Tonight the Top 12 contestants on American Idol stepped to the stage and unleashed another batch of spirited, top notch performances that once again wooed the warm and fuzzy, kitty-cat judges’ panel as well as the live studio audience and folks watching from home (like me). (You can’t argue the “kitty cat” comparison when the biggest, baddest set of claws of the bunch belong to Randy Jackson.)
Tonight’s theme had the artists performing songs from the year in which they were born, which meant an ’80s and early ’90s music revival with songs ranging from Elton John’ “I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues” to Tina Turner’s “What’s Love Got To Do With It” and… Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit?”
On Idol I usually find myself pulling for the quirky folks that bring a little more to the table than a big voice and lots of octaves (although this season my eggs are all in Pia Toscano‘s basket!) and that description couldn’t fit Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis offspring Casey Adams any better. But, Casey’s brand of quirky just isn’t the right fit for some songs, and Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is definitely one of those songs!
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not an “awesome music snob” who doesn’t think anyone can cover the late, great Kurt Cobain, I just think part of why he was so great is that the sincere passion and grit that comes through in his singing means 99% of anybody trying to sound like him will come across a bit hokey. Casey Abram’s performance of the song tonight was a bit hokey, to say the least.
Here’s the video clip the performance starts right around the 2:13 mark:
Just in case that one disappears here’s another, much lower quality version – the performance begins at the 1:53 mark on this one:
I’m all about rewarding singers for taking risks and all that mumbo jumbo (notice that the judges continually flip-flop from singer to singer as far as whether or not “taking risks” is a good idea or not) but sometimes it just doesn’t work and the end result can wind up excruciatingly bad. I like Casey Abrams and I hope he’s able to survive this round because he does like to take risks and he injects a much-needed surprise element to the show’s performances from week to week, but in all honesty he deserves to go home for having placed that performance of that song in my brain as well as millions of other innocent brains all over the globe.
I don’t envy the ghost that has to tell Kurt Cobain about this.
