Well, after the shocking save week and the top ten tour that will now be eleven, we’re ready to drop a couple this week, with no swears. Let’s see who brings it. This. Is. American Idol!

It’s Elton John week – can’t wait to see what the song picks are.

Scotty: “Country Comfort” - Grandma may have saved him from the 1st to perform bottom three curse. Hard to believe that’s an Elton song.

Naima: “I’m Still Standing” – One of my favorites of Elton’s. And while I would have never thought I would like reggaelton ja(n), it somehow works. I dug it.

Paul: “Rocket Man” – This kind of song really suits his funkiness. But I’m over the suit itself.

Pia: “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me” – Another great performance from Piandroid… anyone who has to say that they are emotional is trying to convince themselves as well…

Stephano: “Tiny Dancer” – This isn’t doing anything for me.

Lauren: “Candle in the Wind” – Didn’t sell me until she stepped away from the stand and drove the chorus. But then I was sold sold sold.

James: “Saturday Night’s Alright” – I hate those stairs and I can’t understand a word of the verse. Not his best by a long shot, but hey, the piano is on fire.

Thia: “Daniel” – One of her best, but felt like one note the whole way through.

Casey: “Your Song” – Much improved from last week. He’s back, and with no swears.

Jacob: “Sorry Seems to be The Hardest Word” – He is awesome, but it was still just one note for me until the last chorus, which was ridiculous. Someone’s gonna have fun freeze-framing some of the faces he made in close up tonight.

Haley: “Bennie & the Jets” – Hard to argue with a girl sitting on a piano… I still like her, even though she could not have picked a more “non-vocalist” chorus to try and turn into a vocal song. But it was growly and fun.

Seriously. Can anyone name a season that had this many excellent performers in the top 11? Seriously. My bottom three are Naima, Stephano and Thia, but they are all three still very good. So which two are going home?

Well, after a family staycation for a couple days in Chicago, I'm quite a bit late on my American Idol update - but I did watch it and comment in the moment using my iphone, so I kept it short.  - So here they are, even though I know Casey got the big save... enjoy!

Casey - grapevine - better than last week fo sho
Thea - heat wave - pure goodness.
Jacob - don't know this song well but he rocked it. Great control and soul.
Lauren - keep me hangin on - major comeback for her. Not sure about the last run but it was all good.
Stefano - hello - goodbye...
Haley - her straightened hair turned her into a hunchback. Better toward the end.
Scotty - for once in my life - he's great out of his element. Looks like Alfred E. Neumann tonight.
Pia - all in love is fair -  for a humanoid robot who has come to take over the world she is amazing.
Paul - tracks of my tears- it was like a rod Stewart tom petty Mashup. Quirky Boring.
Naima - dancing in the streets - well she's definitely better than Mick and Bowie were - didn't need the Milwaukee throw in or the dance break.
James - livin for the city - great jam - he's in some rare company man - what pipes.

Bottom line: Everyone did better than Casey, and that plus the fact that he sang first left him in the dust. Glad to hear that he's going to get to go on the tour - but will he be able to get his thing together to keep from the same fate next week? I guess we'll see...

Hello friends!

This afternoon I uploaded the latest episode of a new podcasting adventure I'm on - it's called “The Pop Culture Pulpit” – every week or so, I’ll be uploading a new episode where I try to connect the pop culture dots for pastors and church attenders alike. As your resident court jester, I will step up to the pulpit, digging through pop culture tidbits, and explaining to pastor-types what they need to know about it all, so that they don’t get up there on their own pulpits and mispronounce the word “Gaga.”

You don’t have time to keep up with everything – so let me do it for you! The Pop Culture Pulpit is One-Stop Pop Culture Shopping for the Discriminating Pastor.

This week in episode 52, I'm discussing Nathan Fillion, Glee's original songs, and delving into all that is Rebecca Black's Friday...

There are multiple ways to get a hold of the podcast. First, you can subscribe to the podcast through iTunes by clicking this link.

Second, you can visit the web page! You can listen right on the page at http://www.popculturepulpit.com.

And I’ll always be posting and directing podcast traffic through my website, http://www.ericbramlett.org.

I’m passionate about keeping Pastors in the know when it comes to being salt and light in this world – and I want to have some fun with it along the way. So listen, let me know what you think, and tell a friend! You can email podcast questions for the Court Jester at popculturepulpit@gmail.com.

Thanks and I'll see you at the pulpit!

Hey everybody!

It’s down to twelve after Diana Ross left us last week. Still excited, still interested, still ready to comment on the performances of the top twelve – my comments offered before hearing the judges speak – eeek – this week is “songs from the year the contestants were born.” Nothing better to make someone feel old.

Naima – What’s Love Got To Do With It – Tina Turner – Can we please get some stairs training in here if we’re going to continue to build them for American Idol stages. This arrangement doesn’t do much for me. She reminds me of Ventress from Clone Wars.

Paul – I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues – He’s like “Countrified Coldplay” – While I do think that his variety is good for AI – he is starting to be more like Taylor Hicks than like himself – becoming a bit of a parody of his schtick, less honest to me.

Thea – 1995. Ouch. Colors of the Wind – She’s pretty stunning – but in the end, I was kind of bored, but I attribute that more to the arrangement than her performance.

James – I’ll Be There For You – Remember when this song was a ballad? Not his best performance – feel like he’s losing it a bit. When they play this back they’ll realize how many notes he actually missed due to adrenaline.

Haley – I’m Your Baby Tonight – Loved it. First one I enjoyed from beginning to end. Little lipstick on the chin after the performance, that’s hilarious.

Stephano – If You Don’t Know Me By Now – He’s doing a great job with this song – a great pick. Great last note. Showed he deserved to get the wild card. The system works.

Pia – Where Do Broken Hearts Go? – Pantsuit? Really? Probably the most soul that she’s shown, nailed the top notes for sure. Wow! But… need more soul and less pantsuit…

Scotty – Can I Trust You With My Heart – He’s brilliant – seriously – how does he do it? I can’t stand country music, and yet, I’m drawn to his talent like a moth to a dadgum flame.

Karen - Love Will Lead You Back – She’s singing to us from the future! Her voice is a little thin by comparison to the original, and she’s not doing enough different with it to make it stand out.  And just as I say that, she breaks out the Spanish. Boom.

Casey – Smells Like Teen Spirit. Oh snap. The ghost of Simon Cowell can be heard saying “yes, but this is a singing competition…” It was good and cool, but really? First time I didn’t really get how what he was doing was fit for AI.

Lauren – I’m The Only One – She was awesome, until the last 20 seconds when the flu caught up with her. But wow, much improved from last week. Great catchy song right in her strengths.

Jacob – Alone – I always knew that ann and nancy were channeling a young black man with golden pipes. Oh wow on that “I never really cared until I met you” run. Most impressed with his ability to come back down from that craziness to sing the quiet parts at the end.

Random Notes – I hope they plan on doing more with Jimmy Iovine than these little couch sessions for one-liners. It really would be cooler to see more of what’s going on with that portion of the process.

So I noticed that Jimmy Iovine went to his jacket pocket fr something after talking to the very sick Paul – and then later he mentioned to James to stay away from the sickness in that house? I’m guessing he had some antiseptic lotion in his jacket that he went for right away…

Last weekend at Community we celebrated generosity through something we call "Celebration Generosity." It is the fourth such Sunday we have celebrated - where the giving for that one weekend goes to the four teams: the Village Team, the Barangay Team, the Reproducing Church Team, and the Neighborhood team.

And Community's people showed up in an awesome way. $529,000 was given to the four teams, and not only that, we also celebrated 141 brand new givers. For so many of our attenders, Celebration Generosity represents their first taste of what it means to put others first in their finances. It's awesome stuff.

If you don't know much about what we do and how we tell the story of Celebration Generosity, check out this playlist of Celebration Generosity videos from this weekend's services. They are all worth the time taken to experience them - I promise!

All right America - we got what we've said we wanted in year's past - we sifted through the 24th, 23rd, 19th, 17th - in one night last week - and now we have the top 13 going head to head, nice and slow-like. Song selections are from their own personal idol. Wonder how many J-Lo and Aerosmith songs we get… Here are my thoughts on each contestant, as always, typed before we hear what the judges say…

Lauren - Shania Twain's "Any man of mine" - I can't understand her first verse - no consonants! Not a fan of the camera blocking for her number. Hoping it's not a pattern. I like her a lot, but not my favorite of hers.

Casey - Joe Cocker's "A Little Help From My Friends" - I know this sounds crazy, but until the very end I felt like he was too reserved - I was imagining him doing better than he actually was. But again, how can you go wrong with the Beatles via Joe Cocker?

Ashthon - Diana Ross' "When You Tell Me That You Love Me" - Not a huge fan of this - it's not a great song - she's pretty and her voice is good and all, but  all that build up with the video piece made it seem like this note was crazy high, and it just didn't have that build for me.

Paul - Ryan Adams' "Come Pick Me Up" - I feel like he should have a "Jim Henson's" before his name. If anything, his performance suffers from not having enough of a live pub kind of mix in the house- needed more reverb, it's all very contained.

Pia - Celine Dion's "All By Myself" - Okay, so there's no question that she can sing the crap out of stuff - but every other part of her face, her stage presence, her body is so uninvolved - Open your eyes! I realize she's impressive already, but if she would let herself go just a little bit, it would be off the charts.

James - Paul McCartney's "Maybe I'm Amazed" - Great song, one of my favorites. He's great - will he go for the high notes? Do I have to ask? And he's in control of it - which is amazing - makes you realize how shaky Adam Lambert always was. Weird ending to the number, but I loved it.

Haley - Leanne Rimes' "Blue" - Check the difference here between her and Pia - both can sing for sure - but Haley tells a story with her song. And with her face. And I don't even like country music!

Jacob - R. Kelly's "I Believe I Can Fly" - No question that he's incredible - but today he was incredibly sharp. But unbelievably, it didn't matter. He's amazing.

Thia - Michael Jackson's "Smile" - I loved loved loved this until the beat kicked in, and then it was very odd to me. But what a pure voice quality.

Stephano - Stevie Wonder's "Lately" - I loved all the parts that weren't a disco inferno. Really, this was the best Stevie song to pick? All that modulation could make a person go blind…

Karen - Selena's "I Could Fall In Love" - interesting to sing an english cut of Selena's after impressing everyone bilingually… Not great for me - just kind of reveals a weak song - does this count as a J-Lo song?

Scotty - Do you think his idol is Ozzy? nope. Garth Brooks' "The River" - Seriously - he's so pure and solid - Did I mention before that I don't even really like country music? Am I being transformed?

Naima - Rihanna's "Umbrella" - Her first moves sent me back to a certain Neneh Cherry performance - she's great and all, but even this as interesting as it is, does not even compare to the earlier great voices. Great spectacle, but probably better when downloaded on iTunes.

Random notes:

Never been jealous of AI contestants until this year - getting to work with Jimmy Iovine, and Don Was… and all the Interscope peeps - wow.

Casey was a "rainbow of talent and a plethora of passion" - Steven Tyler('s writers).

So the judges went easy on that Diana Ross tune what with Barry Gordy in the house… respect. But you know they were thinking it.

Steven really loves to talk about how the "sum total" of [blank] has led someone to the [moment] - with interchangeable nouns. Wondering if he can sustain this 13 week stretch.

The product placement for Coke and Ford was bad, but the product placement for the mics and the sound equipment is even more annoying, because I don't know what the red letters stand for or what they are. Is that Dr. Dre's stuff?

So who is going home? My money is on Naima, but Ashthon is a close second. Or, I guess, twelfth.

Every now and then, you see something on the internets that just makes you pause and take note.

Earlier today, Elic showed me a faked trailer for a non-existing sequel to E.T. called "E.T. X" - it's awesome, and has combined footage from films so as to make it plausible this film exists, with grown up appearances from Henry Thomas and Drew Barrymore. Brilliant. This, my friends, is good parody.

Well, I have to say I was skeptical when I first heard about the game plan involving getting to the top ten as quickly as possible.

The main reason I was skeptical was because this year's top 24 seemed to have so much talent - particularly compared to previous years. There were a few who perhaps picked the wrong song, in the sense that the song they picked didn't make them shine like they would have needed to pass other competitors, but we didn't have a single contestant buckle under the pressure of the big stage - and let's face it, in previous years, there were some awful weeks where someone who was never going to make it into the top ten had to keep showing up week after week, because while they were low in the voting, they weren't low enough to go home right away.

So this format did work for me in the end, because last night they created something that had been missing in elimination episodes prior to this point, in recent memory: they created compelling television. Usually, for Kristi and me, the elimination episodes are an Olympic level demonstration of the nuances of the DVR fast-forward levels: how close can you get to the edge of the moment without knowing who went home, hit play, and then only watch in "real-time" the bare-minimum. Don't need to watch the replays from yesterday, or the filler, or the guest performer - just give us the goods. But that all changed when we found out who was going home, and who would be singing again, for a chance to stay in the competition.

AI did another very shrewd thing here - they used the "judges save" in a much smarter way than years' past. The last couple of years, when a judge saved someone, you already knew that they got the least number of votes. So even if a judge was saving someone for the next week, you knew that in a way, it was just a matter of time. But in this scenario, all we knew was that there were 14 people who didn't make it. We didn't know their order - now, maybe the judges did, and if they did, I hope that knowledge didn't influence their choices.

We also didn't know how many if any they would bring back for a "wildcard" save. It could be one, could be two - Kristi guessed four - but it was three. And we guessed wrong in terms of who we thought they would keep. So even that forty-five minutes of the program was interesting.

Nicely done, Nigel - you have saved and revived a franchise that wasn't really dead per se, but one that needed a major makeover. Can't wait for the botox to wear off.

I wanted to give my take on this whole Rob Bell controversy.

As you know if you’ve read my blog, I take comedy pretty seriously. And so when I read through Twitter and Facebook that a lot of people were taking potshots at Rob Bell, and that they were going after him as a universalist, and were assuming things about his new book “Love Wins”, well, I knew that I would have to do the research and offer my point of view.

I even heard some people were talking about Rob Bell like he was some kind of clown, and well, what can I say. It’s hard to argue with the truth.

Ever since I have known of Bob Bell (his friends call him Bob), I have known him to be a man full of joy and frivolity. Why people would want to choose now, this moment, to vilify him is beyond me. Sure – he placed too much emphasis on the medium of television, and it was tough to look at him too long with that nose and those glasses… but to accuse him of universalism! Oh sure, he’s a universalist all right – universally revered, as the greatest clown of all time!

If you’ve forgotten how influential Bob Bell was, just look at this cover art from his film series “Bozooma”, that played on WGN in the eighties.

Powerful stuff. Let’s all take a minute to drop our stoning rocks, and pick up some pop rocks. And a joy buzzer. And a rubber chicken.

Okay – are you still reading? Hope you enjoyed the satire – I know I did! (thanks to my friend John for having an idea that I could steal) And now… the real reason I gathered you here today…

I’ve launched a new podcast! It’s called “The Pop Culture Pulpit” – every week or so, I’ll be uploading a new episode where I try to connect the pop culture dots for pastors and church attenders alike. As your resident court jester, I will step up to the pulpit, digging through pop culture tidbits, and explaining to pastor-types what they need to know about it all, so that they don’t get up there on their own pulpits and mispronounce the word “Gaga.”

You don’t have time to keep up with everything – so let me do it for you! The Pop Culture Pulpit is One-Stop Pop Culture Shopping for the Discriminating Pastor.

There are multiple ways to get a hold of the podcast. First, you can subscribe to the podcast through iTunes by clicking this link.

Second, you can visit the web page! You can listen right on the page at http://www.popculturepulpit.com.

And I’ll always be posting and directing podcast traffic through my website, http://www.ericbramlett.org.

I’m passionate about keeping Pastors in the know when it comes to being salt and light in this world – and I want to have some fun with it along the way. So listen, let me know what you think, and tell a friend! You can email podcast questions for the Court Jester at popculturepulpit@gmail.com.

Thanks and I'll see you at the pulpit!

12 girls ready to rock the world! This is American Idol…!

Here are my thoughts, as always typed before I hear what the judges have to say, so as to “keep it real, dog.”

Ta-Tynisa Wilson – “Only Girl (in the world)” – Tackling Rihanna – This kind of song is not helped by the adrenaline of the live performance – and she is sharp/flat in a couple of places. Songs that stay on one melody note for that long become difficult to hold without auto-tune, even for Rihanna.

Naima Adedapo – “Summertime” – Lost interest in this one really – maybe it was just the style, but to me this song is Fantasia’s when it comes to American Idol, tough to compare to that.

Kendra Chantelle – “Impossible” – She did a better job of being Christina Aguilera than Christina has lately. Pretty good, and pretty. Good?

Rachel Zevita – “Criminal” – She was good, but people who like Fiona Apple don’t understand that her songs aren’t particularly memorable. I loved her in Juno.

Karen Rodriguez - “Hero” – Hold on – the language changed somewhere in here, right? Oh now it’s back – just had to hit the tv a couple times. Great soft run at the very end, otherwise, kinda forgettable for me.

Lauren Turner – “Seven Day Fool” – She’s got a real voice for sure – great song, great pick for her – and she needs just a little bit more personality – it was all attack – needed a little something going on behind the eyes….

Ashthon Jones – “Love all Over Me” – Is this a Christopher Cross song? This definitely landed better live in the room than it did on TV – I really like her but this wasn’t my favorite song pick.

Julie Zorrilla – “Breakaway” – She’s a smarter performer and artist than this song pick, I think. It’s gotta go somewhere – will it? Nope. That didn’t work. Another one that I really like, but that didn’t do what she needed to with the song pick.

Haley Reinhart – “Fallin” – That, my friends, was smoldering. Wow. She sold it 100% now maybe that’s just the pretty talking… but I liked it.

Theia Megia – “Out Here On My Own” – She was great – perfect song selection. Wondering if Randy’s gonna go on a rant about how she sounded just like the great Irene Cara, and how can you do a song like her.

Lauren Alaina – “Turn on the Radio” – Great performance, stage presence – she’s sassy in a very genuine and appealing way. I hope we get to hear more of her.

Pia Toscano – “I’ll Stand By You” – This song has kind of been played out in this competition, but she still is pretty and singing good at things. She was robotic until the very last key change and last high notes – and then, zoinks, scoob! She may not have to go back to work at Wizards of Waverly Place…

Random Notes:

Ryan's opening tag is "but... who do you love? This. Is. American Idol. Huh?

Steven Tyler gave us a little Paula flashback: "It's a new old timey thing but could be new."

So who is getting your vote? Do you think American Idol underestimated how good this group would be when they decided to go from 24 to 11 or 12 in one week's vote?

Is that actually true?