For those of you who wonder just what gets a person motivated into this kind of gig – and on the evidence there are a whole lot of you, some of whom at least haven’t already chalked it up to lobotomy or sociopathy:

It’s all Burton Cummings’ fault.

Really. Were it not for Shoemom’s chance purchase of The Best of the Guess Who, one day back when I was just a little sneaker, I might to this day be puttering along believing that all music was MOR, and all rock bands were to be taken seriously. Of course, somewhere along the line I had learned all the lyrics to Please Mr. Custer, but we didn’t talk about that much.
Instead there was Dream of a Child, complete with Rosincrucians…and my mind was expanded about as far as a plump bespectacled suburban white kid (who had been way too impressed by that Very Special Episode of Different Strokes containing Nancy Reagan) was ever gonna get. .
Let others ride the cutting-edge; by the time the heroine of Undun had "crossed the sun" (OK, plus the purchase of The Fifty Worst Films of All Time) yours truly understood that the real riches of pop-culture lay along the earnestly populist path. Only by sincerely embracing the concept of alligator lizards floating in the air are we truly able to appreciate Art. Plus, of course, we can make a real hit at parties, especially when we reveal our theories about the Deeper Meaning of the soggy cake in McArthur Park. At least we think that’s what all that screaming is about…

….anyway, so here I am nearly a quarter-century later, and I'm recapping the Guess Who on Idol. Goofily earnest Canuck rockers, meet goofily gilded Canuck wannabes; for once, I can forgive all of you for not being in on the joke. Except of course that if any of you little twerpazoids even think about mangling Sour Suite I will drop the whole recap and become totally obsessed with finding a way to pipe In the Year 2525 non-stop into every single freaking mansion corridor, you follow?

We open on Benedict in what I'm pretty sure is what he actually wears to Rush concerts - jeans, tee, if-the-Gap-dressed-the-military surplus bomber jacket, and one strand of hair carefully lacquered out of place over his forehead. Ben's another one doesn't have to work any too hard at fitting in, this night. I bet he still gets all teary-eyed every time Wildfire gets lost in the killin' frost.

"We're entering a whole new phase of the competition!" No wait, let me guess: they sing, we vote? Whoa, trippy, brother. "Every vote counts - just ask the Josh Palmer fans!" Yeah, if you can find them. Call me a raging optimist, Benedict, but I'm pretty sure Melissa's fanbase for instance won't have to resort to power-dialling ten separate phones plus one with their noses. I'm sure Josh appreciates the attempt anyway, though.

Anyway. Time to meet the people who were relevant right around the same time as this theme, which is why their ego trips are as entertaining as they are now, which is overall not much I admit but still:

Jake in his best black "no-boys-you-can't-count-the-incense-as-a-business-expense" suit, what's special about the Guess Who? Jake's big contribution is "They've got the best...Canadian...no, the best songs ever written". Apparently he's forgotten that a pretty good chunk of his audience has already heard Bachman's contributions to both Idol CDs plus Clap for the Wolfman. Or maybe he's still just that miffed at Downie.

Farley in what looks very much like the pillowcases from that sheet set a few weeks ago, given last week's Bottom Three should any competitor ever assume they're safe? Ah, I see, they finally had to steal his clothes so he'd quit replying "Yeah, sure, assuming they want to move to New Brunswick and get a perm." I mean, even Farley has his limits. Plus, as will later become evident, he has clients in the audience Sass in the Ruffles of Penance again, pep talk for the competitors? "Take a deep breath, relax! You wanted to sing in front of people...well, congratulations!" Yeah, stop whining, you cry-babies! One little unforeseen massive public humiliation and you're all into the self-doubt.

Zack in a bomber jacket that looks a little more authentically surplus than Benedict's, you're from the 'Peg, so are the Guess Who, so...Whereupon Zack "spontaneously" gets up and starts whaling away on an electric guitar. I think this is supposed to indicate that Winnipeg is in fact one truly rockin' town, but the more immediate impression I'm getting is well, hey, whatever keeps them warm.

OK, back to the actual contestants and stuff. This week: The ESL writers go have a beer instead of cramming for their exams, and wake up in a total panic. Then it kicks in that they write for Idol, after all, and so they contentedly roll over and go back to sleep until ten minutes before showtime: Casey is "the small-town girl with big-time dreams". Oh, so you're saying she's a character in a LaVyrle Spencer novel? That'd explain a lot, actually. Including the peasant skirt belted with some sort of big-huge-circly-metal-y thingee, which I'm almost certain I actually read the description of in the one about the wannabe country singer.

Suzi - never mind, you know what she looks like by now - is the "queen of out-of-control rock'n'roll"...Uh-huh. Apparently Benedict finally worked up the courage to invite her clubbing or something, because not happening on the onstage evidence thus far.

Time to meet that "high-voltage powerhouse of musical machinery"...Rex! Oh, sorry, Aaron. In a golf-clubbish shirt and sport jacket. No, I have no idea either. Maybe they had a short after the floods last week and he volunteered to act as an insulator?

Ah, here's our "Rowdie Rex Goudie" - and yes, I'm sure that's how Ben's mentally spelling it - "the good ol' boy who puts the Rock in rock'n'roll"! Yep, it's the cliché that just keeps on giving, folks! Although going by Rex's current getup - untucked maroon dress shirt over baggy Wranglers and under the ubiquitous metalhead hair - there's no overt evidence here that his favourite hangout isn't the Scarborough Bluffs.

Melissa is the "musical athlete who's playing for keeps". Mm. By now I'm absolutely picturing her CI CD being displayed proudly on the shelf with her soccer trophies. Seriously, the girl came this close to pulling off real soul on Stevie night, isn't there one more interesting trait we could focus on here? .
...Uh, I take that back. The brain is just refusing to process those flood denims on this savvy a teen – not to mention the fugly dirt-coloured jacket over Grandma’s-lace-curtain camisole - and would have no problem reverting back to the camp-counsellor culottes for the rest of the series, if that’s OK with the readership? Great.

“Our CD came out today!” Just like American Juniors! Squee! OK, I would be a lot more sympathetic to the all the girlish starry-eyedness going on here if it wasn’t playing out against a stark mental backdrop of Like You Deserve It More Than Theresa Did, You Little Twits. Um, not that I’m, like, massively bitter or anything. I only imagined Jacob mocking them for ten minutes straight or so. Really. .
Rex, this CD showcases the songs that made you "famous", back in the Top 32. Must feel like a long time ago, huh? Rex shrugs. “Seems like a long time…but now it’s close! Heh.” Right. I think somewhere in Rexy’s mind "famous" is still vaguely associated with "appearance on Sesame Street". .
Anyway, turning to Aaron - with a mild air of desperation - you obviously feed off the crowd energy, big guy, the studio must’ve been a shock…Nahhh, Aaron just lurves singing. Also, in the studio? There are donuts. .
Suzi, what does The Band think of your recording without them? Oh, they’re totally supportive! They’ll be out there buying it no question! Sure, why not. While they’re at the mall, they can pick up their "My Lead Singer Made Top 5 on Canadian Idol and All I Got Was This Lousy Autographed CD" tee-shirts. Then they can meet up with the abandoned Hedley members and all chuck beer bottles at the HMV receiving entrance together.

But first, let's all give a big Idol welcome to "legendary rocker Tommy Lee!"...and of course his tattoos, as he yawns, stretches and heads out amiably to proffer words of wisdom, or whatever it is those %$#^% PR $%@#ers want now. Not to keep on, but I do need to point out that last year, this identical imagery was the subject of a Jon Dore skit. And I think Benedict realises it, because he's VOing with the same semi-apologetic dubiousness he usually reserves for ditto.
Anyway, "Tommy Lee has seen it all", most of it from the same pop-culture strata as our little Idol hopefuls will shortly be occupying, and so could actually probably give them more practical advice than usual. That is, if he remembered any of it beyond something vague about following his heart rather than his gut. Which I always thought were roughly the same concepts, but then I was never married to Pamela Anderson.

Intro bio. In which a really authentically surplus-bomber-jacketed Bachman and Cummings do an oh-so-Canadian "garage band makes good" shtick. What makes it that Canadian is when Burton says things like "It's so amazing that we were from, like, Winnipeg...what does it mean to LA or Chicago?" you actually feel kinda bad about thinking "Not much, as it turned out..." Because, in the States? They're straight outta Novelty Act City. .
Benedict explains that their singles have however been spun over a million times on the radio - I should know, because I've heard pretty much every single airing, and it's These Eyes. Seriously. I think LiteFM deejays in Southern Ontario at least may be a trifle more bitter over CanCon regulations than is popularly supposed.

Again with the band this night, or at least A Pianist, A Guitarist and an ill-assorted Trio of Backup Singers. Which is odd, because about the only time the GW were into intricate harmonies was when they were clapping for the Wolfman. This is apparently TPTB's way of subtly hinting that we ain't actually in Winnipeg anymore, Toto. Not even Zack's suburb.

Vid-bios, complete with Piano of Inspiration. Interesting in that since apparently Bachman's self-respect decided to kick in at the oddest possible moment (and Tommy Lee was still sleeping it off) in order to fill the time we get a clear several seconds apiece of the Idols working acapella.

Well, it'll get interesting after Rex's clip, anyway. "Canadian music is the best", he asserts confidently. Mm-hmm. After having chosen a Police song one week and a Seger song the next, combined with the aforementioned outfittage, one begins to suspect Rex of merely working overtime to placate the mainland fanbase. He's even lost the hat and traded in his regular accent for something that's a trifle more intelligible. Unfortunately, now it sounds like he's being slowly strangled.

Anyhow, performance. Of No Sugar Tonight/Mother Nature. Sort of. After reading the forums I had been happily anticipating a real wow, but this...this is...not bad, exactly. Just really, really generic, which under the song-selection circs is infinitely worse. Forget the Bluffs, Mike Myers would totally be inspired by this kid doing this act in his parents' basement. .
Seriously...when you're a teenage rockerdude performing a song that's pure, unadorned rock, stripped down to the raw, bare essentials of want and need, and midway through you're feeling the need to run into the audience to recharge...there's a problem. And I think it's basically called "taking all the wrong lessons from last week", because for once the vocal is perfectly competent. If he'd decided to tackle, say, I Will Sing a Rhapsody, I'm not at all certain I wouldn't be lauding the attempt. As it stands, I'm just wondering if there are enough weeks left in the competition for him to work on one performance aspect at a time.

Jake: Good energy...but meh, not as good musically as it could have been. Oh, now, that's rich. Am I correct in assuming that every contact you ever made in the entire industry, including drummers you met briefly at a launch party twenty years ago, have been calling you up to berate you for last week, Gold?

Sass: Squeee! Rexy! Amazingly good - can you tell that amazing's, like, my favourite word? - You keep surprising me! No idea you were that good looking! I now have a pretty good idea why she's been so enthusiastically showing off the cleavage lately. All this little scenario requires is a pen, if you get my drift. Meanwhile, Rex is just grinning away amiably through his entire Deliverance audition. Um, kid, those coke-bottle glasses? Don't argue, just put them on and go sit down. Now.

Farley: Too stiff, man! Pick it up! "Gotta bad back, b'y", Rex explains. Amiably. Honestly, the good ol' Canuckleheaded b'y schtick is fun and all, but after awhile you do run the risk of recappers starting to wonder how much more entertainment value you're potentially going to be charging people for than their cousin Earl, say, can provide for free at their next karaoke party.

Zack: You sing just well enough to get by, but you're so charismatic it doesn't matter. Yeah, as I recall Greeley's hand-slapping smarm routines always made him chuckle, too. Whatsamatter, Werner, they'll run you a tab on George Street but not in King's Square?

Casey's vid-bio is really, really short and - not coincidentally I'm fairly sure - involves a whole lot of fluttering lashes. "My mom listens to them...[odd pause, very possibly indicating offscreen producer proddings]...yeah. She really likes them a lot." I would love to report that all this is tinged with understandable teenage-jazz-fan snobbery, but those damn Maybellines just will not stop. Flutter flutter giggle Cut!

Then she launches into Timeless Love. And I should be cringing - "Feels good even missin' ya" in that belt, forsooth - but instead this whole thing is actually reacting on me nostalgically...in a way I can't quite put my finger on until the second run-through: Circa five-ten years ago I spent a lot of time in the pink-bedecked toy aisles, adding to my doll collection, and somehow it's all coming back to me in a rush. Y'know how Barbies have themes, like Around the World or Prima Ballerinas? Well, meet the newest addition to the limited-edition Famous Rock Bands series: Guess Who Barbie.
The interesting part (inasmuch as it's the part where I avoided getting pencilled in on the Maritime fatwa next to Zack and VFTW), that isn't necessarily the total diss it sounds. Barbie dolls are awfully pretty to look at, after all. The clear, sweet, utterly clueless vocal, with its Middle-America country vibe, might be perfect for the little pink cassette bonus-accessory tape, but that also means it's relaxed and self-assured. Which in turn means that for once I can relax and enjoy the fact that she actually has a stylistic clue, the niceness of which after Rex's flailings should not be underestimated. Y'know, if/when Casey ever decides to come out of her plastic box and really play, she'll definitely be something to watch.

Farley: Well, the best you can do is please your voters and keep improving. Translation: Oh, you're still here?

Sass: You look real relaxed, you picked a song that suited you. Translation: Bye-eee!

Zack: Solid...mature...kind of like watching paint dry. "That could be fun!?" Casey pipes up. Yeah, actually, it could. I have fond recollections of the time we all sat around waiting for my brother-in-law's new living-room décor to set up so we could apply the second coat. Of course, we were also listening to Sheryl Crow at the time. So actually this has no relevance to this situation at all. Sorry.

Jake: Now now, we're not here to discuss the guitar playing...Roman, this man is such a tool. At least Zack's not cancelling out any hope of any reputable rock band ever signing with him again, hmmmm? .
Anyhow, Casey, you're really coming into your own. This is where I was really, truly hoping the seventeen-year-old singer Casey thinks she is would make a quick cameo and krazy-glue her eyeballs to the ceiling in full camera view. Instead...flutter wriggle smug little grin flutter....seriously gettin' the urge to "style" me some Barbie hair, here, kiddo. Or maybe apply one or two of those press-on tattoos.

Pause so Zany can do something typically asinine with a Guess Who? quiz and some plastic steaks. .
Me, I'm just enjoying the-up-close-and-personal-Top-10-tee-shirt-pimpage. More specifically, I'm enjoying the bitter, revengeful notion of the 19Evil flunky who missed the boat on last year's Kalan tee being forced to watch an endless loop of Gary Beals' Top 5 results show performance. See, you cover this Idol gig long enough, eventually you develop a vast fund of ways to keep your Dark Side happy. I firmly believe Anakin Skywalker could've been completely freed of the urge to massacre Jedi after just a few run-throughs of John Stevens IV doing Crocodile Rock...

...ahem.

Suzi gives us a good five vid-bio minutes on how much she loves performing without ever once mentioning any actual music. Then we get the acapella clip...and we shouldn't have. Quite seriously, based on this segment I am really, truly baffled by what the judges saw at her audition. I mean, I can see Jake and maybe Farley concluding that pink hair on Idol automatically = cool rocker chick, but the other two?

American Woman. OK, let's face it, the only way this performance works at all is if she picks up the subtext and runs with it all the way to the Lilith Fair. But after all, this is Suzi we're discussing, and even if a subtlety leapt up and bit her on the ankle - and I'm talking straight through the boot - she wouldn't recognise it. In fact, she'd probably stomp it flat, which may be how we ended up with this-here Alice Cooper-esque interpretation of a fairly harmless rock anthem. Stomp, glare, stomp, bellow, stomp. It's like she's trying to exterminate American cockroaches. No, check that...[watching arms swing below her chin]...American mice. .
Stomp stomp stomp. Stomp into the audience to (in a brief shining moment of authenticity) glare with grim amusement at a few startled Casey fans. Stomp over by the judges' table to...I'm not sure, exactly, since bellowing as a vocal style isn't what you might call finely nuanced. She may possibly be trying to tap into Zack's deep anti-Cowell instincts. Finally she stomps to a halt, and I have never been so viscerally relieved to have an Idol performance end in my entire life. Not even that one time Jasmine did It's Raining Men.

Sass: Hey, who needs subtext? Totally works for me! You got some muscle into it, fabulous! OK, Derek has officially been on the road way too long now. Or maybe she's just caught the bootleg footage of him at the Ottawa fiddle workshop wearing Bermuda shorts.

Zack: Honestly, it was a whole lotta nothin'...You're a good bar rock singer, and I guess that's all you'll ever be, huh? Well, somebody's finally caught up with the rest of the class. I suppose up till now he's been able to distract himself with the shirts. Y'know, they're shiny, Suzi's shiny...it's all fun and games until somebody decides to remind himself of his own rock mortality.

Jake: Good song selection, you found a rock cover to fit every theme thus far....[runs through detailed list]. Which is comical on a few different levels, including the one where he's clearly "I do SO have deep musical knowledge!" desperate, and another where I can guarantee he will be heard sometime this season announcing gravely that "the Idol needs to sing everything". OK, so maybe Amber isn't finding it all that hilarious.

Farley: Can't disagree with Zack - not the kind of risk I wanna see you take. Suzi stares at them with the pure disbelief of someone who is pretty much disqualified from true rocker status for life. I have no idea how she missed the bullet the next day.

Ben: C'mon now. Who'd win a fight between you and an American woman? Suzi: Me! Recapper: I swear, I have absolutely no idea why a great notion for the next hit WWF act just popped into my head. Scout's honour.

Melissa tells us in that charmingly earnest way of hers that the GW's music is "quite timeless" and "I mean, it's still cool today", which I think is what happens to Casey's response after a year or so on the debate team. We finally get a decent-sounding acapella clip...as she VOs that she was thinking of going the obvious ballad route. But. You can clearly see the youthful enthusiasm to bust out and make good written right across her face. Melissa, it appears, is in no way tired of the sports analogies.

So...My Own Way to Rock. Erm. OK, let's take the problems one at a time, shall we? First, the outfit. Which now that I'm forced to study it up close resembles nothing so much as a slightly glammed-up version of the getup Hollywood dresses pretty actresses in so as to sell them as Poor-But-Proud Mountain Folk. Thus I am forced to conclude she's making a full-bore play for Rex's fanbase and any minute now the song selection is going to be explained away by a brain tumour, or something. Benign, I hasten to add, because after all chemotherapy just isn't that cute. .
Ah, the song selection. Vocally, perfectly fine. Whatever Melissa does will always sound perfectly fine vocally. Also maturely emotive, and let us not forget wholly sincere. That bloody song, however, just effortlessly defeats her at every single turn. It's the Black Hole of Musical Charisma. Inherently, I mean. Like doing Boogie Ooogie Ooogie on Disco night. It's like...OK, imagine We Will Rock You as interpreted by Casey and sung by Rex. Check. Even Cummings himself couldn't work this sucker, and we're discussing a man who could totally get you grooving to lyrics like "Clap for the Wolfman/He gonna rate your record high!"

Zack: Love ya, kid, but between the outfit and the song choice, you're gonna be lucky to survive. Not to worry, she'll just head out back and shoot herself a mess of wild pigeons! OK, seriously, Melissa does actually take the dissage well...from the look of her, Mom was absolutely right about that time the problem kid in Bunk 25 threw up all over her new CD player building character.

Jake: Not gonna disagree - what, and pass up the chance at a Zack-shirt gag? You just remembered it was Yom Kippur or something, Gold? No, he just thinks it's that totally Holiday Inn. I dunno, at the Holiday Inn she'd be wearing more sequins, and looking more clueless. Maybe at that bar in Timmins Shania's always referencing? Melissa adopts that look she learned when little Eddie's mom cornered her after the soccer game and insisted he play goal next time.

Farley: Argh grack gwolf presentation grrrrrfh ughhh! Aarghhhhh! Basically, this man is about two syllables away from a spontaneous Eminem lyric, and - as might be inferred - it's more sincerely effective as an Idol judgement than every single cute alliteration combined.

Sass: Always enjoys playing the nice judge, plus she really does seem to like Melissa. I think it may have something to do with the culottes. Anyway, she has several very gracious things to say about the actual vocal. Melissa receives this with the wisdom of a babysitter who's been told how well she "handles" little Corey one too many times.

Ben, in full-bore Emergency Self-Esteem Technician mode: Who here thinks this girl can sing...and dress? Heh. Heed thee well, Missy dear; Benedict Paul Martin Mulroney pausing infinitesimally in that particular spot is about as close to a croak of "Nevermore" as your costuming instincts are gonna get.

L'Oreal pimpmercial. Pampering week! Everybody into the white robes! Casey does some more little-girl squeeing at the sight of moisturizers, Melissa shows interest in some herbal treatments. The world's most gratuitous shot of Rexy getting a full-body massage for some reason fails utterly to elicit the SCREAMS! you might expect. Perhaps because I'm not the only one wondering if she's wringing the oil straight out of his hair. .
Speaking of - well, every part of that last couple sentences, really - to my intense relief we will be discussing Aaron only in terms of his hair, which it's becoming pretty clear is the default L'Oreal mode anyway where he's concerned. Actually, it's kinda sweet, how they've got them at least trained out of yowling and backing off making the sign of the cross whenever the big guy comes near.

Back in Piano Land, Aaron VOs that the GW are "the best Canadian band ever," in a tone that gives me the sudden overwhelming urge to lunge through the screen and hug him hard in sheer joyous relief. Because I am finally gonna hear me some Bachman-Cummings overdrive from somebody who gets it. .
And of course he's going to be singing These Eyes. Which, despite as noted having every last teeny nuance of which there aren't many to begin with in this song drilled deep into my brain thanks to bored DJs, puts not a dent in my glee, because I know he just cannot fail.
He doesn't. It's always a challenge as a snark practitioner, trying to find something offbeat to say about genuinely good performances. In this case I think my rough notes might suffice: .
"Struts out?! Backing track very loud! - Wailing...cooool. Soulful to the max. Overacts it - gag viz. song not worth that much be good here? But still. Big, BIG vocal - Ooh, nails the anguished part - nails it. In the homestretch now - crowd goes wild! Damn, is he actually crying? Def. use gag about obviously having heard it on radio as many times as I have. Probably loses cred for that, don't wanna cause vocal still incredible. Judges on their feet?!? - wait, just Farley. Still. Make point re: only performer I've actually rewound repeatedly this year - oh, wait, Melissa on Standards night. Still, though...best top 10 vocal this year, no question."

Jake: Is all "that's the song I would've picked for you." Because, y'know, extensive knowledge of the music industry and all. Actually, given Aaron's song-selection track record thus far I can forgive him the mild amazement over that little factoid.

Farley: Y'know, Cummings let Maestro sample this song...shot of Maestro in the audience looking rather inexplicably proud and happy to be lumped in - literally - with the pale doughy musical-theatre dude; then again, it is just about time past 80's night for the Prozac to be kicking in...anyway, Aaron, I hope he'll let you record it on your CD, too. Yeah, because as we all know nothing says "more than just a musical-theatre wannabe" like a cover of a particularly overwrought love ballad.

Sass: Remarkable....really impressed with your control on the higher notes. One thing about Aaron you gotta love, he generally refocuses Sass on the latter part of the "sex drugs and rock'n'roll" equation for at least thirty full seconds per show.

Zack: Goes into automatic Save the Fave mode re: Melissa, which as usual renders the critique of the person actually standing there a little, er, offhand. Seriously, could we get the relevance re: "the only 'Pegger here" please? Do you all hang around on street corners passing pithy comment re: the state of rock as we know it? .
Anyway, this is of course leading up to the Klippert Memorial Standing Ovation, and y'know...even after three seasons and eight billion Goodwill-reject outfits...damned if it isn't as effective a gesture as it was then. Aaron for one is so moved he's blowing kisses. Er, time to sit down now, Zack, don't want to overdo it, Heh heh. Gulp.

Ben: I wish I'd been sitting all night so I could stand for that. [Product-placed] recap. Unofficial but interesting noise-o-meter: Rex: Scream! Casey: scream... Suzi: Scream! Melissa: SCREAM! Aaron: SCREAM!!!!

And...clapclapclapclapclap. See you on BNL night, kids - in which we meet a new and much less cuddly facet of my development as a snark artist...