Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Former American Idol contestant Jackie Tohn survived to write another song Monday night on Platinum Hit, but only by a whisker.

When the show ended, Jackie and Nashville singer-songwriter Karen Waldrup were on the hot seat.  Karen got sent home with this none-too-ringing endorsement from straight-shooting head judge Kara DioGuardi:  “For a girl from Nashville, you’ve got a long way to go with your lyrical story-telling.”

As for Jackie, she had the good fortune to write one of the week’s three winning hooks in the 10 remaining songwriters’ week-three challenge — to write a hit “road” song. But Kara chastised her for failing to “drive it home.”

Oh, and Jackie proved perfectly willing to throw a vulnerable teammate under the bus, complaining that Karen contributed 15 pages of lyrics that felt “elementary” and produced “one or two usable lines.”

And so it goes on Platinum Hit, where nine songwriters remain in the running for the grand prize of $100,000, a recording contract and a song-writing contract.

The other news of note from week three …

• Egotist Nick Nittoli had been on the winning team the first two weeks. He expected it to continue, even though he was the last songwriter picked to join any team. Heck, one team preferred to stick to three members rather than add Nick.  “Wherever you put me, I’m going to win,” he said. Well, not quite. Nick’s streak ended as he wound up on the losing song-writing team with Karen, Jackie and Sonyae Elise.
• The winning song was “Going Where I Need to Be,” which stemmed from a hook written by Johnny Marnell. He’s a computer programmer who dreams of making his living through music. His winning teammates included Brian Judah and Scotty Granger; Scotty has worked as a creative director with Season 6 American Idol winner Jordin Sparks.
• In spite of what the judges said, the best song of the night was “Home for Me,” written by Jes Hudak, Melissa Rapp and Amber Ojeda. Which means the competition is pretty wide open since Amber and Melissa looked like two of the weakest contestants over the first two weeks.

You can check out all of the songs from Monday’s show here.

Next up for the songwriters on Platinum Hit: writing a rap hook.

That comes next Monday at 10 p.m. on Bravo.