He picked one of the cheesiest, most inane pop hits of the past year, but Reed Grimm still managed to show off his drummer skills and charming smile enough to earn seriously strong words from the judges on "American Idol" last night.
The Twin Cities music scene alum -- whose home town of Ellsworth, Wis., earned some screen time in last night's episode -- kicked off the show and the entire semifinalist rounds with a jazz-boppy version of Maroon 5's "Moves Like Jagger." After a minute of dancing, he walked over to a small, stand-up drum kit and pounded out a few bars of beats, then went back to moving like Jagger (actually, it was a little more like Bieber, but whatever).
"You're definitely a very musical guy," Randy Jackson said to kick off the raves. "This was a great way to show America who they are dealing with," Lopez added, referring to how he remade the song in a different style. "A far cry from Shoeless Generation, isn't it?" quipped Steven Tyler. When Grimm corrected him on his band's name, Shoeless Revolution, Tyler responded, "Well, a whole new generation is going to be watching your ass after tonight."
Grimm was at least more impressive than a lot of the other 12 male contestants last night, but the judges had surprisingly few negative things to say about any of them. Choosing a current popular hit that the teenyboppers know and reimagining it is a risky venture when it comes to the popular vote. That may explain why Grimm is ranked low on the "Idol" phone-call-monitoring site Dialidol.com.
The 13 young women compete tonight, and then America's votes are tallied and revealed in Thursday's episode. Gosh, what are "Idol" fans going to do the other four nights of the week? The voting process will continue after tonight's episode airs.
