Idol Top 7: Jumping The Shark

There have scarcely been more obvious truisms than this: I simply love Australian Idol.

I love it with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns.

I love it with the abandon of Jennifer Keyte wrestling playfully with a handsome bottle of Veuve Cliquot on a summer's afternoon.

I love it with the kind of obsessive commitment shown by Rebecca De Mornay and a breast pump circa 1992; or like Nicolas Cage about 3 years later when presented with Elisabeth Shue's nipples and a whole lot of bourbon.


"If you lick this off my chest I could get an Oscar nomination"

But that love is now irreversibly in decline. Tonight we bore witness to incontrovertible proof that the show has jumped the shark.

'Jumping the shark' is a term which derives from an episode of Happy Days where the Fonz literally waterskis over a shark, a plot point deemed so preposterous that it signaled the decline of the show. In the intervening years the term has inveigled itself into pop culture to designate the moment where a once popular and successful show is identifiably past its peak.

The above photo is actually a fitting selection for this post's message: it shows Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue in their Oscar nominated roles for Mike Figgis' Leaving Las Vegas, a career apex for both (Cage even won that year). They've been rubbish ever since.

And so it is for the once-good Australian Idol. The bourbon and bare breast heyday of Guy, Cosima, Paulini, Anthony, Chanel, Casey, Ricki-Lee, Damien and Jessica is already a vestige of yesteryear, replaced by the B-movie mediocrity and misplaced ego of this year's batch.

Now don't get me wrong: no-one is particularly terrible, but then neither is anyone particularly good.

Let's turn to the history books for a bit of a comparison.

The corresponding week in years' past delivered to us the following unforgettable and justly lauded performances.

"When Doves Cry" by Guy Sebastian (No. 8 in S2BC's All-Time Greatest List)
"Freeway of Love" by Paulini (No. 12)
"The Prayer" by Anthony Callea (No. 4)
"I Have Nothing" by Ricki-Lee Coulter
"Special Ones" by Casey Donovan
"River Deep, Mountain High" by Emily Williams
"Constant Craving" by Chanel Cole (No. 15)
"Wicked Game" by Damien Leith (No. 10)

The Series 5 competitors tonight served us up a mess of such vulgar ordinariness that I half expected plaintive bugles to be playing over the credits. It's hard to imagine they're part of the same show that produced the above roll call of fondly remembered alumni, half of whom are now Young Divas by either profession or demeanour.

As for rankings? Despite the presence of Carl and Marty, it's actually difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff: everyone was resoundingly off the mark. If I had to, I'd probably do it this way:

7. Marty Simpson, "Now We're Getting Somewhere" (by Crowded House)
6. Carl Risely, "Turn Your Love Around" (by George Benson)
5. Jennifer Connolly, "Another Day In Paradise" (by Phil Collins)
4. Natalie Mouskouri Gauci, "Endless Love" (by Diana Ross & Lionel Ritchie)
3. Daniel Mifsud, "Billie Jean" (by Michael Jackson)
2. Ben McKenzie, "Higher Ground" (The Chilli Peppers' version of Stevie Wonder)
1. Parasite Williams Vushe, "I Knew You Were Waiting" (by Aretha Franklin & George Michael)

But with qualifying statements that Tarisai wouldn't even get past Day 2 of the American Idol auditions on the basis of last night and that, if you closed your eyes, Marty and Carl actually weren't horrible. In short: a hodge podge.

There are, however, a couple of important individual observations to make.



Jennifer Connolly, continuing his march toward becoming the most overrated but nonetheless runaway victor in the show's history, chose a song that was actually released the year before he was born, performed it with the emotion of a toothbrush and then, on being criticised for the first time by the judging panel, declared that "1990 wasn't a very good year for music".

WTF?

1990 gave us The Pixies' excellent Bossanova album, Wilson Phillips' peerless "Hold On", Roxette's "It Must Have Been Love", Aerosmith's "Janie's Got A Gun", "Tom's Diner" by Suzanne Vega, Belinda Carlisle's "Summer Rain", Madonna's "Vogue", Kylie's "Better The Devil You Know" and Depeche Mode's brilliant Violator album. Sure - Jennifer wouldn't touch any of these songs with a barge pole (unless he could slow them down mournfully and turn them into clever laments) - but for him to make a statement like that in defence of his choice to sing a terrible Phil Collins song in boring fashion when that song wasn't even from the relevant year is simply frustrating.

Meanwhile, Natalie continues to yearn for the heyday of her youth on the arm of Sonny Bono.



And Tarisai made another pitstop on her tour of homages to crazy-haired sister-girlfriends. This week: Janet circa Velvet Rope, and Kelis circa hating someone.



And that's pretty much as interesting as the contestants got last night.

In such times of woe, thank goodness for Marcia Hines.



Methinks there was a little extra sumtin' sumtin' packed into Marcia's pick-me-up powder this week, based on her mesmerisingly quotable output.

Dressed like a jaffa in Buddhist curtains, she stormed out of the gate with this, to Ben:

"You were born the year you sang that song!"

This pearler came in a fit of uncommon fury from Marcia, who was riled up over ongoing criticism being levelled at Ben by Mark and Dicko. She slammed down her fist, said "shit" and uttered this at the peak of her anger, but it's the most sense she's made in a while.

Then, to Marty:

"Sitting on the stool gives you nice and solid."

It's possible she meant to say "shitting a solid gives you a nice stool" - it's such a tongue-twister.

To Daniel:

"That happens to be one of my favourite songs, and I was lucky enough to see Michael Jackson perform it live back when he was Michael Jackson."

And finally, to Jennifer Connolly, whose vibrato had just been dissed by Mark and Dicko:

"Tons of people have built amazing career around their vibrato, people like Deni Hines..."



[INSERT SEVERAL MINUTES OF LAUGHTER]

Oh Marcia. No matter that Deni is actually an excellent example of the point you were trying to illustrate - Deni's version of "Ain't No Sunshine" is probably the definitive version globally thanks to her distinctive vibrato - but name-dropping your own daughter in the same breath as the words "amazing career"... well, there's just no accounting for a mother's love.

So who will be leaving us? After a night of collective averageness, it's anyone's guess. For mine, I think it's Marty's time after a week's reprieve, but the girls could just as easily be in danger too.

The show itself, I fear, has already left the building.