Danny Gokey, Real or Fake?

American Idol has moved on to the stage where they begin to whittle down the Top 36 into the Top 12. This year, the actual elimination rounds are tougher than ever as idols compete in groups of 12 and only the top male and female vote-winners and the next highest vote-winner move on to the next round. Basically, what that means is 9 people are eliminated just like that. One chance. And what if you end up in a bad heat, so to speak? Where the very best three singers of the whole competition are in your group? Maybe you could have beaten people in the next group of 12, but this week, you're toast. Oh well, no one ever claimed Idol was fair.

This morning I want to talk a little bit about Danny Gokey, one of last night's top 3 moving on to the Top 12 round of the competition up on the big stage. Let me just preface this argument by saying Danny Gokey is extremely talented. There's no doubt the guy can sing.

With that being said, I still wonder if he's as good as the hype. This guy was going to be successful on Idol this year automatically. In fact, I think even if he had missed some words or notes in Tuesday night's performance, he would still be moving on even though singers like Anoop and Ricky were truly just as good.

Danny has two indisputable things going for him at this point.

Number 1. He has gotten an enormous amount of press in the pre-rounds of the competition. He's been featured and re-featured and photographed and held out in front of us like a little puppet. People will vote for him simply because they recognize him as someone they should vote for because the producers have put these subliminal messages into our brains about him. They basically spent weeks advertising him to us.

Number 2. (And this is where people may start hating me) His wife, Sophie, died just four weeks before his initial audition. I mean, the guy's what? 24 years old or something? And everyone watching AI up to this point knows the very sad story about how his wife, the absolute love of his life, died of some disease she'd had since childhood just before he auditioned. His friends convinced him to carry on to the audition, because that's what "Sophie would have wanted." Cry me a fucking river, okay? Yes, I feel bad for the guy. It's not fair for anyone to have their love taken from them so soon and so early in their life. On the other hand, the producers are milking it for all its worth. They have guilted Americans into thinking they pretty much have to vote for the guy because he deserves to go forward. Not simply because he's talented, but because he's been through a lot and needs our help to move on??? There's something wrong with that logic. American Idol is, after all, supposed to be about talent. Not pity.

And talk about being in a bad heat. How is anyone supposed to compete with this guy? I mean, it's a terrible way to say it, but it's almost like in some ways, he was fortunate to lose his wife when he did. It might just mean an American Idol win or at the very least, a recording deal worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Would he trade all that for a chance to be with his wife again? That's the question: is he real in his sorrow or is it just a game? No one knows that but Danny Gokey.