Well. I think it's official. Men are more interesting and better at things than women. Sorry JezeFriskyXX.com. It's just how things played out in the ol' game of evolution. I'm basing this on scientific Idol Evidence, mind you. Truly credible.

Last night the final eight dudes crooned for their life and, I gotta say, they did well. They did better, and were more interesting, than the ladies. It had a lot to do with song selection, but it also had to do with the fact that the Girls side of the competition is four versions of the same white lady singing and then Paige Miles wandering around and bumping into walls. Whereas the Boys team is five versions of the same white lady. VARIATIONS. If it worked for Diabelli, it should work for Idol.

But here's the real reason the girls officially lost last night. Kara DioGordy cried. Yes, she wept like a nincompoop after Big Mike sang his stirring Kate Bush number and it was the most ridiculous and awful thing any of us have ever seen. I was watching the show last night with an old fellow who liberated the camps during the war. He shook his head at Kara of the Gourds crying there and said "Worst damn thing I ever seen." Lynne Curtin's husband stopped staring at his wife in mild terror for a moment to watch Idol last night and when Kara started crying he thought This is the ugliest thing I've ever seen. It was very, very bad. Not that Big Mike's performance wasn't good. It totally was. But Kara. Kara. This is American freaking Idol, not the end of Gallipoli. You don't cry. The singers can cry if they want I suppose. But the judges?? That is only allowed if you are Paula Abdul. And Kara, I served with Paula Abdul, I knew Paula Abdul, Paula Abdul was a friend of mine. Kara, you're no Paula Abdul. So can it with the waterworks please.

Also, Ellen? If you like Tim so much why don't you just marry him? Did you see when she ran out and hugged Tim Urban after his emotions-lite performance? I don't understand what she's doing on this show. Is it some sort of weird, inscrutable sexual politics performance art? I really hope that's what it is.

So that's why the girls lost last night.

Here's Why the Boys Won
 As mentioned above, Big Mike did a nice job. He sang Kate Bush's "A Woman's Work," though I suppose he was really taking his inspiration from Maxwell's version, if Randy Jackson is to be believed. And, actually, he's not, so Big Mike was doing a Kate Bush homage last night. Normally I've found him to be super boring, and he still sort of is — his voice and carriage in performances are rather bland, potato buds from a box rather than mom's homemade heartattack mashed. But he just picked such a great song. Have we ever heard that on Idol before? I really don't think we have. Which makes it an automatic win, as long as it's pulled off with some level of competency. So yes, it was good. Not worth blubbering and stopping the show completely and standing up and clapping robotically while mascara streams artfully down your face, but good. I don't think Big Mike is destined to win the big dance, but this ought to guarantee him safe passage for a least a few more rounds.

Carol Brady with the Carol Brady hair did well again. I don't know. I think I kind of like him. He just sort of has this weird, interesting tone to his voice. He sounds not unlike Jennifer Coolidge's character in A Mighty Wind. But he's always clear and clean and crisp and seems to actually know his limits, which is something of a compliment for this particular season of Idol, for this miserable overreaching theatre troupe. Well done, Carol. I wonder if he misses his son, Johnny Bravo nee Greg. I'm sure he does.

Why the Rest of Us Are Crying
 Oh my beloved Egghead Latino. Where did he go? There used to be a guy named Andrew Garcia who was interesting and had big Carol Channing glasses and sang fun, moody reworked covers of pop songs. I don't know where that dude went. He hopped a plane to Biarritz. He rode a bicycle over a hill one day and no one ever saw him again. He disappeared into the abstract. Now we've got something else, a snatched body, an avatar. Last night there was a dark-ish cover of "Genie in a Bottle," but it just didn't feel right, it didn't work. Plus, there's an element of the grotesque in singing about getting rubbed the right way on American Idol. It's just unpleasant. I'm sorry, Mr. Garcia. Might he go home tonight?

Casey Potato Head Johnson is in danger too. I can't even remember what he sang. It was something, y'know, strummy and croony and all that other stuff that he does, or tries to do. But he's such a blur, so insubstantial in one's memory. He's like trying to remember what you did in high school. Not things that happened in high school, but what you did. How did classes work, day in, day out? What did you do on the weekends? I don't know about you, but I can't remember that stuff for the life of me. When I was seventeen, what did I do on a Saturday afternoon? What did Casey Johnson sing last night? I don't know. But I'm sure both involved watching TV.

Dweezil Zappa or whatever that reheated David Cook (recooked?) guy's name is can't really sing all that well, can he? I mean for the world he can, but for the music industry, I don't know. He kind of overthrows it every night, doesn't he? He's going for stadium roar and it just comes out like a reasonably talented kid in a garage band and they've got the door open because it's spring and getting warm and then a cute girl from school walks by so he tries to sound extra Into It and Emotive. But I'm just not sure America is going to want to make out with you at Mike Fenster's party next Friday after hearing that, Dweezil. I'm just not sure that's how it's going to play out.

The teenaged boy who sang "I'm Already There" just makes me sad — a kind of soft, sprawling sad — so I don't really want to say anything about him. He's got miles to go before he's himself, I'll just say.

Urban Renewal
 Well, well, well. They liked it, they really liked it. After last week's slight uptick, Tim Urban studied his recent Idol history and busted out the "Hallelujah," Jeff Buckley edition, which served Jason Castro so well during semis two years ago. This has gone from a song that makes pond-eyed 19-year-olds who smoke too much feel deep and weary to a song that makes the souls of pimply explode-o-teens do mournful jigs. Yes being Sad is sort of in these days, like it was almost twenty years ago for a different generation I suppose, and Jason Castro sang "Hallelujah" and then Justin Timberlake sang it (very well) with another dude on the Hope for Haiti telethon thing, so it's just very Now. So it was a clever choice on Timmy Kapowski's part. How'd he sing that shit? Oh, well enough. It was near flat as Nebraska, not dynamic at all, but it'll do, it'll do. One thing that was funny and annoyed me was at the very end (you can see it above) he was like "Hahhh layyy looooooo..." and then took this breathy pause and went "Yahhhhhhhhh." Which, like, a full separated "Yuh" is not a terribly pretty way to end a pretty song. If you go listen to professionals sing the tune, they smooth out that ending, shade it. It was sort of another little cutesy telling sign that wee Timothy Bertinelli has no idea what he's doing.

So who will go home tonight? Of the ladies I suspect it will be Lacey and Paige. Or maybe Katie instead of Lacey. Of the fellows? Well, I didn't even mention Todrick Hall, so probably him. He sang something that Simon declared "Broadway." Great, Simon. You watch this kid drag himself OUT of the musical theater and you keep him on the show this far and this long only to tell him, "Hey, why aren't you in the theater?" Blergh. Other than Todrick... I dunno, dawg. Maybe the sad, Texas-evening teenager.

Sigh. That poor kid. He makes me feel a little like this: