American Idol Season Finale

American Idol...what a great show!!And to think there were more votes cast for the final two, Katherine and Taylor, 63 million. More than any elected President of the United States has ever received!(don't we know there is a war going on?) yes we do but what the hell can we do about now?. One of the reasons most of us enjoyed Idol so, is because it is an escape from the horror of war, to what America really is like, and how any one can make it in life in this country without being suppressed. With all my heart, I hope America did the right thing for the Iraqi people and not to many more Americans and Iraqi innocents die for the cause.Time will tell. American Idol had sentimentality and there has always been a good feeling when the majority of people you know watched the same thing you did. Kind of like when Elvis, The Beatles, Doors, Rolling Stones and so forth performed on "The Ed Sullivan Show". A person couldn't wait until the next day to talk with friends and give opinions, just like I'm doing now. Remember when just about everyone knew all the hit songs on the radio? You could drive around town with the convertible top down and the radio turned up and listen with almost a stereo affect when the guy next to you had the same song on. Of course there were only a couple of big top forty stations in each town. Idol had everything last night. Fun, entertainment and some fine performances. Carrie Underwood and Clay Aikmen are truly professionals and showed it last night. They have sold a lot of records. I loved the duets that were performed and some brought some sentimental tears to my eyes. Parris Bennett and Al Jarreau were wonderful. Hard to believe Parris has such a fine voice for being a teen.They were all excellent. Chris Daughtry and Live, ( Chris will be a star),Elliot Yamen and Blige (Elliot is so good, but Blige seemed to not know the song she sang.? Taylor and Toni Braxton where very good! The Burt Bacharach segment was heart warming. Give credit to Dionne Warwick doing some of the songs she recorded over 45 years ago.Her songs brought back many memories for me of make up break up times with girls.(maybe you to if you were around then?) The Katherine McPhee duet with Meatloaf was very, very good and maybe the best. You can't help falling in love with Katherine when watching her perform. It is almost as if you wish you could reach the TV screen and touch her. She will not only be a famous singer but an actress, too.! If Elvis were alive today and was Katharine's age, I could see them as a perfect couple. I like how the families are brought into American Idol. Shows where these performers came from. It may sound corny but if you watch all the episodes one almost feels as if you know them all. Liberace was a master at using the screen to almost reach out into your living room and bring you on stage with him. Women were in love with him, (a lot of men too). Showman ship always works and that is why Taylor Hicks won. He never let the putting down by Simon affect him one bit. He went on and yes... I did like his shinny fancy suits.(thank you, Elvis) Speaking of showmanship....hard to beat Prince. He knows how to put it together and has so much talent. When the song "Raspberry Beret" came out in 85, I was working a t KJR at the time. The program director"Tom Watson" a very nice man for some reason refused to play it! Gary Lockwood, myself and others could not believe it and begged him to no avail. I liked the "Broke-note Cowboy" segment. Those three guys weren't too bad.(kind of cute, too) The only low point to the show was showing the poor sport women swearing and Ryan Seacrest making references to her being a hooker. Could have done with out that. A lot of young kids (the majority) are watching that stuff including my grand-girls.(Does any one remember when comedian Jackie Mason was on Ed Sullivan and ED thought Jackie gave him the finger as he walked off stage? He was never invited back again and was black-balled from most of the TV networks. Jackie to this day says he never did it and I believe him. Well lets hope they have another good group of singers next year on Idol. A lot of nay sayers thought it would be a one season wonder!! (see the movie "That Thing You Do" with Tom Hanks. It captures the sixty's perfectly. Rock on Brothers and Sisters, Joe

American Idol Final

Just some thoughts on American Idol... the talent was great this year and at times it looked like at least 7 or 8 had a chance to go all the way to the end. I liked Taylor and Katherine from the very beginning and I think Taylor will win it. Katherine has the better voice, but too bad she couldn't have stuck with the blues more. Nice to see a guy with gray hair not be afraid to go the way he was. He could have easily dyed it, but wouldn't have stood out from the others. I do wish he would have done Joe Cocker's version of "I Get by With a little help from my friends" or "High Time She Went." I find it a bit odd to think that television is making stars of talent that would have more than likely, never been heard. I'm glad they are doing it. Radio stations for the most part, are not. They just to want play something that has been approved by some focus group and the conglomerates have made everything so homogenized, that I don't even listen much any more. now that I have satelite radio. When I got in radio broadcasting,1966,the jock could still pick a few songs that he thought could make it. One of my pick hits of the week was "Oh Kitty" by a guy named Cat Stevens. In Grand Rapids the jocks would come in early for their radio shows and pick through boxes of oldies they thought listeners would like. Those were the creative days. Before radio, when I was in a couple of rock bands, we could stop at the radio stations, let the on-air guy listen to the records we recorded and he could decide to play it if he wanted. When I lived in Michigan and had the band "Joey Gee and the Bluetones" I was more or less my own promoter. I sent out letters with the 45s to stations that I knew of. WLS, Chicago, Dick Biondi, read my letter on the air and played the song we recorded. It only sold a few thousand copies, but it was still fun. Later on when I decided to attend broadcast school in Milwaukee I formed another band called "Joey Gee and the Come-ons." We got in a Battle of the Bands and came in sixth. No one offered us a contract and I then realized how tough it was to make it when we competed with over six hundred bands. Being a country bumpkin from the U.P., eh, where there were only a handful of bands made me understand that it might be a hard way to make a tough living. Who do you think will win tonight - Taylor Hicks or Katherine McPhee? Joe

Manual labor or labor by Manuel?

Maybe I was wrong saying the illegals are taking jobs Americans don't want. Thinking back there were twice and many kids coming into the world when I was born in the mid forties. We had seven kids in our family and you would get nothing, unless you worked for it. Even the "Leave it to Beaver" families made the kids work in some way. We used to sell greeting cards, flower seeds or whatever, door to door just to get enough money to buy that new bike or cap gun. One of our rituals was to pick strawberries, raspberries, pine cones, potatoes and we were paid by the bushel or pound. How many young people do you know do that today? I remember clearly when I was in 7Th grade and wanted to go out for football but didn't have the money for the ten dollar insurance we all had to have, one of the teachers heard about it somehow, and asked me to rake leaves for the money and I was excited to do it. Later years I set bowling pins (job doesn't exist any more). In high school we took shop (woodworking) and I learned so much from it. Sometimes the counselors might ask why I wanted to take it every year thinking that maybe it was just an easy subject, but I really liked it. Later in life and even to this day I use knowledge from wood shop when building houses, and so forth. Not everyone can work in the computer connected industry. Some have to do physical work, also. When I was doing my radio work, which I enjoyed, I also enjoyed and sometimes even more so, getting out there and framing a house, hanging doors and cabinets, building decks. When one is done for the day, you at least can stand back and see what you accomplished. Very rewarding. My son Joey and daughter Gina framed homes with me in High School and College and loved it. I know it is hard if you have kids and you are doing fairly well, not to just give them things without working for it. I'm guilty of that even as a grandparent but whenever I think of something for them to do to make a little money I'll ask them. They have picked raspberries with Kathy and me. When Kathy and I lived in Portland we would pick berries for extra money which we needed at the time. Never for a minute felt too good to do it. We learned a lot, also from the folks that had to do it 8 to 14 hours a day. My point to all this and I don't mean to lecture or tell you what to do, but feel you should make your children work for at least some money. I know most of us didn't want that for our kids and we would rather they play sports, and study in school instead. They can do all of that but maybe not at the extent some of us did when we were kids. Pick some strawberries for money this spring. Raspberries, potatoes later on and see what it feels like. When you get older you never regret any hard worked you did as a kid. A lot of children were over worked and that is not good either. I just think it is good to walk in someone else’s shoes for a while and make us all more understanding. Sometimes even I forget… Cheers, Joe