As usual, this was the week where I started feleing American Idol fatigue.

By the time we get to Top Six (or Top Six + Matt Giraud), we’ve pretty much seen all the pony tricks, and the show becomes an inevitable march to the finals.

Once again, for instance, Lil Rounds demonstrated that she doesn’t have a “real self.” She’s just not enough of an artist or a singer to place something memorable on a song.

The judges refuse to admit that, of course. After Lil wobbled through “I’m Every Woman,” Kara said she’d been hoping Lil would tackle an artist like Chaka Khan all season, but that when she did, it lacked Lil’s “personal flair” or whatever. Um… guys? Could it be that Lil has no personal flair? She’s got a great personality and a fair-to-middlin’ voice, and she was able to joke her way through a Mary J. Blige song a few weeks ago, but that’s not the same as having interpretive skill. I hate admitting it, but the hoary “karaoke” label totally applies.

We also got more of the same from Matt Giraud and Anoop Desai, meaning they were a little bit good and a little bit annoying.

And  Danny Gokey. Oh,  Danny Gokey! Roommate Joe nailed it when he said this kid gives the same performance every time he sings a fast song. The overly-mapped-out running and jumping. The blank facial expression. The acceptably sung notes. The blatant desire to make us like him. It’s always there.

My boyf Andrew suggests Danny may be relying on the same drunk-uncle-at-the-party tricks because he realizes he’s not the favorite anymore, so he’s trying to recapture the magic from the beginning of the season.

Meanwhile, even the good performances were good in the way I expected. I mean, I really enjoyed listening to Adam Lambert‘s “If I Can’t Have You,” and I dug both Kris Allen and Allison Iraheta‘s reinterpretations of Donna Summer. But their excellence wasn’t surprising, you know? The drama is gone.

In my heart, I’m reaching for the Hurry-Up Machine, so I can get to the part where Adam, Kris, and Allison release their albums already. Unless Adam literally turns into Donna Summer next week, I don’t imagine anything else will surprise me this season.

Hey everyone — You can me catch me in a live webcast on CNN.com (online, not on TV), starting at 12:10 PM today.

I’ll be on for about twenty minutes, discussing environmentalism in the current economy. The topic is a nod to Earth Day.

Does that topic have anything to do with pop culture? No. But hey… go with what they give you, right?

I’m not entirely sure how to find the webcast once you get to CNN.com, but if you miss it, I’ll definitely be providing a link to the Video On-Demand as soon as it’s available.

By the way… I got a webcam for this thing, since I’ll be transmitting live from my apartment. If you’re wondering what my living room looks like, today is your lucky day!

Good news, fellow theater majors: Yesterday’s U. N. conference  on racism was a wonderful example of how our academic work applies to daily life.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s grandstanding in Geneva, and the immediate protests it caused, can be observed through many lenses—ethnic, political, cultural, historical —but they also can be understood as acts of theater.

Take a look at this video. After the jump, I’ll explain why I see it as a piece of drama:

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Hey guys! Here’s the link to my appearance on yesterday’s broadcast of CBC Sunday. As promised, I’m discussing Susan Boyle while wearing a nice blue button-down.

I’m working on embedding the video here, but for now, at least you can watch online. Woo-hoo!

For a variety of reasons, I’ve spent the last week thinking about obscure songs from the 80s and 90s—more than usual,  I mean—and I’ve been reminded of some tunes that didn’t get nearly enough attention when they were released.

After the jump, I’m going to anoint two singles that should have been more popular. After you read my selections, tell me which hits you think deserved to be bigger.

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Welcome to the Ultimate 90s Music Quiz, Part II!

That’s right: I absolutely loved writing last week’s quiz—pop music geekery is my thing—and it seemed that many of you enjoyed it as much as me, so I’ve decided to create a sequel.

Enormous thanks to Roommate Joe, who generated a large portion of these questions. Way to do it, RJ!

The rules are the same as last week. You’ll see lyrics from 105 lines from 105 songs of the 90s, and you’ll need to provide the artist and title. Since Joe and I didn’t use references to look up these lyrics—we mostly just sat around the living room hollering, “Hey! Remember this one?”—we challenge you to do the same.

If you’re stumped, you can find all the answers here. 

Also, with just a few exceptions, none of the artists on this week’s quiz were on last week’s quiz. Who knew the decade produced so much bounty? (The artists we repeated were such massive 90s stars that we felt they deserved more love.)

Have fun everyone!

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I have a theory on why Susan Boyle has become such an instant and inescapable internet star.

But first, let me clarify the scope of her fame: Last night, my dad sent me an e-mail about her audition on Britain’s Got Talent.  My dad, y’all. He’s a sixty year-old retiree who mostly uses the internet to play online chess and download classic rock. If he’s hearing about a YouTube sensation mere days after it hits the web, then it must really be something.

In case you haven’t seen it, here’s the celebrated clip, which shows Boyle, a forty-seven year-old spinster, blowing away a roomful of skeptics with her rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Miserables.

“I Dreamed a Dream,” by the way, is currently one of the top 50 best sellers on iTunes, meaning a scene from a show we can’t even watch in this country has prompted the kind of sales that are usually reserved for nationally broadcast hits like American Idol. That’s another barometer of this woman’s impact.

After the jump, I’ll explore two reasons she means so much to us.

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Here are four things I’ve been digging this week from blogs-o-friends. Enjoy!

• Ramblings of a TV Whore has created a cool project: Using their online kit, you can build your own soundtrack to the TV series Chuck. I’m hoping they do one for Lost!

• Over at SlingBlog, my friend Tara Ariano points out a hysterical ode to nasty/insane comments that people leave on websites. (I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that The Critical Condition has steered clear of this sort of thing. You guys rule!)

• While you’re at it, please enjoy Tara’s series of things she secretly thinks at the gym. They all make me laugh… even the ones I can’t experience, since I don’t use the women’s locker room. I’d like to add that I always, always think secret evil thoughts about people who use treadmills for more than thirty minutes when other people are waiting. And if those people are just strolling on the treadmill instead of running? They get double curses from me. Why not just walk around the perimeter of the damn gym and let someone else actually go for a run? And don’t even tell me it’s because the machine measures your heart rate for you, because your heart is not going that fast at 2.2, okay?

• Via The Wicked Stage, I found this very interesting essay by Douglas McLennan. He suggests that arts organizations should start hiring critics-in-residence. I absolutely agree, and unlike some commenters at the original site, I don’t think a dramaturg serves the same function (have worked in both roles.) 

There are three songs I can’t stop jamming to right now, so I want to share them with you. Two are by indie and/or southern rockers who deserve to be better known. The third is by a pop star and his guest rapper, and it’s constant bubblegum presence in my life belies my interest in avant garde theater. But there it is.

After the jump, won’t you join me for three quick bursts of delicious musical flavor?

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I saw Hannah Montana: The Movie last Friday, and though it delighted the little girl behind me to the point of rapturous applause, it left me feeling paranoid and itchy. I just kept noticing all sorts of fucked up messages that no child should ever hear, you know?

My study of Hannah’s dark underbelly just got posted on NPR’s blog. Let me know your thoughts!