‘The X Factor’ USA review: Tim Olstad, Rachel Potter, Josh Levi, Alex & Sierra perform (again)

As you may have heard earlier today, “The X Factor” managed to get something else completely wrong this week (in addition to their usual mess ups) when the show failed to put the voting numbers up correctly. Thanks to that, tonight was basically a re-do using songs that contestants would have used to save themselves.

We’re not going to get too in-depth about these since there were so many to get through over the hour, and they were all mostly ballads since that is the sort of thing that contestants always use on results shows to save themselves. We are, however, listing them below from worst to best.

Carlos Guevera, “Cannonball” – Not the sort of performance Carlos needed after a bad night. He’s just showing to us at this point that there is not that much to his take on modern music right now.

Restless Road, “Don’t You Wanna Stay” – Finally, they get to sing an ACTUAL COUNTRY SONG. They sound pretty good together, but they have some serious work to do as soloists still. Their vocal flaws are definitely shown off doing ballads.

Carlito Olivero, “If You’re Not the One” – A great song choice, but Carlito needs work on that falsetto. That was shaky, and that is putting it nicely. This was a few bum notes away from being downright catastrophic. He has some work to do to match those insane screams in the crowd.

Sweet Suspense, “That Should Be Me” – Pretty competent for a ballad and it’s at least current, and another positive here is that we at least heard them. That’s a step above last time.

Tim Olstad, “I Believe I Can Fly” – No props whatsoever for Tim singing the ballad from “Space Jam.” What a hokey, terrible choice. He sang it pretty well, but we laughed and we shouldn’t be laughing!

Ellona Santiago, “Titanium” – There’s nothing that is that interesting to us about what Ellona is doing with this song, which has been covered a billion times. She’s going to risk being forgotten, especially for going around the middle of the show.

Jeff Gutt, “In the Air Tonight” – Perfect song for Jeff. He should just continue to go for this sort of era of music. Embrace your voice! We still think Jeff’s ceiling after the show is getting to be a part of a really good rock band.

Lillie McCloud, “Who Wants to Live Forever” – A little too smiley for this song, but a good rendition of one of our favorite songs. This is one where you have to be a little bit over-the-top to match Freddie Mercury, but emotional at the same time.

Khaya Cohen, “Distant Dreamer” – Good, but not necessarily amazing. Khaya needed another great performance to make up for being a little bit of an afterthought leading up to this week.

Josh Levi, “Stay” – Finally, Josh puts together some of that “potential,” and gives the performance that we’ve been waiting for since his first audition. Pretty great vocal that should keep him around for a while.

Rachel Potter, “Anyway” – Rachel can SING in the right moments, and this was her chance to do that. The vocals were very good, and this suited her a heck of a lot more than some Motown number that didn’t make any sense at all last night.

Rion Paige, “Born This Way” – The surprise of the night for us, mostly in that the energy and passion that Rion brought to this. It’s like she actually did feel like she had to save herself to win this thing!

Alex & Sierra, “Give Me Love” – Amazing. We had no idea that these two had such an interesting musical sensibility, and they are becoming more and more interesting by the day beyond just a couple who sings together.

Episode Grade: C+

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Photo: Fox