'American Idol' Season 11, Episode 19 Recap - 'Finalists Compete'

Seacrest opens things up by telling us how the show, "in cooperation with law enforcement," has determined that one of their contestants has to be eliminated for rules violations. In case you're wondering, yes, he just used Jermaine's past arrests and incidents of lying to law enforcement as a tease for the opening of the show. Not only that, but he's holding off on revealing who it is until later, hoping we'll all stay tuned.

Gross. Just absolutely disgusting. Anything for ratings, huh Fox?

Anyway, the theme of the evening is having the contestants sing songs from the year they were born, which means the music will range from 1995 to like 2007. No, it's actually 1983 to 1995. But still.

We also get baby photos of all the contestants, plus our three judges and host. So far, Phillip Phillips wins for cutest baby, and also for biggest trooper: the kid has to get a kidney stone removed, but Will.i.am maintains that he "killed it" in rehearsal. He sings "Hard to Handle," which is kinda cheating since it's an Otis Redding song from the 1960's that was covered in 1989 when Phillip was born. He does well enough with it, though it's not much of a song to show off with.

The judges love it! But the reaction from the audience is maybe a little too overenthusiastic. Yeah, it was fine, but nothing deserving of that long an ovation.

Jessica Sanchez is up next, and she's doing "Turn the Beat Around." Will.i.am does a little giddy dance in his seat when she sings. Coincidentally, that's the same thing I do when she sings, because she's actually really good, and makes up for everybody else in this competition at this point. Sure enough, she sings the hell out of it, shiny pants and all, but it may have not been the best song choice.

The judges agree. Steven doesn't want her to stray from ballads, and thinks her rhythm was a little "shady." But he loved her pants. In fact, all the judges loved her pants. Well, good. Pants.

Next is Heejun, who was also born in 1989. His parents are kinda adorable, but the best part is when his mother starts crying when thinking about her little boy, and Heejun's father reaches his arm over, gives her shoulder a few quick pats, then takes the arm away. Now we know where Heejun gets his awkwardness from.

Heejun chooses "Right Here Waiting" by Richard Marx, and asks Will.i.am for Fergie's phone number. His performance is emotionally connected, but he's still ever so slightly off pitch on a couple notes, and pretty much just stands center and delivers.

The judges don't love it! Randy calls it "pitchy all over the place" and thinks it sounded out of breath. Jennifer heard some struggle, but enjoys his tone so much and notes that the emotional connection was good. "You've got a special voice," says Steven. Seacrest asks Heejun if he was thinking of someone while he was singing, and Heejun points out his girlfriend in the crowd. He also notes that he was thinking about Jennifer and Fergie too.

Elise Testone is next, and she was either a handful when she was younger or her parents were very absent-minded. She's singing "Let's Stay Together," presumably the Tina Turner version and not the Al Green version, because I'm pretty sure she wasn't born in 1973. The editors also cut her together with President Obama so that they harmonize. Ha.

The performance is short and sweet, and very nicely sung. It's a big improvement over last week, which is a nice break since she's better than most of the other singers here.

The judges love it! Randy says, "America, Elise is baaaaaack!" Seacrest makes a joke about making babies.

DeAndre was born in 1994, so we're going to get some great music out of him I'm sure. Poor kid. DeAndre's mother has provided video of DeAndre watching "The Music Man" in full drum major garb, marching and singing along, for which DeAndre is appropriately mortified.

He shows up singing "Can You Feel the Love Tonight," to which Jimmy and Will.i.am fall just short of saying ARE YOU F*CKING KIDDING ME?! They assign him "Endless Love" instead, and I'm not sure it's an improvement. He sings it fine technically, but clearly has little interest in it. Can't blame him.

The judges don't like it either, saying it wasn't the right song for him. His choices weren't great from that year, but even "December, 1963 (Oh What A Night)" might have been better than this.

Shannon Magrane is next, and she was born in what, 2002? Oh, 1995. Whatever. Apparently she loved the song from "Thumbelina," which her dad would heave in his head while he pitched. Poor guy.

Speaking of poor guy, poor Jimmy has to tell Shannon all about the HTC Whatever or Something phone that syncs wirelessly with the conveniently placed boom box that plays Shannon's song, "Don't Speak" by No Doubt. For a moment I'm really excited that she'll sing that, but then she goes with "One Sweet Day" by Mariah Carey. DAMMIT.

Shannon's very talented, but I'm not so sure taking on Mariah was the best choice. She seems a little lost through, and unable to really support the notes and runs that she takes on in trying to match what Mariah did.

The judges love it! JLo thinks she did a "beautiful job" with it. Steven loved it too, and Randy notes that he was worried about the song choice, but says that she did a great job considering the big choice. I disagree.

Colton Dixon's mother is wearing way too much makeup for someone who just gave birth in Colton's baby picture. Colton chooses "Broken Heart" by White Lion, joking that he'll start choosing songs that people know next week. Side note: Jimmy must want to kill Will.i.am in every take. Colton sings the song nicely, but it isn't a terrific song to begin with and nobody knows it.

The judges love it! Jennifer says that Colton "looks pretty" when he sings. Steven didn't like the song, and thought that it didn't go anywhere. Randy wasn't crazy about the song, but liked the performance.

Erika Van Pelt was born in 1985, so if she doesn't pick a good song, there's something wrong. Her mother gives her a nice send-up. Erika chooses a Bryan Adams song, "Heaven," which is... fine, I guess. I feel like that's a waste of 1985. Colton could have picked probably five Bryan Adams songs with 1991.

Erika starts singing in front of a screen showing some horrible animation of climbing subway stairs, because when I think of climbing the stairway to heaven, I think of the urine-soaked steps of the subway.

The judges aren't crazy about it! Steven thought it wasn't a great arrangement and she should have stayed with the melody more. Randy agrees that the song didn't need that much help. Jennifer mostly talks about Erika's appearance.

And now, exploitation of Jermaine's personal problems! "Idol" actually has a clip of Nigel Lythgoe's meeting with Jermaine, in which he confronts him about his outstanding warrants and arrests and fake names (Joel Jones and Kareem Watkins... the second is much more creative), which is in incredibly bad taste. They couldn't have just booted the kid and that was that?

Anyway, the producers tell him they don't have any problem with contestants' backgrounds, but they have to disclose them at the top. We get a look at Jermaine's performance during Tuesday's rehearsal, and a very dramatic slow-motion exit. Vomit.

Skylar Laine is nervous about the judges "being meeeeeean!" Skylar had to choose from 1994, and says she had trouble choosing a song. Wasn't Reba McEntire singing in 94? Oh well, she sings Bonnie Raitt instead, despite Jimmy trying to give her something else to sing. Will.i.am jokes about Skylar doing a Coolio song, and the segment ends with the worst Photoshop you've ever seen of Skylar with Coolio hair.

The judges love it! The song, not the photoshop. Steven is all about it, Jennifer psyches Skylar out but tells her he loves it, and Randy says the song choice didn't matter because she rocked it. Yawn.

Joshua Ledet finally gets his crawfish: a big bucket of them on stage, and he and Seacrest both bite into one. Joshua cheats a bit too by singing "When a Man Loves a Woman," saying it's the Michael Bolton version. Of course it's not really. "My dad's a pastor" he tells Will. "You SOUND like your dad's a pastor!" Will responds.

Joshua kills the performance again, just like he did last week, so if he ends up in the bottom three again, that settles it: the voting audience is racist.

The judges love it! Jennifer doesn't want to sit down. Randy says he "blew it out da box." Jennifer says it was "the best thing I've ever seen on 'American Idol.'" At least she's trying to keep him on the show.

Hollie Cavanaugh will close out the evening, who was born in 1993 over in the UK. Her dad gets all choked up, and it's kinda sweet. Hollie is taking on Celine Dion now, after tackling Christina Aguilera and Whitney Houston thus far. Tough choices, but the girl has guts. She does a pretty solid job with it, belting out the big notes.

The judges love it! Jennifer notes "one or two tiny little things," but thinks it would be "silly" to criticize them. Steven notes the pitchiness, and Randy says that she also "blew it out da box."

Randy thinks Joshua is safest, and says Heejun is in trouble. Jennifer agrees about Joshua, but wimps out about the in trouble. Steven calls Joshua the "Jessica of this week," and refuses to name one in trouble. It's cute how they think their opnions really matter, doesn't it?