E.K. NATION

Off we go! Season 7 started with auditioner Joey Catalano, who, we're told, lost 204 pounds, pretty much changing from Ruben Studdard to Jordan Catalano (My So-Called Life reference). Two hundred and four pounds? That's an entire me! Anyway, he got the season off to a good start with a smooth rendition of Maroon 5's "Sunday Morning" and...well, we're off and running. American Idol, Season 7. Yeah, I'm hooked already, okay?

The first real guffaws of the season came when gold-suit-bedecked James Lewis sang "Go Down Moses" as if he were a walrus -- unintentionally -- and Randy and Paula couldn't contain their laughter. But then we saw the judges give Three Thumbs Up! to auditioners Junot Joyner, Jose Candelaria (who sang in Spanish), and Jonathan Baines, a Zac Efron look-alike, and please don't tell me I even know who Zac Efron is.

Our first real sad moment of the season came when 16-year-old Temptress Browne, a hulking middle-linebacker of a girl (no, really, she actually plays football), gave it her all but was not sent through to Hollywood. The judges gave her a group hug as her tears flowed like Angel Falls, and then they all went outside to apologize to her family and friends as Temptress got more hugs. Awwwww.

There was New Jersey's Mark Hayes, who told us all about how he does an impression of crickets chirping whenever he sees a show and the act doesn't go over well and how everyone laughs, 'cause you can really hear it in the theater. And he made the chirping noise for us...and no points for guessing what sound effect the producers inserted after his painfully boring attempt at "White Christmas" was over and the judges sat silently...chirp, chirp...Ahhhh, the irony. The producers then gave us our first manufactured "group song"; a compendium of auditioners performing the same song, apparently at the behest of whoever is running the show at the audition spot. This time, I guess they told the singers, "Look, do some 'I Love Rock 'N Roll' poorly, since we know you didn't prepare to do it, so that we can make a brief clip-show of you all sounding horrible." Why do they need to do this to the audience? Producers, you're working too hard. Gold comes from the auditions by themselves; no need to force anything.

After all this was an incredible waste of an entire segment. A full seven minutes were spent on one Alexis Cohen, a Grace-Slick wannabe who sleeps on a couch right next to her mom's bed. Watching her go through the typical Idol-loser rant after being told "no" was dreadful. Again, producers, you're trying too hard. We've seen this person numerous times before; she gets turned down, and immediately goes into a psychotic-sounding tantrum telling us how idiotic Simon is, and how she's gonna go back to "actressing", and then her middle fingers fly, and blah blah blah. Yes, these "singers" can be entertaining in small doses but seven minutes was way too much.

Then we met Angela Martin, a very attractive 26-year-old from Chicago whose daughter has Rett Syndrome, which, I learned after I looked it up, is caused by sporadic mutations in the MECP2 gene located on the X chromosome, which almost exclusively affects female children (since most male fetuses are killed by it before they leave the womb), and is WHOAAA there, self, this isn't WebMD, it's E.K. Nation's American Idol recap. Ahem. Anyway, Angela is good at singing, and when she gets rid of the Whitney Houston affectations, she has a chance to really be a star on this show.

Somehow, a 39-year-old "songwriter" from New Jersey named Milo Turk was allowed to perform before the judges a tune he wrote called "No Sex Allowed," which I guess means he's a virgin and he wants kids to not have sex and he will do whatever he can to have a chance to sing before Simon, Paula and Randy so that he might get on TV with his message. Yeah. Congrats, Milo, on a waste of a Philadelphia day; you could have spent it checking out the Liberty Bell or the Rocky statue, but no, you had to sing us this Not-Ready-For-The-Rocky-Roads jingle (Saturday Night Live reference) that no child of any age needs to hear, if only because of the musical quality. "No Sex Allowed", Milo? Really? 'Cause I can almost hear the condom wrappers ripping as I write this. But I guess if Milo is the foul-tasting shot of tequila (this analogy will only work if you hate tequila, the way I do), Kristy Lee Cook is the refreshing lime wedge that follows it.

Apparently Kristy lives in Selma, Oregon. Now, I live in Oregon and even at this moment I do not know where Selma is. All I know is that she lives in my home state and somehow I have not been treated to this goodness before. She trains horses, and trains herself to do cage-fighting, and all I can say is I wouldn't mind being trapped in a cage with her. This blonde 23-year-old from a town called Selma -- she lives in a log cabin, bless her heart -- sang "Amazing Grace" and was indeed amazing, and I have my first favorite of the season. And if Kristy is the lime wedge, Ben Haar is another disgusting shot of tequila, complete with Princess Leia's Jabba's-dancer outfit on. I only wish I were making that last part up.

Paula was too distracted by Mr. Haar's chest hair -- I was distracted by the fact that "Haar" means "hair" in German -- and he was sent away to find someone to wax him. I wish I were making this part up as well. While we not-so-anxiously awaited a return, we got to see someone named Paul Marturano. This Idol-ineligible 32-year-old who obviously pulled some strings to even get to audition for the judges gave us a song about stalking Paula, with lines like, "If she were a doggie, I would walk her; if she were a blackboard, I would chalk her; if I were Columbo, I would Peter Falk her," after which it became clear he was just a wannabe musical stand-up comedian who might one day be seen opening for Daniel Tosh, if Daniel Tosh one day starts to really suck bad at comedy. And speaking of (S)talking, next up was a pretty blonde young woman improbably named Beth Stalker, who once recorded an album of children's songs under the name of Little Liz when she was four, has recorded a Christian-music CD in her adulthood, was pleasant enough in her audition, and was put through to the next round even though Simon said she probably wouldn't stand out in Hollywood and is probably right about that. I wish you nothing but the best, Little Liz.

Next, Jabba the Haar returned, freshly-smoothened chest a-glowing. (Achtung!) We had been treated to brief shots of someone waxing his chest during a prior outro to a commercial break -- I kept waiting for him to yelp out, "AaaaaaaAAAHHHHHHH Kelly Clarkson!!!-- and we saw the results as he dropped his cape. I don't think anyone not named "Haar" thought it was remotely entertaining. He launched into the song "Dontcha", of which he was only able to get out two syllables ("don't cha") before Simon said, "I'm not interested. Out you go," and who the hell could blame him. With his butt-crack showing, the rest of us cringed as a much better contestant appeared, one by the name of Chris Watson, whom I Guess? looks like a model. He was a nice kid, humbled by the judges' positive opinion of him, and off he went, golden ticket in hand.

The Star Wars theme continued into the final segment as we met Christina Tolisano, a 24-year-old from Connecticut with the Princess Leia Cinnabuns strapped to her ears and a Star Wars belt buckle around her waist. Now, obviously, she wasn't going to go through. But I must say, upon listening (but not watching) her sing a second time courtesy of the rewind feature on my remote, I'd have to say she wasn't that horrible. Probably not good enough to get through to Hollywood, but let that be a lesson to all Season 8 prospects who are reading this -- could there really be any? -- do not go for the gimmicks. Let your voice do the shining. Which is what Brooke White did to end the show.

Brooke is a delightful-looking 24-year-old from California who doesn't drink, and doesn't smoke, and -- get this, before any specific Adam Ant song pops into your head -- has never seen an R-rated movie . I don't know how all of that is possible, but I guess it has given her time to work on the Corinne Bailey Rae song she did for the judges, and she was just fine. Off she goes to Hollywood, and that's the end of our first show of the season. I'm going to get some sleep now, 'cause I'm going to be doing this again tomorrow night.