally something we can agree on

Gonna just ignore Zoey’s rankings and move on

1. The one and only Da’Vonne. I was disappointed she was so convinced David betrayed her and didn’t see through Nicole’s lies but her exit speech was everything

2. Kevin - One of the only redeemable people left in the house. Him gushing about getting to play with Da’Vonne was adorable.

3. David - I’m disappointed her didn’t try harder to convince Day that he voted for Ian. He seems content to coast.

4. Enzo - I mean, he seems like the least problematic person in the majority alliance so he lands here by default.

5. Cody - he’s hot and also relatively quiet right now so he hasn’t gotten on my nerves yet.

6. Dani - idk I guess I rank her here. I hate that she was part of the plan to lie to Da’Vonne but otherwise she hasn’t been driving me up the wall.

7. Christmas - I mean, she should probably be lower because I hate her but the other three have been annoying me more lately.

8. Tyler - Still haven’t forgiven him for what he did to Bayleigh.

9. Memphis - So entitled. It’s gross.
10. Nicole - Good god, shut up. She’s so whiny and fake.

@Deeee and I have chosen to give our immunity to... Katya

2 minutes ago, Elliott said:

@Solaris @Zoey @Deeee @sublymonal

 

19 minutes ago, 1234567890 said:

This guy cut Already Gone. Don’t listen to him.

1 minute ago, Elliott said:

I mean I was literally only referring to Dark Side

cut Mr. Know It All, there are better songs on that album.

Any guesses for the two tied number 9’s?

1 minute ago, Elliott said:

In Sonika’s exit interview that week, she said nobody tried to claim the same Sia song as someone else.

That surprises me. I mean, I can see Dalton wanting to sing Bird Set Free, but I can't imagine La'Porsha not wanting to sing Chandelier.

Just now, Alex95 said:

La'Porsha's a black woman so yes.

I mean, Candice won only a few seasons prior and she too reprised her best perfomance right before the voting lines opened. Imagine if La'Porsha sings Chandelier in the pimp spot on finale night? I imagine she was leading the vote at some point so she must have been within spitting distance of Trent, but I bet enough of Dalton/Mackenzie's votes probably went to Trent and pushed him into a clear lead.

To be fair, I imagine there was a fight over Chandelier since it's her most well known song and Trent won some kind of coin-toss or rock paper scissors, so they were all bitter that he got to sing it and probably even more bitter than he absolutely obliterated it the way he did. Imagine if La'Porsha won that coin toss and sang it. Would we be talking about Trent as the winner?

3 minutes ago, FrogLenzen said:

Just re-watched Chandelier and the camera cuts to Dalton and Mackenzie at the end and I'm like loooooooooooooooooooooooool

 

 omg how have I never noticed this

4 minutes ago, Elliott said:

My husband ranked him 4th!?

I ranked him based on who I think needed to be ranked higher (Lee, Blake, and a third person). Also my vote counted for 1/17th of a vote.

3 minutes ago, The Ghost of Weedy Speedy said:

I was all about Dalton

  11. Trent Harmon

Average Score:

12.75

Rankings:

@Elliott - 2nd

@NGM - 5th

Public - 10th

@Alex95 - 12th

@*Chris - 12th

@Zoey - 17th

@1234567890 - 21st

@Solaris - 23rd

Quote

I ranked Trent fourth and it probably goes without saying that Trent is one of my favourite Idol contestants of all time. When Idol started it's final season, my hopes weren't high after we suffered through seasons 12-14, but I tried to cling to the hope that we'd get another Candice, Kree, Jena or Clark this go around and, when Trent performed a brief but beautiful cover of Sam Smith's "Lay Me Down" during Hollywood Week with mono and still killed it, I started to think he could be the one.

 

Going into the semi-finals, he and La'Porsha were neck-in-neck for me. And they stayed that way for weeks, the two of them delivering the clear best performances week after week. Trent served back to back excellence in the semi-finals with Chris Stapleton's "What Are You Listening To" and his duet with Season 6 winner Jordin Sparks to the BeeGees classic (and one of my parents' favourite songs) "To Love Somebody", earning himself a fast pass from the judges into the Top 10. While I wasn't a fan of the fast pass, I also didn't want to watch Trent or La'Porsha get robbed of a spot in the Top 10, so I was happy they advanced. We'll just ignore the other two fast passes

 

His first performance in the semi-finals was another Sam Smith cover ("Like I Can") and while it's not among my favourite of his performances on the show, it was still among the strongest of the night. This was also the night Kelly Clarkson performed and was a guest judge and basically declared La'Porsha the winner. I can't be certain, but I definitely think this lit a fire under Trent to prove that he also had what it took to win and watching his journey over the next few weeks definitely left me rooting for him.

 

The next night, Top 8 week, he tapped into that soulful R&B side that people had come to love and sang the hell out of Percy Sledge's "When A Man Loves A Woman". While I think Joshua holds the clear title for the best version on the show, I think Trent definitely deserved the praise he got from the judges for his version. At Top 6, he and La'Porsha stole the show again. For Trent's solo song, he served up another killer cover of Ben E. King's classic "Stand By Me" and then him and La'Porsha joined forces and proved their worth in gold with their cover of Charlie Puth and Wiz Khalifa's "See You Again". It remains, to this day, one of my favourite contestant duets we've had on the show, along with Allison and Adam's "Slow Ride" and Lee and Crystal's "Falling Slowly". At the final five was when Trent had his first off night. I loved America's choice of OneRepublic's "Counting Stars" for him because I do liken his voice to Ryan Tedder's, but this performance just didn't hit the mark. However, Trent redeemed himself in the second half of the show with his cover of Lynyrd Skynrd's "Simple Man", which was another perfect song choice for him.

 

The Top 4 show was when I felt like Trent said all bets are off and gave us one of the best one-two punches of performances in the show's history and he did it with only one of those songs being a ballad. His first performance, a swampy version of ZZ Top's "Sharp Dressed Man" show that Trent wasn't a one-trick pony. He could perform and command a crowd, something that was sorely lacking from Idol in recent years. He then finished the night with what can only be described as an immaculate version of Sia's "Chandelier". It was the first night where I felt like he clearly out performed La'Porsha and made us all question Kelly Clarkson's prediction only a few weeks prior. We all knew that whoever took the "last" Idol crown ought to be deserving, but Trent had just proved that he was also deserving.

 

Then Top 3 night happened and Trent, again, turned in two stellar performances with Parson James' "Waiting Game" and Chris Stapleton's "Tennessee Whiskey". His third performance, Justin Timberlake's "Drink You Away" was decent enough, considering Dalton turned in three performances that I would argue were all worse that it. Then, the next week, we all held our breathe as Ryan delivered the results and revealed that, thankfully, America had chosen the right Top 2 and given us the Trent and La'Porsha showdown we'd all been longing for. And a showdown it was. The two of them went back and forth, exchanging Idol singles. Trent's single "Falling" was written by Keith Urban and although Trent's wheelhouse was far broader than country, it definitely felt like it suited him well. He then sang Simply Red's "If You Don't Know Me By Now", a song well suited to his soulful tone, before singing a reprise of "Chandelier" that matched his original version note-for-note and, I think, sealed the deal on his win. It was hard to know what would happen, since La'Porsha seemed to dominate the conversation in the early part of the season, before Trent picked up steam and momentum in the weeks leading up to the finale but, ultimately, his momentum and streak of stellar performances was enough to crown him Idol's "last" winner during it's Fox era. I think it's a testament to how good Trent and La'Porsha are that, although everyone has their preference between the two of them, almost everyone agrees that they were a fantastic Top 2 to close out Idol's final season, even if the season itself was lacklustre.

 

Since Idol, Trent's has found some success in the country music scene. He released an album and several singles ("There's a Girl" and "You Got 'Em All") that charted and got plenty of radio play. Although some people complain that he went into country music, I wasn't surprised, given that he was signed to Big Machine. I also love his album, so I don't mind and think Trent was thrilled to work with big names like Chris Stapleton on his album. He also seems to be working his connections in Nashville, playing shows and writer's rounds with big names and writing songs for other artists. But none of that explains WHY I ranked Trent fourth or why he is one of my favourite contestants.

 

 

Before, during and since the show, Trent has been one of the kindest people Elliott and I have met from the show. When I wrote an article reviewing his album, he posted it on his twitter and messaged me to thank me. That summer, Elliott and I went to Nashville and met him at the Grand Ole Opry. When he met him, he immediately knew who I was, introduced us to his agent and chatted with us for a while. He also then gave us the tickets he had for the charity baseball game he was playing the next day with other musicians. He played several shows and did several signings that week and we went to all of them. I'm sure he was sick of us by the end of it, but he seemed genuinely grateful and so humbled that we would take the time to do that. We even met his mom at one of them and chatted with her for a while. We also made some friends that we still talk to. We haven't seen him for a while, but hopefully next time we are able to go to Nashville, he'll be playing a show and we can go see him again. He also messaged Elliott and I after our wedding to congratulate us which, again, is just one of the reasons I love him. I think he is one of Idol's best male contestants the show has ever seen (in the conversation with David Cook and Bo Bice) and his voice is so versatile, so I hope he continues to make and records music because from all the demos I've heard of his, he's got a lot more in him and he's so talented. Anyway, I probably went overboard, but I figure none of the rankers except my husband will so I had to say my peace.

On 8/31/2020 at 11:33 AM, Elliott said:

Perhaps a hot take, but I think Trent's the best male vocalist Idol's had.  Trent was an early favourite of mine in season fifteen, and my love for him never wavered. I enjoyed his two semi-final performances, and really dug his performance of Like I Can, which may be surprising since I'm generally not a fan of Sam Smith. Though I thought he did well with the Top 10 Redux/Top 8 Round 1 (whatever you refer to those shows as, jfc that format was garbage) performances, it was after his unfortunate of stumbling of Counting Stars that he just demolished the rest of the competition. Simple Man, Sharp Dressed Man and Chandelier in a row? Legends only. I also really enjoyed Tennessee Whiskey and Drink You Away (which I always found underrated, though I think it was hindered by the shortened performance time). Waiting Game was another top-tier performance, and then his (and La'Porsha's for that matter) showing in the finale was what the show needed to go out on.

 

My love for Trent has only grown post-Idol, as the result of getting to see him so many times for two CMA Fests in a row. The first year, he already knew who we were from interacting with us on social media, and his mom talked to us at one of his singings to thank us for all of the support, which was sweet. In the second year, we saw him far too many times (except not really) and each time, he was just the sweetest guy ever and talked to us about our engagement. After we got married, he even sent us a message on Twitter congratulating us for getting married.

 

Overall, Trent's easily become one of my all-time favourite Idol contestants, and I look forward to seeing his career grow in the future... particularly now that he's from Satan Borchetta.

On 8/30/2020 at 9:52 PM, NGM said:

Super talented, and what a great way to end the first run of Idol. He and La’Porsha pretty much carried S15 on their backs and where one of the most evenly matched F2s ever. They even delivered during finale which is where most people just bomb lol. Wish we got more post-show from him, but that goes to a lot of AI alumni.

On 8/26/2020 at 12:01 AM, Alex95 said:

You don't understand how painful it is for me to give Trent credit. He is a straight white dude who showed up on a late season of Idol, and just marched to victory with absolutely no competition. But for the first time since Kris Allen, this straight white guy did totally deserve it. Trent is extremely talented, had great song choices, and a likable personality. His competition was weak, so I really can't complain about his win at all, as much as I may like to. Trent really had no business being as good as he was. He had a lovely falsetto that elevated many of his performances, but he didn't solely rely on that. "Chandelier" is obviously a huge moment for him and an amazing performance, but I've always been partial to "Sharp Dressed Man" personally. Still, Trent during top five week is definitely up there amongst the most dominant nights in Idol history for a contestant. "Simple Man" is also one of my favorite performances of the season. It was an extremely risky song choice that I was petrified he would butcher, but Trent worked it out. La'Porsha was also a strong contestant so no matter where that final two went the winner would be deserving, but I was rooting for Trent and I was glad he won.

On 8/31/2020 at 9:45 PM, *Chris said:

TRENT HARMON

 

Trent Harmon, the winner of the 15th season of Idol, is one of my all-time favourite male contestant - he's probably up there in term of winner, as well. Not only is he one of my all-time favourite male contestant, I also love his voice - there's something so special when a male contestant can be seen as a power vocalist which he was able to show via different performances. And I would consider some of his performances as some of my all-time performance such as "Simple Man", "Sharp Dressed Man", "Chandelier" and "Waiting Game" - the majority of his performance also round-up my favourite performances of the 15th season. 

Now why is he at #12 if he is one of my all-time favourite? I made a deal regarding 3 contestants which forced me to have him outside of my Top 10.

On 8/31/2020 at 12:44 AM, 1234567890 said:

 

I really do like Trent Harmon but La'Porsha Renae was cut so a low ranking he gets. When you have @Alex95 singing his praises and he usually hates on the white males? You know you have a problem and a threat. Trent Harmon was amazing on the original farewell season of American Idol Season 15. I wanted La'Porsha and Trent to be the final 2 which I got I just wanted the outcome to be reversed. Trent had many great performances during his run but I think my favorite of his is "Waiting Game" by Parson James. He really solidified his winner status after La'Porsha had really steamrolled the competition in the beginning and he just kicked it into high gear towards the latter part of the competition. He was a great winner but did he ever release an album? If he did I never heard of it or picked it up.

 

On 8/28/2020 at 1:44 PM, Solaris said:

In the scope of Season 15, I enjoyed Trent. He was my second favourite contestant after La'Porscha, but I was severely annoyed when yet again a woman couldn't win when they rightfully won the season. That said, I am not surprised to see Trent get this far, he's had some vocal supporters. I personally just don't want to see him win, when we have so many amazing people in this Top 24. He had a couple of performances I really enjoyed including Chandelier, Sharp Dressed Man and Simple Man.

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