It is a sad day here at Marley World Headquarters. Yes, Mandisa was voted off of “American Idol.” Sad not just because we thought she had the goods to go all the way, but because tools like Ace and Bucky are still hanging around. What gives, America?

Well, in all fairness, Mandisa was not very good the last few weeks. And let’s face it, when Simon made the comments very early on this season that the stage might not be big enough……let’s just say America already has one extremely overweight Idol and you don’t see much of Ruben Studdard anymore. And every time you do see him perform, he’s soaked in sweat and out of breath. That may not be fair but I am quite sure appearance was somewhat of a deciding factor.

The show started with the new face of Kenny Rogers….seriously dude, it’s okay to look like an old man!
Anyway, he performed his new single “I Can’t Unlove You” and sounded great….Simon even
commented beforehand that even though he doesn’t like country music, he is a Kenny Rogers fan.

Then after another really stupid Ford commercial (it’s not even worth getting into) they broke the remaining contestants into groups of 3, with one of those being the bottom 3. I thought for sure the group of Katharine, Ace and Bucky was it but I was wrong…it was Elliott, Paris and Mandisa. Paris….are you kidding me? Please, people…don’t vote her off before Ace or Bucky…show me that you have some semblance of hearing left.

So now we are left with the elite 8: Taylor, Kellie, Chris, Elliot, Paris, Ace, Katharine and Bucky.
I guess I’m sticking to my guns here and saying Chris is my favorite to go all the way. But has anyone noticed that Taylor keeps hanging around and hasn’t been in the bottom 3 yet? Neither has Kellie….hmmm. Stay tuned, it’s gonna get interesting.

Next week the contestants perform the music of one of the greatest rock bands ever, Queen. Ace will use his falsetto to hang on, but Bucky doing Freddy Mercury? Start packing your bags, dude.

Marley, OUT.