'Big Mike' Gets Saved by American Idol Judges

After finishing last among the Bottom Three, along with Andrew Garcia and Aaron Kelly, "Big Mike" Lynche earned a charitable and unanimous reprieve from the American Idol judges - to escape elimination in the AI competition tonight.

Proving once again that AI is first and foremost a popularity contest and not a true singing competition, American voters unbelievably let two far worse singers survive.  Both Garcia, who on Monday night sang a rather dull Big Band-Stray Cats version of the Lennon-McCartney classic "Can't Buy Me Love," and "Teflon Tim" Urban, who managed to make it through an uninspired rendition of "All My Lovin'." deserved to be sent home ahead of "Big Mike."  However, Big Mike fell into disfavor on Monday night by delivering an over-wrought rendition of "Eleanor Rigby."

Lee DeWyze also deserved to be in the Bottom Three tonight, after delivering a pitchy reading of  "Hey Jude," on Monday, inexplicably accompanied by a kilt-wearing bagpiper.

Casey James turned in the strongest performance of the week with a poignant reading of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy," while accompanying himself on acoustic guitar.  He was closely followed with a rousing rendition of "Come Together" by Crystal Bowersox and an uplifting interpretation of McCartney's pop-anthem "Let It Be" by Katie Stevens.

Two usual strong performers in the AI field had off-nights Monday, with Aaron Kelly looking and sounding a bit lost on "The Long and Winding Road," and Siobhan Magnus playing it a little too safe on a very timid version of "Across the Universe."

While we guessed that the judges would not let "Big Mike" go home early, the reality is that, considering how the AI demographics are skewed to pubescent female and predominantly white Middle America, his chances of surviving and winning the competition are slim to none.

We still think that Crystal, Casey and Aaron are still the class of this year's talent crop, but that Siobhan remains a wild card, who on a given night, is capable of delivering an inspired performance to tilt the voting her way.

And that's our view from the A&R Room.