final 12

Australian Idol Round-Up: Australia, This Is Your Final 12

9:11AM Clem Bastow | While it took team Defamer a little while to get over the tragedy of a) James Spargo not getting through to the Top 12 and a.i) James Spargo actually turning out to be a bit shit (although he gets points for saying his baby son could “put it in lots of different holes” when discussing what genre he tends towards), last night the 2008 Final 12 was revealed (eight of them have already been bought domain names by Sony BMG) and, gee whiz, what a bunch of champeens they are. (Also, the Cadbury gorilla ad ISN’T FUNNY ANYMORE, so imagine what it’ll feel like in two months’ time!) Let’s hold hands and head over the jump to discuss their prospects, shall we? More »

Idol Round-Up: Mark Da Costa Leaves As Viewers Finally Realise He Is Not The Missing Member Of Jet

10:47AM Clem Bastow | “Rocker” Mark Da Costa is the first male Final 12 contestant to be booted from this year’s Idol, after his “groovy” acoustic version of Yellow (with excess use of the word “thang”) failed to keep him in the game. We actually felt a little sad at Mark’s leaving, mainly because of the look in his eyes that said, “I’m 28; I will get exactly four months more exposure out of this and then I will be a courier until the day I retire to dream about what might have been” – but also because dear old Marcia actually seemed genuinely upset to see him go, even despite Andrew G and James Mathison’s offer of a “cup of tea” backstage after the show. We’d like to see Surfin’ Marty leave next, if only to attempt to address the gender imbalance in this year’s Final 12. It’s just not cricket. More »

Our Shoddy Photoshop Skills Prove Prescient In Picking Idol Romances

11:47AM Clem Bastow | Turns out Marty was copping a feel of Idol’s Lana, as we surmised a week or so ago, as Kyle Sandilands got Marty to admit (in a round-about way) on his radio show. Lana, who was booted on Monday night, has admitted she will “keep in touch” with the surfer dude and Police fan, which is code for “we will be having lots of R-rated iChat sessions when my parents are out of the house”. The Idol judge said he asked Marty if he was “going the distance” with little Lana, 17, because everyone was talking about it – and the singer’s response was, “Yeah”. Lana admitted there was an attraction between the pair. But she said nothing happened besides “a couple of cuddles”. “A couple of cuddles”?! Judging by Matt Corby and Brianna “Quirky” Carpenter’s fast hands in the spa-bath, which were brushed off as just fun between mates, lord knows what “a couple of cuddles” could stand for! If only Idol itself could be as entertaining on-screen as this year’s off-duty escapades. More »

Idol Round-Up: Lana Leaves After Being Declared “Out Of Her Depth”, Australia Sez “You Don’t Say”

11:16AM Clem Bastow | Australian Idol finally did something right last night, ousting Perth teenager Lana Krost a few weeks later than should have been the case (about five weeks too late, to be exact). The schoolgirl with the Mid-Atlantic accent of indeterminate origin faffed her way through weak-voiced renditions of songs we suspect she didn’t really understand, though we were slightly taken aback by the mature (read: very unlike previous schoolgirl Lauren “The Waterworks” Buckley) manner with which she acquitted herself post-eviction: “I’m gonna look at it like I came 10th out of 35,000 people,” she said, wearing a girlish grin that had been largely absent during the past few week. And then she sang a reprise of her Moloko cover and all the bile came flooding back. We look forward to this week’s “acoustic” night and the accompanying, no doubt, soulful/meaningful/”special” performances full of deep male pain (as with the departure of another female contestant, we are, as Mark Holden so sagely put it, “heading into the testosterone zone”). More »

“Devastating News For Female Idol Fans Everywhere”

10:42AM Clem Bastow | In a bit of press hyperbole the likes of which have not been seen since we were advised that Kate De Araugo fans would “literally die” if they missed her gig, Australian Idol’s Jacob Butler has announced that his ‘ITALIAN GIRLS DO IT BETTER’ t-shirt actually means something – yes, sorry girls, he’s off the market. In devastating news for female Idol fans everywhere, Butler this week revealed he’s been secretly dating Channel Ten publicist Paula Lucarelli for a year. The pair met on the set of The X Factor in 2005, but their relationship didn’t hit the right notes until Butler moved to Melbourne last year. “Devastating”! Were we snoozing when Jacob “Failed Musos Become Music Journalists” Butler became this year’s choice Idol hottie? Matt Corby, Mark Da Costa, Daniel Mifsud and Carl Riseley must be breathing a collective sigh of relief that Jacob has evidently swooped in to take over their pin-up duties. More »

Idol Round-Up: Questionable Song Choice Standing In The Way Of Holly’s Idol Dreams

11:30AM Clem Bastow | Adorably dorky Mildura barmaid Holly Weinert last night became Australian Idol ’07’s first casualty with a performance described by Kyle Sandilands as “Patti Newton on crack”. Weinert played her part as this year’s Reigan Derry by being “true to herself” by choosing a song that would’ve freaked out 98.3% of Idol viewers: The Gossip’s Standing In The Way Of Control (she did, however, give it a pretty red hot go). Despite neither being gay nor fat, Holly reckoned the song showed audiences who she was, and evidently they didn’t like it. Although, we will also express our dismay that Lana Krost is most certainly this year’s Schoolgirl Lauren, somehow escaping a boot out the door for her wet, tone-deaf and largely forgettable rendition of The Boog’s Shiver. This Sunday’s rock night will surely sort the wheat from the chaff, or at least provide Idol car-crash material the quality of which has not been “enjoyed” by viewers since Cosima De Vito went for a big note in River Deep, Mountain High only to find no sound emitting from her mouth, followed by a facial expression that would’ve won first prize in the international gurning contests. More »