I've been so busy with my Hari Raya preparations these last few days that I've all but neglected my poor, poor bloggy~!! So here I am, finally determined to write a decent bloggy entry, inbetween all my dusting, packing, cleaning and a myriad of other chores...
As we all know, seventeen year-old Daphne Khoo bid us farewell this last friday and it seemed only right because she IS the weakest out of the four Idol finalists left in the competition (my apologies to all Daphne fans out there ;p ). Nevertheless, before we get too far ahead of ourselves, here's my two-cents worth of the Idol performances on thursday night...
Daphne started the ball rolling with Tata Young's dance hit I Believe but in my honest opinion, it was really very bland and just a by-the-numbers routine by this Crescent Girls' alum. She didnt sound too bad on Penny Dai's The Love You Want (from the Meteor Garden soundtrack)... yet it was still... very bland. Looks like Daphne's (previously) unique vocal tone is starting to seem abit stale by now especially since it's rapidly becoming apparent that her range is quite limited (as can be seen from previous weeks' performances). Hence, I'm not the least bit surprised that she has been eliminated from the show.
Olinda Cho was so at home performing a Teresa Teng number that I'm left to wonder: is there anything that this girl canNOT sing??? Anyhow, this was a pretty laid-back song and I was glad that she chose Coco Lee's rousing ballad, Before I Fall In Love, for her second performance. I've always liked Olinda since the beginning of the competition but I'm starting to feel however, that her singing lacks a certain emotive punch.
Emoting, on the other hand, is what I feel Sylvester Sim does best, even though I have some grievances about his clumsy diction on the English lyrics of his songs, as was evident during David Tao's rather mundane Katrina. On Jay Chou's An Jing though, dear old Sylvester was flawless~ He looked totally at ease and confident, and delivered a heart-felt performance which I think must be his best in the whole Idol competition thus far. Now, wouldn't it be great if he was THis good on his English songs???
Belaian Jiwa is such an overplayed Innuendo hit that I didnt think Taufik's version could be any better; but thankfully, he proved me wrong! His vocals were silky smooth and he managed the runs in the song so effortlessly that I got the goosebumps~! What a shame then that his second song, some Reshmonu number which I've never heard before, was quite crappy. Moreover, I also think he should stop doing his sitting-down-on-chair-while-singing thingy because it has begun to lose its sense of novelty.
With Daphne gone, the Idol competition seems more stiff than ever. Although Taufik, Olinda and Sylvester are disparate from one another in vocal style and personality, I think Singapore couldnt have picked a better trio to be in the top three positions because they are definitely the best amongst the twelve fnalists. I'm very certain that each of them have their own fair share of (numerous) loyal supporters but it still remains to be seen which one of them have enough clout to stay on til the end...
