Rock Star Supernova: Week 2 Performances

Well, this week is was actually busy on tuesday night and didn't get to see Episode 2 of Rock Star on CBS, but I did watch both the Reality Show and Web Performance on the site - so my perspective this week is decided focused. I didn't see any of the excess, no chit-chat between the SN boys and the hamsters on the wheel, no comments or feed back, just the preparation for the show and the results.

One thing about seeing the show this way is that my impressions are pure - I don't have the tendency to have my feelings and views batted to and fro by what the band says, or what other commentators have said. I've read none of the other write-ups on any other site - not yet, only my wife has given me a spoiler that "that Zayra chick really got clowned". More on that later.

Watching the webcast of the performances the first up was Magni, and his verion of The Who's "My Generation" was strong and impressive. He seemed real self assured and pulled off the vocal very well. It didn't blow my socks off or make my fingers tingle, but it was decent and without major flaws.

Jenny was second and I was expecting a repeat of her head-on collision with last weeks Nickleback song, but she did fine on her version of "Tainted Love". It had a little bit of the Marilyn Manson vibe going at the begining but veared off nicely to become it's own thing without echoing either Manson or Soft Cell's original. In the reality show Jenny had made quite a big deal about Lukas comments that she her performance on week one was "weak" and had assumed that those comments were some strategy on his part - but no, she was weak last time - this time she was better.

Jill - the tiny Italian powerhouse - was not very whelming on Violet. Well, in a way she was if her goal was to do a Courtney Love impression. She delivered that wonderfully, including the Baby-Doll dress and Madonna-ish crawling around on the floor, so we got a fine upskirt shot (ala Courtney with Madonna on the MTV awards). It's a weird thing to listen to a good singer do a song by a bad singer. I can't say that she was "pitchy" because she was doing what Courtney does, which - to play a little musical inside baseball for moment - is to actually sing the song modally (using notes between the regular 12-tone "doe ray me" scale). Normally people doing that just sound like crap, but sometimes - sometimes it works. Sometimes you can miss the notes and still land on your feet, Trent Reznor is a master at this, and in many ways so is Courtney. Hearing Jill do it, particular after she belted the shit out of Janis Joplin last week actually sounds a bit forced. Her tendency is to actually hit the notes and when you have to deliberately miss them, it sounds strange - at least to my ear. Overall I thought her performance was technically great, maybe even better on technical grounds because of how she had to fight against her own habits, but I don't know if the overall effect was the same. It was good I guess, but I would have like to see more Jill and less of her channelling someone else for once, be it Janice or Courtney. A band like Supernova doesn't need a chameloen, who is a second best version of everyone else - they need the first and best version of Jill!

Ira from Metal Church (left) with Brian O'Connor (Vicious Rumours) in Hollywood

Zayra during the reality show looked like a freight train headed for a mountainside painted over to look like a tunnel. Wham! In rehearsal she was just completely, totally fucking lost. On the show she was a little bit better than I expect, but still terrible. After the way she sounded in the studio on the first reality episode - where I literally fell out of my chair laughing - I knew this was a disaster just waiting for a return receipt. I was right. This time she destroyed "You Really Got Me" and it's pretty difficult to fuck up a song that David Lee Roth has previously failed to fuck up - but she did. Watching this girl sing is like watching a hyper-active poodle jump up and down going "Yip... Yip...Yip". I'm pretty sure I saw some of the hamster in the bullpen falling over themselves laughing this time too. It was just too fucking pathetic. HOW. DID. THIS. BINT. GET. ON. THIS. SHOW! Is she the token chica or what? I'm serious, this is Bull and SHIT. At the Hollywood audition was the former lead singer of the metal band Vicious Rumours - Brian O'Connor. I know that Supernova isn't going to be Metal band, but the idea that Brian - whose a fantastic singer - got the boot and this freaking poodle-in-a-bodysuit wound up on the show just melts my cerebrum. Oy vey!

Chris doing "Take Me Out" was good. During the reality show he seemed like he was in trouble, but I think he pulled it out. Unfortunately this song, just like his previous performance of Roxanne, tended to show the limitations of his voice. Unlike that song, this one was pretty undemanding and actually fit his style pretty well, but he's going to have major problems if he has to jump out of his niche again.

Dilana's Ring of Fire was cool. She definately has an eerie vibe going, and brought that to this version of the Johnny Cash hit, making it sound almost like a track from his final Trent Reznor produced album. She also did well to create a sense of stage prescence without being overly dramatic and affected. A little pitchy at the beginning but a strong finish.

Phil's performance of the Tonic song was a step up from last week. He actually bothered to enunciate this time, so you actually discerne words and syllabals and stuff. He, like Chris, has a very affected vocal style, which actually reminds me quite a bit of Jeff Buckley but without Jeff's fantastic falsetto control. Phil definately has potential, but again like Chris and unlike Jill, his stylings are more limiting than expansive. Phil as a choice for Supernova shuts down their options rather than opens them up.

Storm, is as I've said, my nominal NorCal favorite - and I think her performance this time on Cheap Trick's "Surrender" was as strong as last weeks "Pinball Wizard" even if I really wasn't feeling the pig-tail look at all. She seems to be staking out the lower register and becoming on of the two Dueling Altos (cue the banjo music) with Dilana. Both of them have strong voices, which at times sound like men - but their stage styles are very distinctive. After years of making small stages look big in the clubs Storm is all ARENA ROCK, which fits well with Supernova's aims - but I think she's going to have to find a way to bring some more character to the table in order to match up with with Dilana and some of the others on this show. There's more to this than simply being the Arena Rock Chick (tm)!

Ryan on "Jumping Jack Flash" looked lost on stage - at least during the first verse, then he seem to go out into the audience and find himself as he came back strong for the second verse and chorus. It wasn't a bad performance, but again - not knock your socks off great. Feh.

Patrice, who last week did an awesome job on the Jefferson Airplane song "Want somebody to love" was practically terrible this week. First of all she was pitchy during the first verse until she found herself during the chorus. Playing guitar along with the band is cool, but it's also limiting - you can't move around the stage unless you wear one of those little Brittany head-phone mics (which don't work worth crap - hence all the lip-syncing) . I guess Patrice mostly suffers on this song in comparison to Jordis performance of it from last year. Jordis tore it up, and really pulled out the angst and passion of the tune, but Patrice sung it almost too prettily for any of that to come throuhg. She was probably wise not to try and duplicate Jordis' or Cobains version too closely, but I'm not sure what she came up with really stood on it's own as anything more than pedestrian.

Lukas doing the Coldplay was ok, but feh. My main problem with Glamour Boy is that he's just too damn glam all the time and the eye-glitter was just inappropriate for this song. Sure, I guess that's his schtick, but over the top much? His aim in taking a lower energy song from the Reality Show was to showcase a different side of his style, and I don't think he accomplished that. He showed that he can sing without growling for 15 seconds, but that's about it. His normal un-angsty voice is no great shakes, it is was - this would have been cool, but it wasn't. Also his tendency to kick into growl-man cause him to foreshadow his knock-out punch at the climax of the song -- you don't give away the ending before you're halfway through the story or it falls flat, and that's just what this performance did. A little restraint, a little more nuance and a teeny tiny bit more taste - and this could have been a killer performance, but it wasn't.

Dana, the Country Kitten is so out of place on this show. She has a great voice, if it's a little weak in the lower registers, but this performance of "Born to be Wild" was not happening. This is a real Biker Song, it's not for moped riding wanna-be's in their big sisters leather skirt. This was Vegas, as Ty was so often accused of last year, it was lounge singer. Y'know the people who don't get to the big stage and instead wind up singing to the drunk losers at the bar, who are interested in looking up their skirt than listen to their vocal stylings. She sang song great technically, but it was just way more American Idol-atry than Rock Star. Lukas need to give away some of his excess vocal grit, and Dana could certainly use some of it.

Josh and Toby's songs weren't included on the website, so I didn't get to see them which is a bummer and drag, but oh well - what can you do?

I don't have the full perspective this time and in some ways I still think that might have been a good thing, but I have what I have.

Until the Elimination Show tonight - Hasta.

Vyan