Alas, poor Michael.

Expecting Lil to good with Motown wasn't because she was black. For me it was just based on her voice. I expected her to take Heatwave and run all the way downfield with it.

Thanks for the comments, Carl! I have spent a lot of time on stages, I've probably logged as many stage hours as Laurence Olivier in my life. But I was rarely involved with any theatrics that were musical. I did, however, stage a big band World War II era show with an 18 piece orchestra and six singers. It was done like a radio broadcast of a USO show and all of the music was drawn from the war era. That was a lot of fun. It drew about 500 people and the dance floor was packed for the whole night.

Remember the guy that used to be on Merv Griffin every week in the 80's with a weekly paper called The Friday Morning Quarterback? He tracked and predicted hit records as a type of consulting service for radio stations. During that period I could have done the same thing that fellow did. I could listen to an album once, pick the singles, and generally even pick the order that they would be released as singles. I think my personal best was calling an album that had six singles on it. I seem to recall that it was an Elton John album. While it was no great feat at that time to predict that Elton would have a bunch of hits on an album it was kind of fun to pick which they would be and their order of release.

Meanwhile, I think the problem of how to handle the group numbers with Scott has been answered. The group number was pre-recorded and cut into the broadcast tonight. Has the group number always been pre-recorded?

Ruben was okay, but that's all. His single was no great shakes. So far I think the best original song done by a returning Idol was been Brooke about a month ago. I really liked the single she sang. I thought it had everything it needed to be a hit.

I was a bit disappointed with Smokey. I would have rather heard him perform one of his classics solo. Yes, Tears of a Clown would have been much better than what he did.

Alas, Michael. But, again, I think this is a strong group vocally and if I were a record exec in Nashville I'd be on the phone with him tonight. Is that because he is stellar? No. But he's a good singer and has had an incredible platform for national recognition. He'd sell some records.

I do think that Danny and Matt are appealing to the same segment of the audience and that's why Matt was in the bottom three. The votes are being split in Danny's favor. It's the same kind of logic that led me to believe that even after a lackluster performance Megan would be safe tonight.

Oops---got a bit long winded with this post!