Idol Chatter & Voice Views

The males take center stage on American Idol again Wednesday night at 8 p.m.

On Thursday, the 10 remaining singers become just five.

Here are my rankings of the remaining Idol guys.

The link attached to each name will take you to a profile and pre-Idol videos, if they’re available.

1. Lazaro Arbos: Fans get their way now, and his combination of humility, back-story and perfectly fine vocals will likely take him deep into the finals. The Vegas performance wasn’t great, but Lazaro knows that.

“Tonight I Want to Cry”

2. Cortez Shaw: He’s better than he shows in Vegas, and he’ll need to be because he won’t get the pimp spot two straight weeks. He has one of the best vocal ranges among the remaining guys.

“Titanium”

3. Nick Boddington: He probably prefers folks remember that excellent effort on the last day of Hollywood than the Vegas performance he admits wasn’t up to par. He has experience on his side.

“Say Something Now”

4. Burnell Taylor: He signs so well he already made Mariah Carey cry. And he’s received an Idol makeover a couple of weeks before they normally occur, which will help make him stand out for voters.

“This Time”

5. Curtis Finch: He’s not singing in the shadow of Joshua Ledet this year. Of course, he’s not singing as impressively as Joshua either, though his Night 2 Vegas vocal was among the best so far from the guys.

“Superstar”

6. Charlie Askew: The self-described awkward turtle hasn’t exactly seemed shy in his last two performances. If anything, he’s been a pleasant surprise on a guy’s side that has offered too few.

“Rocket Man”

7. Paul Jolley: Tough to figure. He got a tongue-lashing for acting defeated in Hollywood, then impressed us with “Blown Away.” He needed Jimmy’s save to survive Vegas, yet he’s got one of the biggest followings on social media. Being the only country guy left will help.

“Tonight I Want To Cry”

8. Vincent Powell: Speaking of singing in shadows, Vincent has been singing in the shadow of Curtis Finch, who’s gotten more airtime. And there’s likely only room for one male gospel singer in the finals.

“Cause I Love You”

9. Devin Velez: In a season in which current seems to be what the judges are looking for, Devin’s song choices often are not. But he’s still among the top male singers on the show. Oh, and he pledges not to sing in Spanish every week.

“Listen”

10. Elijah Liu: Nicki Minaj might like his look, but that Vegas performance was totally underwhelming. An off night? Who knows? We’ve seen so little of Elijah to this point it’s tough to know if he’s capable of better.

“Talking to the Moon”