Stepping out of their comfort zones, James Durbin and Pia Toscano took bigger risks than they would even know on Wednesday’s “American Idol.”
Already taking the chance of moving away from what made them popular on “Idol”–wild, energetic rock in the case of Durbin and pure powerhouse balladry in the case of Toscano–they also faced another layer of difficulty; nearly every member of the top nine was strong Wednesday. That made the risks more serious; viewers would not only have to accept the new sides of the two contestants but believe they did tremendous work with their song choices.
Although Durbin had technically performed a slower song in a previous competition week–Paul McCartney’s “Maybe I’m Amazed”–his “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” was the first instance of his not relying on his stage presence and higher, power notes to sell the song. Save for the final note, Durbin was restrained on the song, a particularly-surprising move given the fact that “Rock and Roll Hall of Fame” week seemed to lend itself to the piano climbing, wrestling-loving rock star Durbin has portrayed for most of the competition.
America’s reaction should be interesting. Reviews of the vocal were fairly strong, but “Idol” voters have not always been receptive to these sorts of “risks” from contestants. The biggest example comes from season five–Chris Daughtry, that year’s “rocker,” made a surprise trip to the bottom two after a fairly-well-liked but rather-soft rendition of “What a Wonderful World.”
As for Toscano, a case can definitely be made that she is getting more credit for the risk than was deserved. The vocals for her performance were tremendous–easily the best of the night–but she seemed to also score points for the risk, even though she was really just being Pia on an un-Pia song. As alluded to by Jennifer Lopez and Randy Jackson (but in a far kinder way), the lack of movement and energy that have been Pia’s only real weakness in the competition were not resolved this week. It is for similar reasons why her “Where Do Broken Hearts Go” seems to be forgotten when people criticize her for only doing ballads.
Still, what America will remember is that James greatly toned his act down, while Pia greatly turned her volume up. How will that affect votes? The results are revealed Thursday night. Headline Planet’s full breakdown and review will be available Thursday morning.
