The 3 remaining Idols are each 3 songs away from the Kodak finale. First the trio sing a song selected by music mogul Clive Davis, next a song chosen for them by one of the panel, and finally a number of their own choice!

It's hard to separate them at this stage, Taylor Hicks turns in 3 solid performances, as does Elliott Yamin. However Elliott's song choices aren't perfect for him.

The most memorable performance of the night, perhaps even of the whole season, belongs to Katharine McPhee, although no doubt Simon Cowell will claim a big chunk of the credit as he chose the song for her!

Click on the performance and results show links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

Tonight's 'Final 4' show tops off a great week for the final four during which they were packed off to Graceland for rehearsals. There they met music mogul Tommy Mottola (mentor for Elvis week) as well as Priscilla and Lisa Marie Presley.

The Elvis songbook guaranteed some great songs and some great performances, especially from Taylor Hicks and Elliott Yamin!

Click on the performance and results show links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

American Idol is down to its fabulous five, which means it's a split themed show tonight with each contestant performing two 90 second numbers.

For the first half of the show the theme is "Birth Year Songs" which means we get to coo at their cute baby pictures.

We also get to learn some interesting facts about the contestants; Elliott Yamin finds Idol a nail-biting experience, Paris Bennett grew up in a ruffled neighborhood, Chris Daughtry was born to perform, Katharine McPhee was once serious and quiet and Taylor Hicks has had more hair changes than Ryan Seacrest!

The second half of the show is themed on 'Songs from the current Billboard charts'. It's a chance for the Idols to showcase how contemporary they can be, but time-warped Taylor somehow manages to choose a song which is 37 years old!

As we expect from the fab 5, the overall standard is pretty good. Our champ this week though has got to be Taylor who made us laugh with his funky white boy dance moves and later topped the show off with that special "Something". The only 2 performances which miss the mark for us are Elliott's and Katharine's birth year ones, however they both make better jobs of their 'current Billboard' songs.

Click on the performance and results show links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

Top Tuscan tenor Andrea Bocelli and award winning Canadian producer/composer David Foster take on Idol mentoring duties for the "Love Song" theme.

Straight talker David runs the rehearsal room like a recording studio. He pushes the Idols hard, but they seem to enjoy it and some of the results are fantastic. Andrea ably assists, injecting Italian passion and humor into the proceedings.

Performances from Katharine, Elliott and Chris top our Idol chart this week. Paris and Taylor hover around the middle, and Kellie trails for the second week in a row.

However, hitting absolute rock bottom on our performance charts are Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul and Simon Cowell, primarily for their abysmal appraisals of Katharine McPhee  this week!

Click on the performance and results show links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

There are great American songs and great American singers... this week's Idol delivers the best of both worlds!

Rod Stewart does a really great mentoring job and brings out the best in each of the contestants. Since they all perform so well it's hard to separate them out, but topping our charts are Paris Bennett, Taylor Hicks and Katharine McPhee.

 Of the rest only Kellie Pickler falters, although, as always, she entertains, not least by getting things off her chest with Rod Stewart! Paula Abdul, on the other hand, doesn't so much get things off her chest, as not have things on her chest in the first place!

During this week's Final 7 results show Rod performs "The Way You Look Tonight". He sings quite sexily for a sexagenarian, although we wouldn't go so far as to say we want his body!

Click on the performance links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

Tonight's theme is "The Songs of Queen" and the contestants received their royal treat last week when they got to pick their songs and rehearse with Brian May, Roger Taylor and Bad Company's Paul Rodgers (who is currently touring wih Queen).

Fantasia, season 3's queen, watches over the panel from her front-row seat, injecting a little home grown royalty into the occasion.

The Idols do not disappoint either queen. However the same cannot be said for  court jester Simon Cowell with those "weird" and "ridiculous" comments of his!

Our regal ratings, based on tonight's performances only, are as follows... Sitting upon our top 3 thrones are Kellie, Taylor and Paris, Katharine is a lady in waiting, Bucky retains his country manor but down in our dark dungeons of dread and danger languish Ace and Chris.

Click on the performance links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

Simon gets cheers, Paula gets boos and everybody loves Ryan Seacrest! What's going on in the world? Even Kenny Rogers doesn't seem like his old self!

However Kenny does do a great job mentoring the Idols for tonight's country music theme, giving them plenty of common-sense tips based on over 50 years of experience in the business. Unfortunately some Idol hopefuls take advice like "...you're not trying to impress 'em, you're trying to make 'em cry" a little too literally!

Kellie and Bucky capitalize on home advantage to top our charts tonight, closely followed by Ace and Chris who make us cry for the right reasons with some "Urban" country. The rest of the performances are kind of forgettable, which is probably just as well!

Click on the performance links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...

Tonight's theme is Songs of the 21st Century, so the Idol Contestants have carte blanche to choose any song from the past six years which really suits them. Given such lattitude we should be in for 10 excellent performances, but sadly that's not quite the way things turn out!

Only Taylor and Paris knocked us off our feet tonight, with the remaining performances not quite hitting the mark. So, for tomorrow's bottom placers just pick any 3 from 8!

Oh, and if you think we're hard to please we've got nothing on Randy Jackson, who sat through the first half of the show as miserable as a dawg without his bone! Click on the performance links (below) to read the judges verdicts as well as our own...