“We are on a long thing”, this was DJ Zeez’s comment last night (13th March) on the Nigerian Idol show, where he made the comment after Naomi Mac’s electric performance of Kalif Keita’s ‘Africa’. According to him, “Why are we wasting time? We already have a winner”. While the audience were trying to recover from the performance, DJ Zeez went ahead to give her a standing ovation, which stirred up another session of applause from the audience. Jeffery had earlier commended her performance but Audu who was really tough on the contestants admitted that he was disappointed with Naomi’s first performance of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti’s song ‘Lady’ however he commended her performance of ‘Africa’.
The show is getting hotter as it draws to an end, last night’s theme was ‘AFRICA’ with the contestants expected to perform songs by Legendary African Musicians. Each contestant performed two songs each which kept the audience entertained.
Yeka Onka’s first performance was Yvonne Chaka Chaka’s ‘Umqobomthi’ while her second one was Angelique Kidjo’s ‘Wombo Lombo’. She didn’t fail to impress the audience. Jeffery commended her performance while also referring to her as the ‘African Whitney’. Though Yinka didn’t pass any comments, Audu didn’t fail to tell her that the he preferred the second performance.
Emmanuel also performed two songs; the first was ‘Sweet Mother’ by Prince Nico Mbarga while the second was K’naan’s ‘Waving Flag’. Even though his first performance was wonderful, his second was a bit disappointing. Trust Audu to give it to him, he told him without mincing words that he was not representing the men well. Yinka tried to soften things a bit by saying it was a fair performance while DJ Zeez noted that he tried to spice the song too much. Jeffery however did not agree without his fellow judges, he commended Emmanuel on his perfecting the art of working the stage and the crowd but also told him he needed to see more of Emmanuel’s vocal power.
Now we have three contestants left, one to go this week and less than three days to decide. While we wait for Thursday, are we really on a long thing?
