American Idol: What Should the Top 10 Sing for ‘Top 10s of 2010-2014’ Night?
This week’s American Idol performance telecast (Wednesday, 8/7c on Fox) will bring new meaning to the expression “tens across the board.”
Yes indeed, the official theme for the week is “Top 10 Sings Top 10” — in which the remaining contestants must tackle Top 10 hits from 2010 to the present.
To avoid an onslaught of overdone ditties (on reality singing competitions, anyhow) like “Radioactive,” “Stars” and “You and I” (which should have its jersey hung from the rafters thanks to Season 10’s Haley Reinhart), I’ve cooked up a dream set list of unexpected possibilities.
Check out my picks below, then hit the comments and do a little more brainstorming!
Dream Set List for “Top 10s of 2010 and Beyond” Night
Majesty Rose: The Lumineers’ “Ho Hey” or a slowed-down, acoustic twist on Rihanna’s “Where Have You Been“
Alex Preston: Usher’s “More” (acoustic, of course) or The Script’s “Hall of Fame“
Jena Irene: Karmin’s “Brokenhearted” or Sara Bareilles’ “Brave” or Fantasia’s “Bittersweet“
Jessica Meuse: Miranda Lambert’s “Mama’s Broken Heart” or Phillip Phillips’ “Gone Gone Gone“
M.K. Nobilette: Kelly Rowland’s “Motivation” or Miguel’s “Adorn” or Alicia Keys’ “Try Sleeping With a Broken Heart“
Sam Woolf: Hot Chelle Rae’s “Tonight Tonight” or Taylor Swift’s “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together“
Malaya Watson: Mike Posner’s “Cooler Than Me” or La Roux’s “Bulletproof“
Caleb Johnson: Lady Gaga’s “Paparazzi” or Daughtry’s “Waiting for Superman“
C.J. Harris: Kenny Chesney & Grace Potter’s “You and Tequila” or Jason Aldean’s “Fly-Over States” or American Authors’ “Best Day of My Life“
Dexter Roberts: Carrie Underwood’s “Two Black Cadillacs” or Little Big Town’s “Pontoon” (maybe covering a female artist can help him avoid another karaoke moment?)
Your turn! David Cook up a list of your favorite recent Top 10s for the Season 13 Top 10 below!
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Sam should sing OneRepublic’s “Counting Stars”
Or Sam Tsui does a sick mashup of Timber and Counting Stars that Sam could pull off.
Michael, you usually want someone to sing “Fast car” and this season I completely agree. Jessica or MK could do amazing things with that song. Where is Reality Check?!!
Tonight, Tonight is an awful, awful, awful song, it shouldn’t exist, and nobody should sing it. So I disagree with that suggestion for Sam.
Majesty Rose has another shot at Let It Go!!
LOL, please no!
I want Majesty to do Dixie Chicks’ Travelin’ Soldier. Yeah, it wasn’t top 10 and it was an older song. But sing it anytime during the show.
Love the choices of “Mama’s Broken Heart” for Jess and “Adorn” for MK. Take note, ladies.
I never thought I’d miss the themes as much as I do. I used to complain about the themes but it was because it was the same old crap over and over again. But I miss themes forcing people to be creative and interpret songs to their style. Those are the things that gave the “moments” they always talk about. A bunch of singers just doing karaoke version of current songs isn’t going to create moments.
As much as the show itself has improved this season, the stuff on stage is still very mediocre compared to other seasons.
I don’t think I can see someone as timid as MK doing “Motivation.” Unless the goal is to make the poor girl spontaneously burst into flames on stage like that cheerleader on Buffy.
Oh dear, that’s a Made Me Laugh! :-)
I hope Dexter gets eliminated. He is soooo karaoke. I’m not sure how he has a fanbase. Just because he’s country does not mean he is anything special.
I agree, to me I find dexter to be the weakest singer left (I felt he was generally weaker than Ben, although probably not last week).
Would totally vote for Dexter if he sings Bird is the word by Peter Griffin
That was funny!
Jessica is in the center of that Top 10 picture. She is the winner. Well….hopefully.
She’s amazing!
Can’t wait to hear her Wednesday.
I dont think Jess can win unless/until she begins to connect more. At the moment I think she is heading straight for an elimination at 4 or 5.
I said ‘hopefully.’ To be honest, I know it’s more likely that she won’t win, but one can dream can’t they?
But anyway, I’ll be a Meuse fan for life.
I only know 5 songs on this list.I love Adorn and if MK is up to it ok then. Bittersweet is the best song I have heard Fantasia sing.Be curious to hear,Jena’s take on it.Ho Hey is a fun song for Majesty.And Caleb singing Paparazzi would be a hoot.Gone Gone Gone might lift Jesse up.BTW,what top 10 lists can they choose from??
Love the Way You Lie? I bet somebody does Wrecking Ball, and Born This Way,
Even though I’m sure we’re all sick of the song “Say Something,” I think it could be a great moment for Majesty.
I so agree with the first half of your sentence :-)
I think we’ll probably get the same old rehashes. I expect to see songs by Katy Perry, Pink, Adele, Bruno Mars, Train, Rihanna, maybe even some thing from the competitor Maroon 5, all the stuff AI already has the rights to. Don’t know if we’ve heard a Taylor Swift song yet. Retreads in other words. I definitely expect something by a former Idol, maybe Kelly? I want to hear someone do Call Me Maybe, but I bet that’ll be a group number. I think Dexter, Caleb, Sam and MK are really gonna struggle to find the right song this week. And in my opinion, none of these singers has the vocal chops to do anything by Sara Bareilles. Agree 100% with suggestion for Dexter. Wait a minute, when did Chicken Fried come out? Lol.
Here’s a quick list with a few suggestions.
Majesty – Cough Syrup (Young The Giant)
Jessica – Blow Me One Last Kiss (Pink)
Malaya – We Found Love (Rihanna)
MK – Jar Of Hearts (Christina Perri)
Jena – Telephone (Lady Gaga)
Alex – When I Was Your Man (Bruno Mars)
Caleb – Tighten Up (Black Keys)
Sam – Get Lucky (Daft Punk)
CJ –
Dexter – I’ve got nothing for these two. I just don’t do country.
Jar of Hearts=EW!
When I Was Your Man=Boring
Other than that, I thin they are pretty good suggestions (though Cough Syrup already has been done a LOT)
A side note: Remember when nobody had ever heard of Stars, and it was a novelty that Amanda Brown sang it. Yeah, those days are long gone.
Here are some of my picks.
MK – Tegan and Sara Closer, Beyonce – XO
Jena – Lady Gaga – Dope, Justin Timberlake – Mirrors
Alex Preston – Vampire Weekend – Diane Young, Drake Hold on We’re going home
Caleb Johnson – The Power of Love – Gabrielle Aplin, Avicii – Lay me down
Jessica M. – Tie it up – Kelly Clarkson, ZZ Ward – Move like you stole it
CJ Harris- You Ain’t Alone Alabama Shakes, Thinking About you – Frank Ocean
Majesty Rose – Call Your Girlfriend-Robyn, Churchill – Change
Dexter Roberts- American Honey – Lady Antebellum, Kacey Musgrave – Follow Your Arrow
Sam Woolf – Love you like love song – Selena Gomez, Ed Sheeran – Kiss me
Malaya Watson – Ciara – Body Party, Mary Blidge – The Living Proof
Some great choices here, but were these all Top 10 hits?
i think sam could pull off a stripped version of cough syrup.
Omg the every-single-post mentions of Haley have got to stop. We get it, you like her and so did we (though she hasn’t done anything too notable since she left Idol has she?) but if someone should dare to sing a song done by the Great Haley Reinhart then let them and maybe it will be good and maybe it’ll be terrible but stop acting like she’s, I don’t know Christina Aguilera or Steven Tyler or someone else that’s that established and inimitable. Geez sorry just had to get that off my chest lol.
I’ve gotten so sick of the HR bs that I don’t read the articles any more. I just go to the comments. I couldn’t stand her during her season and hope to never see her again.
Haha good to see from the responses that I’m not the only one annoyed by the Cult :P
Thing is, I did like Haley, she was probably my favourite contestant that season towards the second half, but is she one of the most significant contestants to ever be on Idol? No. If Michael constantly mentioned Kelly Clarkson or JHud or Adam Lambert- i.e. contestants that were prodigiously talented in their seasons AND who’ve gone on to do great things post Idol- I would not be complaining one bit but putting Haley on this kind of pedestal honestly just takes away from her and gets really annoying.
You will never know true peace until you have accepted Haley into your heart. Long after AI is canceled (probably after next season), the cult of Haley will meet here every week to hear the prophet speak of her soothing songs. All praise Haley!
Thhpptt!
You got that right! All hail the princess! All hail the princess!
Even though she has no career, it’s not her loss. It’s the record label that dropped her’s loss.
Her album, (I DO OWN IT) is great!
Haley will live on forever on Slezak’s blog.
(But sometimes, I think Slezak mentions Haley a lot to piss some people off. But he’s laughing at them They should just accept the fact that Haley was one of the best contestants ever on this show.)
This whole “it’s Haley’s song, no one else should sing it” is super annoying. Haley didn’t even write the song, so why is it hers? I get that people here seem to like her, and I did too, but please cool it with that BS; it makes you sound like Rachel Berry.
Michael, we love You for your undying love for Miss Reinhart.
Some of us love him in spite of it.
Thank you, Mr. Slezak, for loving Haley Reinhart!
Seriously, what I liked about Haley is I didn’t care for her at all initially. In fact, I was upset when she made the top 13 or Top “whatever it was that season”. But when she sang “Blue” I thought maybe I can like this girl. And with each week I liked her more and more. By the time she sang “Bennie and the Jets” (not even my favorite Elton John song) I was hooked. And when she sang my all-time favorite Led Zeppelin song “What is and what Should Never Be” with her dad on the guitar I was a total fan.
.
I also loved Crystal Bowersox – but she had me at hello. ;-)
Majesty Rose: “Undone” (Haley Reinhart)
Jessica Meuse: “Let Her Go” (Passenger)
Malaya Watson: “Girl on Fire” (Alicia Keys)
Jena Irene: “Human” (Christina Perri)
MK Nobilette: “Carry On” (Fun.)
Dexter Roberts: “I Hold On” (Dierks Bentley)
CJ Harris: “Cough Syrup” (Young the Giant)
Caleb Johnson: “Bleeding Out” (Imagine Dragons)
Alex Preston: “Pompeii” (Bastille) – stripped down and slowed down
Sam Woolf: “22” (Taylor Swift) – stripped down
To me, there is so much more artistry in watching young artists sing songs from different eras and the ever-hated “theme nights” and at least *try* to make them unique and current than there is in performing pop songs of the past four years and get karaoke performance after karaoke performance–except perhaps from Jena, who has shown originality in her performances. I hope I’m wrong and these kids blow me away. But then, I hope that every week and it hasn’t happened yet. I can honestly say that not one performance has blown me away. Not one.
Jena – “Ain’t It Fun” (Paramore)
MK – “Hold On We’re Going Home” (Drake
Majesty – “Everyone’s Waiting” (Missy Higgins)
…don’t really care about what the others sing.
Jessica-Gunpowder and Lead
Majesty-Let Her Go
Alex-Timber (but changing it up on his guitar)
Malaya-People Like Us
Sam-Story Of My Life
MK-Jar Of Hearts
“Gunpowder and Lead” is a great choice for Jessica but I think the songs have to be from 2010 and forward. I believe that song is older.
Majesty Rose- Clown (Emeli Sande)
Alex Preston- Some Nights (fun), Payphone (Maroon 5), Pumped Up Kicks (Foster the People), We Can’t Stop (MIley Cyrus), Scream and Shout (will.I.am. & Brittney Spears)
Any florence and the machine, elle goulding or birdy songs will sound interesting to mk, majesty, sam, jess and jena ;)
What’s up with all these taylor swift and 1D suggestions for Sam?
I dont really see him as the cute-boy-next-door type either. His charm is more dark and mysterious. His stare kind of reminds me of Dexter or Hannibal.
That may be, but he hasn’t really done anything upbeat. Maybe he needs to change it up to get the votes.
He’s a white guy with guitar, he doesn’t need upbeat songs to get the votes. All he need to do is keep on singing with his guitar with lots of smoldering and smizing in front of the camera.
Are we not remembering he was in the bottom 3 this past week?
And remember the lyrics, Brook :)
Now that you mention it, he really does look like a young serial killer in movies lol. My votes, my heart (and brain?) are still on him though. Haha
Top Ten/Top Ten?
Majesty–“Girl on Fire” (Alicia Keys)
Malaya–“Royals” (Lorde)
MK–“Get Lucky” (Mackelmore and Ryan Lewis)
Jessica–“Same Trailer, Different Park” (Casey Musgraves)
Jena–“Begin Again” (Taylor Swift)
Dexter–“Boys ‘Round Here” (Blake Shelton)
Caleb–“Springsteen” (Eric Church)
Sam–“Pumped Up Kicks”
Alex–“Now You’re Just Somebody that I Used to Know”
CJ–“I Drive Your Truck” (Lee Brice)
Reblogged this on Septian Online.
I can see Jessica possibly doing Pumped Up Kicks for this week.
Y’know, decided I don’t care ’bout this season at all. Yay — one less thing!
Candice was my apex it seems. None of these ‘warblers’ are going to come close to her. Still, best of luck to (nearly) all. It must be a real meat grinder of an experience.