Thursday, December 20, 2012

X Factor US 2: Finale

This Finale was a major flop and completely underwhelming. I mean, Carly got paired with a strangely off pitch artist, Fifth Harmony performed two songs that they have already done and Tate was, well, Tate. Haha.

I don't know. At this point, I was expecting someone to kill it, but no one stepped up their game. Fifth Harmony was consistent, but the song choices may hurt them. Oh well. 

Let's get on with the rankings, shall we?

REPRISE

03. Tate Stevens
Anything Goes
I admit, Tate sounded good and this actually sounded like something that would be played on country radio, but the gripe I have with him is that he sounds the same on every song. There was no range or any dynamics to his delivery. It's still a strong vocal performance, but it just didn't do anything for me. 6.5/10

02. Fifth Harmony
Anything Could Happen
Did Simon sabotage his own act by giving them a song that they just performed last week? Yes, I still loved the performance and I somehow enjoyed the tweaks they did in parts, but the problem with these repeats are that they lose the magic especially if it's done two weeks straight. Plus, I was hoping they will change the staging, but whatever. 7/10

01. Carly Rose Sonenclar
Feeling Good
Cursed song alert! Haha. While I did think that Carly sang her audition piece with great control and pitch, I somehow felt like she did oversing parts of the song and the arrangement was too choppy. That being said, I thought she had enough attitude to pull it off convincingly and I saw a little spunk in this performance. 7.5/10

DUET

03. Carly Rose Sonenclar
How Do I Live (duet with LeAnn Rimes)
Trainwreck! Haha. Right off the bat, Carly already missed her cue and sort of forgot the words of the song and when LeAnn Rimes came out, the performance just went to hell. Was LeAnn drunk during the performance? The harmonies were awful, LeAnn sounded ahead of the track and both were struggling to find their place into the song. Such a shame. 4/10

02. Tate Stevens
Pontoon (duet with Little Big Town)
I honestly don't care about the sudden country explosion on tonight's X Factor Finale, but this was actually decent. Say what you want about Tate, but he sings his genre very well. Things got even better when Little Big Town came out - something entirely opposite with Carly's duet. Tate truing to be sexy or something was hard to watch though and I felt like the performance went nowhere. 6.5/10

01. Fifth Harmony
Give Your Heart A Break (duet with Demi Lovato)
Wait, what? Another repeat? I guess, Fifth Harmony didn't get enough time to rehearse no? As usual, they sounded great and Demi Lovato singing with them was actually a surprise upgrade to their performance. Definitely the best duet of the three, but I wish they did a new song instead. 7/10

$5 MILLION DOLLAR SONG

03. Tate Stevens
Tomorrow
Ladies and gentlemen, your winner! Haha. Nashville has a tear in her eye after this performance. Seriously. I may not be a fan of country music, but people who are into this genre will eat this up. The song sounded like one of those generic American Idol coronation singles and that's not a bad thing. Again, it's pretty much the same sappy country ballad and Tate was smart enough to play his strength extremely well. 7/10

02. Carly Rose Sonenclar
Hallelujah
I knew someone would do this at one point on X Factor US! Haha. But can we seriously retire this song already? Despite the annoyingly overdone song choice - the song lends itself to the singer that singing it on one of these shows is kind of like entering a cheat code on a video game - I thought Carly sounded gorgeous on it backed up with a choir. It's predictable, but good. So, that's that. 8/10

01. Fifth Harmony
Let It Be
With two repeats tonight, Fifth Harmony needed an outstanding performance to win the show. This wasn't quite the moment I was expecting, but it was possibly the best of the entire Finale episode. I thought their rendition was pure and beautiful and despite their lack of harmonies, I liked that they didn't overdo the vocal acrobatics - save for Camila - and most of them killed their solos. They didn't perform as a group, but at this point, I couldn't care less. 8/10

PREDICTION

I'm rooting for Fifth Harmony and I think Carly Rose is a sensational vocalist, but at this point this is Tate's competition to lose.

3 comments:

X said...

I actually agree with you 100% this time around...weird, huh? =)

To me, Fifth Harmony had the best night even with 2 of their songs being repeats (not sure what Simon was thinking). Still absolutely LOVE "Anything Can Happen", and I actually thought it was better this time than last week. Will it help them win? Not likely, but stranger things have happened.

Carly Rose sounded great as usual, but she got stuck singing 2 songs that are WAAAAY over done on these types of shows. Not to mention getting stuck with LeAnn Rimes, who sounded pretty bad.

Tate, as you said, sounded like Tate. I don't know... he's good, but I'm not sure he really had a memorable moment all season.

So...who's going to win?
Fifth Harmony? I suppose they could ride the high of "Anything Could Happen" to a win, but I don't think it's very likely.

That leaves either Tate or Carly Rose. They have been pretty neck-and-neck all season, so it's really a toss up. Personally, I want Carly Rose to win... but, unlike last year where only 2 of the 3 deserved the win, this year I would be ok with any of the 3 winning.

I am going to go out on a limb though and say Tate is going to win. Carly Rose has had a couple weeks straight that were less than stellar (bad song choices mostly), where Tate has been consistently Tate.

Shawn Jang said...

Honestly, it doesn't really matter who wins. They'll all get recording contracts regardless.

But I would want Fifth Harmony to win. Carly is just too young to be able to be successful (do you know any successful young stars? Justin Bieber doesn't count, he's like 16 or something, not 13). And Tate...i just don't know about him.

bjhyiu88 said...

I hope 5H wins this! :)

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