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"The competition is getting fiercer by the week on American Idol, and we&amp;#039;re already down to the Top 9 contestants. This week, the finalists will be attempting to impress the judges with renditions of their personal favourite tracks. Who will stand out tonight and who will blend into the background? Join Digital Spy live from 8/7c to find out!   21:58And that&amp;#039;s it for tonight&amp;#039;s performances. Someone&amp;#039;s gotta go home tomorrow night, but who will it be? I can&amp;#039;t wait to find out! Join us Thursday night at 9/8c for your results! 21:57Harry knows it&amp;#039;s difficult to follow Caleb&amp;#039;s performance, but Jena managed to hold her own and do just as well. He loved the familiarity of her voice, the way she worked the stage and the audience and she has a lot to be proud of. Keith appreciates that she delivers every single performance. She looks and sounds great and she&amp;#039;s got her own thing that no one else is doing. Jennifer says that she sounds &amp;quot;phenomenal&amp;quot; and it&amp;#039;s comforting to hear her voice. The only thing she wanted was for her to be &amp;quot;more messy&amp;quot; - basically, not care about looking good at all, but that&amp;#039;s just a tiny nitpick.      21:55There&amp;#039;s one more performance tonight, and it&amp;#039;s from Jena Irene. Y&amp;#039;all know I love her - she&amp;#039;s one of my absolute favorites. She&amp;#039;s got an Evanesence track for us tonight - &amp;#039;Bring Me to Life&amp;#039;, to be specific. I love Jena&amp;#039;s life and - I know I&amp;#039;m sounding like a broken record here - she&amp;#039;s just got so much potential for growth. This song is a perfect choice for her. It has the perfect edge and she can easily hit the big notes required. It&amp;#039;s far from perfect and there are some missteps here and there, but I just love watching her and I always look forward to what she&amp;#039;s going to do every week, so I think that&amp;#039;s a pretty good sign. 21:47The judges give it a standing ovation, so I guess that means they like it. Jennifer saw something really sexy about his performance tonight, which took him to another level - he could be a frontman of a band now. She also wants to applaud Ricky Minor, who leads the Idol band. Harry wants to compliment him on a great performance - it&amp;#039;s an iconic song and such lofty goals for him to reach, but Harry doesn&amp;#039;t know how Caleb could have sung it any better. Keith thinks he&amp;#039;s such a good frontman, the band played better than they ever had - the mark of a good artist.      21:42Right, let&amp;#039;s see what Caleb Johnson has up his sleeve tonight, shall we? He&amp;#039;s performing &amp;#039;Dazed &amp;amp; Confused&amp;#039; by Led Zeppelin. Again, Caleb is someone whose record I would never buy but whose talent is undeniable. He knows exactly who he is as an artist and what he loves to do and he goes out there and gives it all he&amp;#039;s got. This performance is no different - he&amp;#039;s a rocker through and through and that voice is a KILLER. 21:34Keith applauds the &amp;quot;clever&amp;quot; choice as it allowed CJ to tap into his soulful side. However, he needs to be careful with confusing the sound of expressing and the feeling of doing the same. Jennifer never gets tired of hearing his voice, but at the middle he got &amp;quot;so off&amp;quot; - though he did manage to pull her back in at the end again. However, he really needs to work on consistency because half the time, she couldn&amp;#039;t tell if he was on the melody. Harry really wants him to work on his pitch because without it, he&amp;#039;s not going to grow as a performer. He can do it, though - he just needs to work hard on it!  21:30CJ Harris has got a nice little version of The SteelDrivers&amp;#039; &amp;#039;If It Hadn&amp;#039;t Been For Love&amp;#039;. It&amp;#039;s a great song, and the arrangement he&amp;#039;s chosen is very smart. It&amp;#039;s low-key, lets his voice shine, conveys emotion and really speaks to his overall aesthetic. CJ doesn&amp;#039;t do much for me personally, but he does have a lot of talent and I&amp;#039;m sure he&amp;#039;s got plenty of fans out there. He&amp;#039;s a bit all over the place at times and his vocals are kind of a mess, but it&amp;#039;s just because he gets so emotional, you can tell. 21:22Harry jokes that Jessica must get annoyed with the Stevie Nicks comparison, but he thinks this was his favourite performance she&amp;#039;s done because he finally started seeing a slightly different side of her that felt focused and meaningful. Keith thinks she looks great and comfortable on stage and encourages her to work on being as good without her guitar as she is with it. Jennifer is glad that her confidence is growing and that she&amp;#039;s connecting with the audience more. She&amp;#039;s got a beautiful voice, now she just needs to make sure that people feel something. People have to want to watch her as well as listen to her.      21:18We&amp;#039;ve got Jessica Meuse up next, and this week she&amp;#039;s performing Fleetwood Mac&amp;#039;s &amp;#039;Rhiannon&amp;#039; - such an amazing song (one of my favourites). In fact, I think this is my favourite performance of Jessica&amp;#039;s that I&amp;#039;ve seen since one back in Hollywood week. Her voice is perfectly suited to the song, it&amp;#039;s strong and clear, she&amp;#039;s got the mood down perfectly and comes across really likable. I&amp;#039;m into this, 100%. 21:11Jennifer agrees that this is the type of music he should be doing and he sounded &amp;quot;great&amp;quot; doing it. However, she wonders if he had anyone in mind that he was singing to because he lacks connection. Harry wonders if he came up with the arrangement himself and again urges him to be &amp;quot;self-assertive&amp;quot; the way he was tonight (he picked the arrangement himself) because he seemed comfortable. However, he didn&amp;#039;t feel any connection. Keith really likes the tone of his voice, but this song has some specific notes and Sam shouldn&amp;#039;t feel so obligated to enunciate every single one of them. He just needs confidence and to loosen up.  21:06What does Sam Woolf have in store for us this week? He&amp;#039;s doing &amp;#039;Hey There Delilah&amp;#039;, which only cements my dislike for this kid. Please tell me why he&amp;#039;s here! He&amp;#039;s not a good singer, he&amp;#039;s completely generic and the pre-teen crowd that goes nuts screaming for him makes no sense to me (but I know they&amp;#039;re the answer to my first question). This is an awful performance of an overplayed song and this kid needs to go home. 20:57Keith calls it &amp;quot;beautiful&amp;quot;, and indeed it was. He believes she chose a song that showed her voice and really hit the emotion in the right place to give everyone her personality. Jennifer appreciates the amount of control she&amp;#039;s able to show in performances like this, when other times she can be so wild and zany. &amp;quot;You&amp;#039;re so blessed! You&amp;#039;re 16 and you blow me away!&amp;quot; she adds. Harry gives her the award for most consistent improvement throughout the weeks. He praises her for listening to the judge&amp;#039;s feedback to grow every week - it&amp;#039;s really paying off.      20:56Malaya Watson is giving us a rendition of &amp;#039;The Long and Winding Road&amp;#039;, originally by the Beatles. It&amp;#039;s a tall order to be sure, but I really like what she does for it. Malaya has such a great tone and again, a ton of potential. She might make some missteps here and there, but she&amp;#039;s still really young, and all things considered, she&amp;#039;s really amazing. This performance in and of itself is really vulnerable but still really strong and seasoned. I love the quality of her voice - it&amp;#039;s strong in all the right places, and she seems more and more comfortable every week. 20:46Harry is displeased with the fact that Dexter picks anthemic tracks and then does them exactly as they&amp;#039;re recorded - he isn&amp;#039;t making them his own, not to mention it&amp;#039;s all so rhythmically driven that you can&amp;#039;t hear his voice at all. Keith finds it interesting that he could have made the song a hit had it not already been made one by Little Big Town, so that&amp;#039;s something he keeps in mind when he listens to Dexter perform. What he wants to see now is another side of him. Jennifer appreciates that he&amp;#039;s the resident country guy and everyone loves it. However, she agrees with the guys - he needs to make them take a second listen with something different.      20:42Dexter Roberts is performing next, and he&amp;#039;s got Little Big Town&amp;#039;s &amp;#039;Boondocks&amp;#039; - a country song, if you hadn&amp;#039;t gathered. Look - he&amp;#039;s not going anywhere anytime soon. People love country - even Keith is singing along and pleased as punch. So while he seems really average to me, Dexter has got it made, really. The song is okay, his voice is okay, it&amp;#039;s all okay... just nothing mind-blowing. 20:34Jennifer is pleased - it showed the Majesty that she loves and she seemed comfortable. Vocally, it was all over the place, but the performance itself was a total ten because she was in control of the entire stage. Harry calls her &amp;quot;so talented&amp;quot; and remembers her first audition. He&amp;#039;s been waiting for her to connect, and she&amp;#039;s so close to &amp;quot;breaking through&amp;quot; in this competition, but her diverse style means she doesn&amp;#039;t give the audience something to latch onto. He liked the performance, and thinks if she sticks in the competition, she&amp;#039;s going to own the stage. Keith loves the song choice because it shows off her range. His only advice is not to let the energy of the audience overtake her and make her performance out of control.  20:31We&amp;#039;ve got Majesty Rose up next, and she&amp;#039;s singing Florence + the Machine&amp;#039;s &amp;#039;Shake It Out&amp;#039;. What a fantastic song choice! I know Majesty has been a bit hit and miss over the weeks, but I really, REALLY like her and think she has so much personality and potential. It certainly takes a lot of courage to take on a Florence song, because her voice is so incomparable, but this arrangement is different enough to be suitable for her. Is it perfect? Definitely not, but I really like it and I really hope she&amp;#039;s in this competition for a long time. 20:21The audience seems to love him, that&amp;#039;s for sure. They&amp;#039;re screaming so loud!  Keith loves that he&amp;#039;s got his thing and has his own particular style, but he really wants him to give an edge somewhere because he&amp;#039;s coming off as very one-note. Alex&amp;#039;s thing isn&amp;#039;t really Keith&amp;#039;s style, but if the vocal delivery was a bit edgier, he&amp;#039;d be more into it. Jennifer knows it&amp;#039;s tough when a song is so identifiable with the singer - Gwen Stefani, in this case - and this soft version really &amp;quot;sucked the energy out of the song&amp;quot;. I agree! Harry knows it&amp;#039;s an exciting time for Alex in his life since he&amp;#039;s designing his career, and he thinks Alex can afford to play around musically. However, Harry wants to see him move around and do fewer center stage performances so the audience doesn&amp;#039;t get tired.  20:17First up tonight, we&amp;#039;ve got Alex Preston, who&amp;#039;s taking on No Doubt&amp;#039;s &amp;#039;Don&amp;#039;t Speak&amp;#039; - a definite &amp;#039;90s classic. He&amp;#039;s changing it up, as well - it&amp;#039;s got a very Jack Johnson vibe yet again, as we&amp;#039;ve come to expect from Alex. You have to admit that even if you don&amp;#039;t like him, he definitely knows what kind of artist he wants to be. It&amp;#039;s just a shame he&amp;#039;s taken the pain and edge out of this track and turned it into some crap to surf and drink Bud Light to. 20:09To kick off the music, we&amp;#039;ve got a live medley by the Top 9 of some rock songs, including &amp;#039;Clocks&amp;#039; by Coldplay, &amp;#039;Satisfaction&amp;#039; by the Rolling Stones and more. My eyes always glaze over during these group performance - it certainly doesn&amp;#039;t show any of them at their best. 20:06Before we can get started with the actual performances, first we have some bizarre product/band placement with Fall Out Boy. All the contestants got to meet the group, who will certainly not be taken seriously after all this (if they ever were?). Snark aside, their recent stuff is REALLY catchy, so I&amp;#039;m really just teasing.      20:04What does the night&amp;#039;s title mean, by the way? Just that the band will actually be on stage rather than in the background/not really visible. Whatever. 20:03They&amp;#039;re calling this week &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m with the Band&amp;quot;, if you wanna get more specific. But before we can get too specific, let&amp;#039;s check out what the judges (i.e. what Jennifer Lopez) is wearing, shall we? She looks good - strange cream-colored top with a proper white pencil skirt (won&amp;#039;t say what I accidentally typed &amp;quot;white&amp;quot; as at first). As for the guys, it&amp;#039;s the usual... 20:02Here we are, back again for another week of Idol. Tonight, the Top 9 will be doing their personal favourite songs, which seems so... slack. Doesn&amp;#039;t it seem like they&amp;#039;ve kinda just done away with any &amp;quot;themes&amp;quot; this year and are letting the contestants do whatever they feel like? I think that&amp;#039;s smart, mind - no one cares how well the singers can do Motown music because that&amp;#039;s not what their album would be like if they won, so keeping it contemporary is a good thing. Just find it interesting! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/american-idol/review/a560444/american-idol-top-9-performances-live-blog/>