American Idol winner David Cook has been praised by both the judges and the fantards for his supposed originality. But really, how original can anyone be on a show that features nothing but cover versions of popular songs? And he sang/growled every single song in the style of a sedated Chris Daughtry. So why do people see him as oh so freaking original?

I think it all boils down to the song choice decisions. Let's take third placer Syesha Mercado as an example. She kept trying to copy her idol Whitney Houston by taking on big diva ballads. She did okay most of the time, but of course she'd never be Whitney. Unsurprisingly, the judges hated her for it. Perhaps she would have been better off if she took on the Beatles. (Oh wait, she was forced to do that twice and sucked both times. Forget I said anything. Sorry.)

David Cook on the other hand wisely went with unexpected choices like Lionel Richie's Hello and Michael Jackson's Billie Jean. He didn't try to impersonate the original artists--he sang everything in his unoriginal rocker voice. And it worked. My favorite is his version of Mariah Carey's Always Be My Baby. Got to give props to a guy who can sing Mariah without sounding totally gay by going overboard with falsettos and other vocal calisthenics.

Not bad huh? I think that a guy singing a famous female song has a good chance of capturing attention simply because he would sound totally different from the original--unless he has undescended testicles like that kid from Boyzone.

Want another example? Check out this cover of Britney Spears's Everytime by some Irish dude.

That one has been stuck in my head for a few days now. And to think I hated Britney's version....

I wonder if the same trick would work for me. I have a boring singing voice with very limited range, so if I attempt to sing something by Journey or Chicago (both of which I love--don't you dare laugh), I'd come across as a very poor imitation. But if I choose to do a girly song instead, I bet I'd sound somewhat original. Not necessarily good, but original.

Or, as Paula Abdul would put it, "You made the song your own.... Your soul shined through the watermelon seed like a squishy magic rainbow.... Oh my god, I'm so high right now. More painkillers please."

One of the things I like about American Idol is how it helps me discover old songs. It's 70s week on Idol, and the other day, bland blonde semifinalist Brooke White covered Carly Simon's "You're So Vain."

I had no idea know who Carly Simon is, but I liked the song. I particularly loved the "clouds in my coffee" line. Songwriters back then really knew how to come up with beautiful metaphors. Nowadays, all we get is crap like "under my umbrella, ella, ella, eh, eh."

So I searched the Web for more information, and I soon landed on Carly Simon's Wikipedia page. I wish I didn't. I almost threw up when I read the first sentence.

Carly Elisabeth Simon (born June 25, 1945 in New York City) is an American musician who emerged as one of the leading lights of the early 1970s singer-songwriter movement, and whose song "You're So Vain" was famously covered by American Idol's Brooke White.

Famously covered my ass. We all know that Wikipedia works by allowing itself to be edited by random morons, and on this night, one moron decided that the crowning achievement of Ms Simon's long and illustrious career is having one of her songs sang on a karaoke show. It took a little over four hours before a smarter moron removed the offending line, which is the right thing to do because Brooke White doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as Carly Simon. She doesn't even have her own Wikipedia page for heaven's sake. She's a nobody!

I just don't quite understand Brooke White's appeal. Sure, she has a pleasant voice and is cute enough, but I find her very annoying for some reason. Maybe it's her phony rainbows-and-sunshine nice girl persona. Or maybe it's how her face reminds me of sock puppets. I hate sock puppets.

Fine, so you probably can't see the resemblance there, but that's only because I was too lazy to find the right pictures. Trust me, she really looks a lot like a sock puppet from certain angles, especially when she opens her mouth wide while singing. Also, she has about as much personality as a sock.

And oh, her performance of "You're So Vain" was "aight" but nowhere near as good as the way Carly Simon did it. Compare.

British singer Amy Winehouse went to rehab the other day. Celebrities check in and out of rehab all the time, but I found this instance somewhat funny because one of her hit songs goes "They tried to make me go to rehab but I said no, no, no."

So it's "yes, yes, yes" now? Heh.

Well, it's about time. She's quite talented, and it would be a shame to see her career destroyed by drug use. And although celebrity rehab rarely works, I guess it's still enough to move her down to #2 on my celebrity death list. Britney Spears reclaims the top spot. Congratulations! I hope no one pulls another Heath Ledger and screws up my list.

9 Crimes by Damien Rice has been one of my favorite songs since I first heard it on the Tonight Show last year.

I like it even though I don't get the meaning of half the lyrics. Hell, I don't even understand the title. 9 Crimes? Why?

After hearing it again on an episode of Standoff a few weeks ago, I thought I should blog about how much I like that song. So I went to YouTube and found the official music video. I wish I didn't.

What the hell? Sure, it's amusing, but it's totally inappropriate for the mood and style of the song! I decided to turn the blog entry into a rant against how criminally lame the music video is.

But I also noticed a video called How To Play "9 Crimes" By Damien Rice in the related videos section. I took a look at it and told myself "Ha! That's easy!" despite the fact that I haven't touched a piano in over a year. Back in college, I used to play a bit almost every night. And although I was never any good, that tutorial video made playing 9 Crimes look like a piece of cake. Mmm, cake....

So last night, I wiped the dust off my ancient Kawai FS690 keyboard and gave it a go. Disaster ensued. The keys felt strange and unfamiliar beneath my fingers. I kept hitting the wrong notes, apparently pissing off the neighbor's dog so much that it wouldn't stop barking.

After half an hour of frustration, I finally managed to play through the whole song a few times without screwing up too badly. Yay! As a bonus, I got the most relaxing night of sleep I've had in months.

It turned out to be the longest too. I still don't know how it happened, but I didn't wake up until 2:30 PM, almost 10 hours after I went to bed. Missing both breakfast and lunch? Now that's 2 very serious crimes.

I looked this up after hearing it mentioned on Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

Brothers and sisters, check out the U2charist! It's just like your good old Episcopalian Eucharist service but with U2 songs instead of boring traditional church hymns!

OK, what the hell? I really don't know what to say. The whole thing is just so... wrong. I guess I'll have to wait for comments from Philos and the other Christians around here.

I'm sure most of you have had experiences with the Last Song Syndrome, an excruciating and potentially fatal condition where the last song you heard plays over and over in your head, and you can't make it stop no matter how many times you bang your head against the wall or the sharp corner of a table.

Beauty and Madness, an 80s pop song by Fra Lippo Lippi, has been playing over and over in my head for a few hours now. But I can't really call it LSS--it's not the last song I heard. Hell, I don't think I've even heard that song once in the last two years.

So why is that particular song on permanent repeat mode in my head? I wish I knew. It just seems so... random. Beauty and Madness just popped into my head as I was having my lunch. It could be because I was having a beautiful meal. Or it could be because the beef lasagna that I had was going to give me mad cow disease. Or it could be because a chip planted in my brain by aliens was picking up radio signals from a retro station. I don't know, and I don't want to overanalyze it.

I just want it to go away.

I actually think that it's a beautiful song. But I've had enough of the beauty, and I'm afraid that I'm inching closer to madness.

God, please make it stop. Make it stop!

I've been trying to cut down my daily TV time. I used to watch Jay Leno's Tonight Show almost every night, but not anymore. For the past two weeks, I've been checking NBC's website, and I only watch the show when interesting guests are on.

When I checked the site yesterday, the scheduled musical guest was Sergio Mendes. Hmm. I don't know too many of his songs, but the guy is a legend in the industry, so it could be interesting. But wait, it wasn't just Sergio Mendes. It was going to be "Sergio Mendes with The Black Eyed Peas"!

I've hated the Black Eyed Peas ever since they polluted the airwaves with that annoying LSS-inducing Where Is the Love song a few years ago. And now, they're doing a song with the Sergio Mendes? What the.... it's like mixing orange juice and coffee. The result can't be good.

Still, I decided to watch the show out of curiosity. And I regret it. The "song" was more Black Eyed Peas than Sergio Mendes. In other words, it sucked--sounded like elephants (elephunks?) letting out random farts.

What happened to Mr. Mendes? How do you go from Never Gonna Let You Go to this crap? I feel bad for the old man. But he did get to see Fergie shaking her booty right in front of his face, so maybe I shouldn't feel too bad for him after all.

It's the first day of December! And you know what that means right? Christmas is coming?!?! What the fuck are you talking about? It's World AIDS day!

With that in mind, MTV in cooperation with Frenzy condoms is bringing you a concert for World AIDS day. It's gonna be held tonight at the Fort Bonifacio grounds.

Why a concert? Well, maybe because MTV thinks music heals... it might even cure you if you're HIV positive. But only MTV music. Not that VH1 crap or the MYX shit thing. And listening to music will prevent you from getting the virus. Having sex with a prostitute with music in the background is a different story though....

It's very easy to get tickets to the concert. Just present an empty carton of Frenzy condoms at the gate and you get two tickets! It's that simple! You don't even need to use the condoms. I bet there'd be a lot of "balloons" being thrown around the audience later.

Doctor: What's wrong with you?
Me: Doc, I've been hearing this song in my head for the past few days, and I can't make it stop! It's driving me nuts!
Doctor: Hmm... we'll have to do some tests...
(30 minutes later)
Doctor (looking at the test results and shaking his head): Hmm... this doesn't look good...
Me: What is it? Am I going to die? Tell me!
Doctor: You have terminal Last Song Syndrome.
Me: *gasp* How long do I have to live?
Doctor: I'm not sure, but as long as you're alive, you'll hear that song playing over and over in your head.
Me (crying): How can I make it stop? Please make it stop!
Doctor: Sorry, there is no cure.
Me (screaming): Noooooooo!!!
Doctor: Next patient!

It started a few nights ago.

I turned on my car radio just as this song that I've never heard before was fading out. I only caught the first line of the chorus: Where are you now? As the song faded out, I could no longer hear the lyrics, but I thought that the melody was quite nice. I was hoping that the DJ would mention the title of the song, but the idiot just babbled about some stupid promo.

I thought that was the end of it, but the catchy melody has somehow attached itself to a corner of my brain. In my idle moments, the song started playing in my head. And I didn't even have the whole song. All I knew was the chorus--with all the lyrics except the first line missing. Yet I found myself humming along like an idiot.

This happened more and more frequently, and yesterday, my curiosity finally got the better of me. I started to compulsively download every song called "Where Are You Now" that I could find. Ooh, there's one by Janet Jackson. Is that it? Nope, that's not it. Michelle Branch? Wrong again. Ian Van Dahl? Who the hell is Ian Van Dahl? That one's not right either.

Then I came across one by Nazareth. Bingo! Who the hell is Nazareth? I don't know and I don't care. I've found it! Bwahaha! I listened to it. What a nice song. I listened to it again. And again. And again.

Now, I cannot get that damned song out of my head. I've tried banging my head on the wall, but when I regained consciousness, the song was still playing. So there is only one thing left for me to do...

Spread the disease.

Here's the evil infectious chorus of Where Are You Now by Nazareth (90 KB).

Download it. Listen to it. Listen to it again. And again. And again. Then you'll understand my pain.