Oh, Wrestlemania, how I love thee, and sometimes, love to hate thee. Yes, Wrestlemania was on Sunday, and for the most part, it wasn’t too bad. A few really enjoyable matches offset the couple crappy ones they had going early on.

One of the highlights of Mania weekend the last couple years though, has been the Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony. A black tie (or at least black wifebeater if you’re a fan) event where they trot out a bunch of old people and let them ramble for a few minutes while everyone pretends to laugh at their jokes.

This year’s Hall of Fame was a little weaker than most years, headlined almost entirely by Ric Flair, but WWE pulled out all the stops to get people to watch this year, bringing back The Rock to induct his father and grandfather. Rock, himself, was true to form during his pre-induction speech. Remember, He Made Doom.

Because I’ll be on vacation Thursday and Friday, we’re going with the abbreviated version of the Hock Show schedule this week:

Monday: YouTube Monday
Tuesday: American Idol Recap
Wednesday: WoW Wednesday/Weekend Top Five
Thursday: Nothing
Friday: Nothing

Set your clocks accordingly.

Five Stories That Are (not) Changing Your World

1. Who Killed Tupac? The LA Times ran a story this week that said that Diddy killed Tupac, finally solving the murder than nobody had thought about in fifteen years. The only problem? They were getting all their “inside info” from some con artist who was in prison who’s never even met anybody involved. Oops!

2. Forget King James, LeBron Is King Kong. Vogue Magazine ran a special cover this week featuring LeBron James holding a basketball in one hand, and model Giselle Bunchen in the other. The black community has decried this as a racist portrayal of LeBron as an angry gorilla. Which totally reminds me of that scene where King Kong grabbed Faye Ray and posted up on Shaq.

3. Grand Theft Auto 4 Looms on the Horizon. In an interesting turn of events, if you hear a song on the in-game radio that you like, you can download it on your X-Box or PS3, and also grab a digital copy of it off of Amazon. Anything new? Nope. But an interesting use of a medium still pretty much in its infancy.

4. “Hot Hot Sex” is No More. While the Italian bloggers who were behind the craze never officially said that they were inflating the video’s hit count, they will forever go down in net infamy as the creators of the Internet’s stupidest controversy. After all, everybody knows that the “Rick Roll” and “Chocolate Rain” are YouTube’s most watched videos.

5. Dr. Pepper Wants to Buy You a Drink. Of course, there’s a catch. If Guns N Roses releases “Chinese Democracy” this year, Dr. Pepper will distribute one free can of soda for every American. How you might ask? Who cares! It’s not going to happen. They might as well have offered to buy everyone a car for every copy of “Duke Nukem Forever” sold this year.

So last week, I examined the first problem with American Idol, which is that the producers aren’t really good about understanding what the American public actually wants in an Idol. This week, we’ll be taking a look at song selection, the bane of many contestants throughout the process of making the show.

It’s something the judges always harp on. “Not the right song for you, dawg.” “This competition is all about song choice.” “You sure look pretty!” But really, how much can these people actually do in terms of song choice?

The answer is not really much. And there’s three key reasons.

1. The Theme

Even in those years without celebrity guest mentors, the Idol cast have always had to apply themselves to some rigid theme. This past week’s theme (Songs from the Year of Your Birth), is actually one of the better ones, because unless you were born in a really crappy year, you’ll have at least a handful of ok songs to sing.

However, last season, they did “Big Band” episode, that was terribly overwrought, corny, and to Simon’s dread, Old Fashioned. Justifiably, the contestants bitched that, of course their performances were corny and old fashioned. They were singing corny, old fashioned songs.

Next week’s theme is “Dolly Parton,” which has me a bit worried. Not that Ms. Parton isn’t a good singer with a deep and varied song book, but do you really want to hear David Cook try to schmaltz rock his way through some jangly country tune? Or Archuleta bleat out whatever song his dad picks for him? No. So why make them do it? Because it’s good for the show, of course.

2. The Selection

The show’s dwindling songbook has been a subject of some debate this year. In order to avoid repetative songs and themes, Idol has cut back on the songs that they buy the rights to every week, forcing the contestants to use an even more limited grouping of songs than in just about any other year.

Sure they leveraged their way into the Beatles’ songbook, but they only got the use of a limited number of the actual copyrights, and they paid so much to get them, they had to slog through two weeks of them for it to be worthwhile. You think Jason Castro’s favorite Beatles song was “Michele?” Hell no. He’d probably never heard it before, but if that’s what was left on the list, that’s what he had to take.

3. This Guy Right Here

Who’s that? That’s Nigel Lythgoe, So You Think You Can Dance judge by day, Idol producer by night. Nigel is infamous for getting particularily attached to certain contestants (which partially explains last week’s column). As such, the rumors fly every year that he gives certain contestants preferential treatment when selecting songs, leaving others to fight over whatever’s left.

How true is that? I don’t know, but the rumor happens often enough and with enough intensity every year, that one has to wonder if the McPhees, Sparkses, and Archuletas of the world don’t have a little help from Uncle Nigel.

Ultimately, American Idol boils down to a show about showmanship and singing, and if the song choices available to you aren’t any good, you’re sunk. The old axiom they try to pass off every year is that good singers will be able to sing anything, and while that’s true to a certain extent, I don’t know if I want to waste my time seeing Kristie Lee Cook try to country jam to the Beatles or Brooke White overthinking another Sarah McLaughlin cover of some Dolly Parton song nobody’s ever heard before. And when it’s gotten to the point where even Simon’s given up on David Archuleta’s complex (with help from Nigel and his stage dad), then there’s some issues that need to be worked out with the song selection process.

Next Week? This Year’s Idol Drinking Game! Ch-ch-ch-check it!

Places of Interest

Auberdine
Mathystra
Grove of the Ancients

The second zone for the elves (and probably the third, or second and a half, for the Draenei), Darkshore is a place you’ll either come to love or hate in your time there. There are plenty of things to do, with two mini quest hubs in the north and south, a pretty nice variety of quests (mob killing, a stealth quest, bear taming, a couple escort quests, and even a fishing training quest), and while the terrain isn’t particularily varied, the types of mobs you encounter will be far more exciting than what you saw around Teldrassil.

The rub lies in the fact that, while the zone doesn’t look particularily big, most of the quests will have you traveling the whole length of the place. At best it’s an exercise in patience and a chance to get to know your character’s ability set. At worst, it’s one tedious trek up and down the lenght of the zone after another.

Mining: Copper, Tin, Silver. Given that it’s the secondary zone for the Night Elves (for whom mining is extremely rare) there are very few nodes scattered mostly among the mountains and caves in the eastern part of the zone. Not enough to consider farming here.

Herbalism: Peacebloom, Silverleaf, Earthroot, Briarthorn, Stranglekelp, Bruiseweed, Mageroyal. The herbs are spread throughout the zone and in pretty good numbers. Most notable is the presence of Stranglekelp, which is actually rather plentiful along the coastline (though, also rather useless ultimately).

Cloth: Linen, Wool, Silk Lots of humanoids around the fringes of the zone, especially in the far north. The Tower of Althalaxx is an ok spot to farm silk if you’re despirate, but it’s not recomended for lower level characters.

Leather: Light Leather, Ruined Scraps, Medium Leather Standard stuff, with birds, nightstalkers, and bears through the north and south portions of the zone. Not as much leather to be had as you’d think, but enough to keep you going.

Darkshore is kind of an interesting place in that it’s not a bad spot for leveling, in fact, characters coming out of this zone are likely going to be higher leveled and more prepared for the next hub than characters who leveled in any of the other secondary zones. The quests, too, are more interesting and varied than other quests at these levels. However, the sheer amount of walking and time wasting you’ll do coupled with the limited advancement of some skillsets might make some players wary of bothering. Great for second tier Night Elves and Draenei wishing to follow their respective plot lines, otherwise, a fairly good but not special second zone.

Ah, the classic “What Year Were You Born?” Episode. How I’ve missed thee. I actually really like these shows because you usually get a pretty good variety of song choices.

There’s the usual dithering about and then Seacrest throws right into the show. I miss the Ringo smiting already!

Ramiele Malubay
Singing: “Alone” by Heart (Fun Fact, Ramiele is the 953rd person to sing “Alone” on American Idol!) (1983)
This Week’s Fun Fact: She was a vampire as a child, but she grew out of it.
Performance: It’s funny, because the song choice is actually probably the right one, but if you perform the song on this show, you’ll be compared to Carrie Underwood, and she wasn’t nearly as good as Carrie. Or Carly, even, really. It wasn’t bad really, I’ll even forgive when her voice broke during the chorus (she’s sick), but you can’t sing this song on this show. It’s been ruined.
Judges Say: Not awful, so you’re probably safe.
I Say: You picked the right song for you, what can you do?
Change: +/- 0
Score: -4

Jason Castro
Singing: “Fragile” by Sting (1987)
This Week’s Fun Fact: Duuude, you can tell he’s soooo pissed that, like, his brother got the keytar and he didn’t. No waaaaaay!
Performance: About halfway through the song he was so quiet and mush mouthed, I thought he was singing in French again this week. His guitar playing is kind of a mess this week too, so it’s a double whammy.
Judges Say: It’s time to put away the bong, maybe.
I Say: The keytar probably would’ve helped.
Change: -2
Score: -3

Sayesha Mercado
Singing: “If I Were Your Woman” by Gladys Knight and The Pips (1971…That can’t be right….)
This Week’s Fun Fact: She does the “Baby Cry” again which causes me to tune out everything else she says. I friggin’ hate that thing. No, no, no, no, no.
Performance: She doesn’t look as good as last week, which isn’t helping things. And…I’m forgetting this song WHILE she’s singing it. It’s like there’s a black hole in my brain, and it’s sucking the memory of anything she’s ever done out of my head (except the stupid baby cry). Technically, she was fine, but still…no. Paula (dressed as America’s Next Top Stripper this week), calls it “her moment.” Um…Carrie singing “Alone” and Blake singing “Shot Through The Heart” this was not.
Judges Say: Your best performance so far.
I Say: I can’t remember a thing about it.
Change: -1
Score: -1

Chikezie
Singing: “If Only for One Night” by Luther Vandross (1985)
This Week’s Fun Fact: Chikezie’s birthday is 9/11, which…I’m sorry, dude. His mom goes on and on about songs that Chikezie says she doesn’t know, and I kind of want her to stop talking.
Performance: It’s back to Balladeer Chikezie, which is not a good thing. After two weeks of really looking like he was having a great time with this, he looks bored again. And he doesn’t have an awesome orange suit to offset it, which makes the boredom even more apparent.
Other songs from 1985 I’d want to hear Chikezie sing?
-”I Wanna Know What Love Is” by Foreigner
-”That’s What Friends Are For” by Dionne Warwick
-”Power of Love” by Huey Lewis and the News
Judges Say: You’re back to boring, stupid ballads.
I Say: You really have to do some more crazy crap to stay in.
Change: -2
Score: -1

Brooke White
Singing: “Every Breath You Take” by The Police (1983)
This Week’s Fun Fact: When she was a little girl, she learned how to play piano by ear, which is how she’s played from then on. That’s how you know you’re supposed to be a musician, I guess.
Performance: Hillariously, she starts on the complete wrong key and is just like, “Ok, we’re doing that one again.” Once she gets going, she’s really, really good. I mean, really really good in the sense that The Police are right in her range of songs that she can sing without sounding/looking like a doofus. Unfortunately, the chorus is way, way off the rails.
Judges Say: It started off good and went nowhere.
I Say: See Archuletta, *that’s* how you screw up on national TV.
Change: +/- 0
Score: +2

Michael Johns
Singing: “We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions” by Queen (1978)
This Week’s Fun Fact: He used to dance around Australia and tell people how awesome he is. The great part is that after two solid months of reminding us how much he’s reppin’ Australia, his kid picture has him in T-Shirt advertising scenic Washington.
Performance: Heath Ledger Tribute Night! Ok, so remember last week when he was, like, “Yeah, so I guess Bohemian Rhapsody a month and a half ago was pretty good?” Well, when they told him that it was “Year You Were Born Night” he was, like, “YES! I can get away with another Queen song! No…Wait! TWO QUEEN SONGS!” And…It totally works. He’s not nearly as good as he was in the early rounds, but he’s totally at home being a second rate Gavin Rosdale in a third-rate Freddie Mercury tribute band.
Judges Say: You may actually have a career after this show.
I Say: The week’s theme rolled right into his favor.
Change: +1
Score: -1

Carly Smithson
Singing: “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler (1983)
This Week’s Fun Fact: She was named “Carly” because her mom heard a Carly Simon song on the way to the hospital. Her mom gets in this week’s requisite “Carly was unfairly treated by the industry” dig and Carly name checks Madonna and Kylie Minogue.
Performance: She actually had a chance to do something really amazing here, because, vocally, she’s absolutely perfect for this song, with its shouty sections and power notes, but the problem is…she starts, like, a key and a half too low, and it ends up sounding really awkward. Which sucks, because I think she had a chance to be really fantastic.
Judges Say: You picked the wrong song, but you’re safe.
I Say: You picked the right song, but you sang it really poorly.
Change: -1
Score: +1

David Archuleta
Singing: “You’re the Voice” by John Farnham
This Week’s Fun Fact: He was always squinty and awkward even in his youth. He’s sad because he’s going to miss prom, but that doesn’t stop him from hitting on some girl in the audience. I just made that sound way more awesome than it was, though.
Performance: Wow…How very…Up with People of him. Seriously, is anybody going to buy an album of this right now? What he needs is a chorus of dancers, and the audience to hold up signs which, when the audience holds them all up together spells the word “Hope.” And…Jazz Hands! Simon takes me one further by suggesting a career singing with The Bearenstein Bears on the A Stage at Six Flags which…HAHAHAHAHA!
Judges Say: Vocally, you’re great.
I Say: If I can imagine you serenading Pocahontas at Disney’s Animal Kingdom? That’s not a good thing.
Change: -1
Score: -3

Kristy Lee Cook
Singing: “God Bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood (1984)
This Week’s Fun Fact: You know, advertising the fact that your brothers and sisters wanted you to shut the hell up whenever you sang as a kid is probably not the best endorsement for yourself.
Performance: You know what *is* the best endorsement? Appealing to the American Redneck sense of PATRIOTISM~! that you can totally cash in on in few years during your USO tour. Seriously, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a more desperate and effective vote grab on this show before. She should’ve worn and American flag dress with “America – Fuck Yeah!” sewed on the back. She’d win the whole show in one night. Simon practically gives her a standing ovation for the balls that took. Once her Country Jamboree tour with Chikezie is over, she and Archuletta should hook up for an “Up With People Presents America – Land of the Free Home of the Brave” arena tour.
Judges Say: You’re smarter than you look.
I Say: A million Sanjayas and Danny Noriegas combined don’t have the crazy brilliance to pull this off.
Change: +2
Score: -2

David Cook
Singing: “Billy Jean” by Michael Jackson (by Way of Chris Daughtry) (1983)
This Week’s Fun Fact: David Cook had the world’s largest forehead when he was younger, and even he realized that he was sporting the Herman Munster a little bit. That at least partially excuses the emo haircut.
Performance: This is actually really where his “I’m Going to Be Daughtry” act completely and totally works. Grab the closest, most 80s pop jam on your list, turn it into a slow rock jam, and let it ride. It’s all overdone, over effected, it even sounds stupid, but it’s totally awesome in exactly the right way. This and Brooke’s performance of “Let It Be” are the only two songs so far this year that I could totally buy as being “concert” songs. I could see people paying to see them play. Tons better than his (way similar if you think about it) “Elenor Rigby.”
Judges Say: You may very well save this show.
I Say: For the first time in his run, he completely nailed it.
Change: +3
Score: +3

That’s what you get when you loosen the chains a little bit. Let them pick their own songs, and tthey’re going to get something they can totally nail. Except for a handful of really boring performances, I think tonight’s was the best overal “show” of the season so far. I’d love love love for them to open up a more “modern” songbook now, though. A Billboard Hot 200 show would really let these guys sink or swim.

Bottom Three:

Brooke White
Sayesha Mercado
Jason Castro

Eliminated:

Sayesha Mercado, mostly because I just don’t think she’s holding up personality-wise with any of the rest of these people.

Oh, NCAA Tournament. How I love you, how I hate you. While my beloved Wisconsin Badgers prepare to take on hated(?) Davidson, home of the…I have no idea what Davidson is known for, actually. Knot tying? Anyway, what I was trying to say is…I have no idea what I was trying to say.

Oh, right! March Madness! CBS owns the exclusive broadcast rights to the NCAA Tournament, until all the games for a day have finished. What do you do, then, when you’re an afternoon newscast?

The answer, of course is ACTION FIGURE BASKETBALL!

Five Stories That Are (not) Changing Your World

1. iTunes Is Switching Things Up. Apple is hoping to roll out a subscription music service with the next generation of iPhones. The idea is that you’d play a flat fee when you buy an iPod or iPhone, or a subscription for the phone, and get unlimited songs for the lifespan of the device. Sounds kind of like…every other music service on the internet?

2. State Department Officials Are Kind of Bored. A couple of State Department officials were fired and a couple more repremanded for digging through the passport files of John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (three times!). Mostly it seems like they were doing it on a lark, but still…why not do it to somebody interesting? Dig up the dirt on Natalie Portman!

3. That Tip Jar at Starbucks? Doesn’t Go to Who You Think. Starbucks lost a lawsuit this week for apparently not paying $82 million in tips. The spare change and gum wrappers you think were going to the employees were being skimmed by the store managers. Oops!

4. It’s March Madness! $3.6 billion will be lost by American corporations this year from people checking scores and filling brackets this year. I don’t know about you guys but I’ve got San Fransico Community College going all the way this year. They’re totally going to beat…is that a coffee stain? Coffee Stain Tech? Ugh…I’m no good at this bracket business.

5. SONY Has Gone Mad With Power, May Be Trying to Eat the Chort. Oh, SONY. Declairing the victory of Bluray while simultaniously raising its price was one thing, but that’s nothing compared to your attempt to charge customers buying new Vaio laptops $200 NOT to install a bunch of useless Windows apps. Stay classy, guys!

The big question that surrounds American Idol every year is whether it’s a talent competition or if it’s going to be a popularity contest. The arguement kind of came to a head last year when Sanjaya hung around for about seven weeks too many and critical darling Melinda Doolittle was ousted before the finale (though they were more than fine with Jordin Sparks).

It’s pretty clear that the producers of the show have no idea what the audience wants to see. In Season Five, Katherine McPhee was positioned as the starlet in waiting against Taylor Hicks, the goofy every-man. People, of course, turned out in droves to vote for Hicks, not because he was the better of the two, but because he was goofy and the show wanted them to vote for McPhee.

The real struggle, that season, however, was between the breakaway star potential of Chris Daughtry and the vocal prowess of Elliott Yamin. To his credit, Daughtry had great stage presence and came out of the contest the most ready to sell albums, but vocally he was (and still is) very bland and unimpressive. Yamin, on the other hand, had a great voice with tons of range, with the unfortunate issue of being really, really ugly. They were clearly the two most talented contestants, but neither was really built for the show. Daughtry didn’t have the vocal variety, Yamin didn’t have the poster-quality looks.

Similarily, last season, Melinda Doolittle was far and away the best singer of the group, but that was only good enough for third place. If you look at the past winners, what’s the one thing that holds true? Kelly Clarkson, Ruben Studdard, Carrie Underwood, and Jordin Sparks are all very attractive people with decent-to-good voices, all of whom had great stage presence. The other two winners were Fantasia Barinno, who had great stage presence and an ok voice, but won a really weak field (with the obvious exception of Jennifer Hudson), and as I talked about before Taylor Hicks won as sort of…a reaction to the fact that only pretty, sort of talented people win this show.

What does this have to do with this year’s show?

Meet David Archuleta. Technically talented? Yes. Interesting story what with having vocal paralysis and yet singing on this show? Absolutely. The sort of boyish charm that makes teen girls vote for him? Yep.

It’s no wonder then, that the show’s producers have clearly put their faith in Archuleta to “save” the franchise. The problem, however, is that there is nothing “salable” about David Archuleta. Outside this competition (and “Star Search,” which he won too), his is not a voice that you’ll hear on the radio or in concert halls. He’s got almost no stage presence, and his squinty singing doesn’t really do anything to connect with the audience. He’s like the winning kid at some ghastly talent show (tm Simon Cowell), whose parents thrust him onto the stage and force him to smilingly squint through one annoyingly overwrought bullshit performance after another as they all blend together in some mishmash of crap. Is he a better singer than the other boys and girls? Technically, yes. But that doesn’t mean he should win the show.

David Archuleta is Elliott Yamin. And years from now, he will be back. Sleepily squinting his way through another single that nobody recognizes, with his new veneers and scraggly beard. Thrilled to finally be in a place that recognizes him again. Ok. That’s not fair to Elliott. He did have that one single.

How long it will take the producers to realize that he isn’t the savior, crown prince, or even a future money earner for them remains to be seen, but it’ll certainly be interesting.

Next Week, we’ll take a look at that thrilling bane of contestants everywhere, “Song Selection” and why it’s more of a misnomer than most people know.

Places of Interest

Thelsamar
Stonewrought Dam
Farstrider Lodge

Loch Modan is the second zone for Gnomes and Dwarves, and home to some interesting characters and quests. Most of the quests are based out of Thelsamar, though some quests can be found at the Dam, in the dwarven strongholds in the north and south, at Farstrider Lodge in the far east, and a few other places in between.

This creates something of an issue, because the layout restricts how well characters are able to complete quests in the zone. You’ll often find yourself running every which way just to turn in quests from the various quest givers. The actual zone is a nice compliment to Dun Morogh, and the lake, while annoying to swim across, provides a nice change of pace to the mountains.

Mining: Copper, Tin, Silver. The zone is surrounded by mountains, and it’s pretty easy to find nodes amongst them. There are a few nodes in the water as well. The biggest groupings can be found in the gnoll caves in the west and the ogre caves to the east.

Herbalism: Peacebloom, Silverleaf, Earthroot, Briarthorn, Stranglekelp, Bruiseweed, Mageroyal. The herbs here are varied, but there aren’t a ton of them. It’s ok to level though, and a good spot to pick up some mageroyal at a very low level.

Cloth: Linen, Wool Plenty of humanoid mobs hanging around this zone, and since they eliminated the Ogre’s “Elite” status, it’s become quite a bit easier to farm linen and especially wool.

Leather: Light Leather, Ruined Scraps, Medium Leather Lots of bears, boars, vultures and things to grab some leather off of. More light leather than you’d like, but enough to keep your leatherworking leveling.

Loch Modan succeeds as an interesting second area of the game. There’s tons of variety in the enemies and types of quests available, and there’s a decent range of environments and places to visit. The thing holding Loch Modan back from being a really great place to quest is the fact that the quest hubs are not very well laid out, and travel times across the zone can make doing some of the longer chains unbearable.