Ashthon Jones Top 24 American Idol 10 (2011) Performance

Ashthon Jones is a singer. She was selected by the American Idol producers/judges to compete in the Top 24 voting round for the 10th season. According to Rickey.org, she sang Monica's "Love All Over" for her Top 24 performance.

Initial Thoughts:

Ashthon is another contestant that hasn't really been featured all that much. While there were clips of her singing "And I Am Telling You" and another song or two, they were really too short to be used for judging her talent.

So Ashthon may be starting behind the "8 ball" simply because she is not clearly one of the chosen ones to easily advance to the next round. Indeed, only Lauren Alaina and arguably Julie Zorrilla have been the only girls groomed to make it to the next round as far as producer pimping (and Julie may have messed that up with a poor performance). But because 5 girls advance automatically to the next round, Ashthon has a chance.

I remarked in another article that Jones seems to have two styles - a diva-type pop style and a modern hip hop/RnB style. I stressed that she needs to stick to the former, as performances of modern music of the RnB or hip hop variety are just not popular among American Idol voters. Thus, Ashthon made a terrible song choice. One wonders to whom she is trying to appeal by selecting a song like Monica's "Love All Over." This relatively tuneless modern songs do not play to the Idol demographic.

It would be like going to a Republican rally and singing the praises of abortion doctors. You have to know your audience, and this fundamental mistake by Ashthon Jones could cost her big time.

Prediction:

With that said, Ashthon is definitely a possible candidate for a wildcard if she does not get through as a Top 5 vote getter. As improper as it is in a singing contest, the wildcards are typically used to create diversity among the singers in the next round. Based on what we have heard so far, it sounds like Lauren Alaina, Lauren Turner and Pia Toscano were highly praised and will take 3 of the 5 spots. That leaves a tossup for 2 spots among several girls. Since most of the girls reportedly gave average to not-so-good performances, it is truly difficult to predict what will happen.

My guess is that either Ashthon or Naima Adedapo will get a wildcard spot. Therefore, Ashthon has about a 50% chance of getting through to the Top 12 (or Top 13 if they pick three wildcards).

Results:

After Ashthon Jones sings Monica's "Love All Over Me" on the broadcast of Wednesday, March 2, 2011,this article will be updated to reflect the results.

She tries to get the crowd going, but they don't seem to be really getting into it until near the end of the song. This is another poor song choice, but she does throw in a few decently powerful notes that kind of save the performance. Ashthon needs to avoid this type of song choice, but I think she is one of the better singers tonight and has confidence.

She got mostly good comments except that Randy thought the song choice was not challenging enough for her. Once again, the spoiler source's comments are way off. I'd say she has at least a decent chance of getting in the Top 5.

Sources:

Rickey.org Top 24 Spoilers