E.K. NATION

It all starts with Simon Cowell.

Save for the night Kelly Clarkson was crowned, I missed the entire first season of American Idol: The Search For A Superstar (its original title, at least Stateside). It seemed like a big deal to everyone else watching, so when Season 2 rolled around, I started watching from the beginning. And that's when I came upon the brilliance of Simon. No holds barred, he tells it like it is, and he's usually dead on the money. That's what made the show fun for me. I loved watching him rip on contestant after contestant, and the reactions on a lot of their faces were priceless. Man, is it entertaining to watch these tone-deaf shriekers try to tell him he knows nothing.

But then a strange thing happened. Every once in a while they'd show an audition of a singer who was really good. And I would think, hmmm, I wonder how this person's gonna do. And that's when I came upon the brilliance of the producers of American Idol. They got me by showing the bad auditions, and they kept me by showing the good singers. I just had to find out how the good ones would do, and I would invariably pick my favorites and blah blah blah and before I knew it I had logged fifty hours of watching karaoke on television.

That's what Idol is: a national karaoke contest. Karaoke mostly sucks when it's in your local bar, right? I mean, come on, who really wants to hear five drunk girls doing "Summer Nights"? Who really desires some screechy chain-smoking girl to belt out an anvil-melting (the anvil found in the ear, not the workshop) version of "Black Velvet" while you're trying to have a conversation with your friends? It's horrible. It really is. And I admit, I've done some karaoke too, and I never felt anything the next morning other than "I feel so dirty." So why is it so interesting on television? I honestly don't know. Most of the songs they perform on the show are lame; a lot of them are the type of prima donnas that I don't really want to see. I don't know what it is. But it's going to start tonight. And I'm gonna get sucked in.

If you can stand another Top 5 Things list, here's mine, all about good things that have happened on American Idol:

5. Jason "Sundance" Head's audition last year. His powerful rendition of Bobby Blue Bland's "Stormy Monday" is the greatest performance American Idol has ever shown during the audution shows.

4. The unconventional success of Elliott Yamin, who didn't look like your typical Idol but used pure vocal talent to rise all the way to third place in Season 5.

3. Chris Daughtry not winning Season 5. Would have ruined his career. Instead, he's doing music he wants to do instead of those insipid Idol-winner-single-type songs. (Same for Bo Bice the previous year.)

2. Jordin Sparks doing "I Who Have Nothing" last season. That was a damn good performance.

1. Pretty much anything Katharine McPhee (<--over there, yeah, the hottie in the photo) ever did, whether it was singing, dancing, just being interviewed, or standing in the background dancing to someone else's performance. Kat's and my wedding didn't go off as planned, basically because she didn't know it was even on, and that's because she hadn't met me when I planned it and she still hasn't, and she's marrying someone else now, but who cares?

So who's the next Brenna Gethers? The one who is so unaware of her mind-numbing blandness that she gets eliminated in about 23rd place but still insists, live on the broadcast, that Clive Davis call her up so they can "make some money" together? Who's the next kid who can't sing but inexplicably gets voted into the top 12 and beyond, like Jon Peter Lewis, Kevin Covais (<--over there), or the infamous Sanjaya and his hair(up top)?

And who's the next Brittenum twin? You know, the silly-ass boy-divas who overdramatized everything during that Hollywood round, declaring "I don't...do...groups!!!", or then quitting the Hollywood round 'cause his brother was cut, then proclaiming to everyone, "My spirit has been broken," then begging to be let back in once he realized his brother had in fact not been cut? (Turns out...they've let the Brittenum twins advance past the first auditions again...they're baaaack!

Who's the next American Idol?