Last night American Idol whittled down from Top 8 to Top 7 using their new elimination method dubbed the Fan Save. This means the bottom two performers get one last chance to sing and everybody watching live has a chance to to vote via twitter hashtags for 5 minutes – this determines who goes home. I have to say, I’m not crazy about this because it means the fate of the show is somewhat resting in the small margin of viewers that can watch the show live. That said, we’re only dealing with the bottom two so I guess you could argue we’re only talking about who goes home sooner. The rest of the performers still rely on the vote that you can make later when watching on your DVR. My favorite method of voting is still just searching for American Idol Vote on Google. I like the interface and it’s easy.

Here’s how my voting came down last night (an hour after the show had ended):

Best Performance of the Night: goes to Clark Beckham for sure. I’ve always been on the fence about him, frankly, but this performance gave me all the feels. You could tell the judges were excited by it too but they still gave him a healthy dose of constructive criticism which in some ways is the sign of a good performance – they think you are capable of upping your game and have something more to say than “Well, you look great!” Here’s what Clark sang last night for those of you who missed it:

Of course the John Mayer-esque guitar riffs were not hurting.

I continue to adore Jax,Joey Cook and Tyanna Jones who I thought all had solid performances (though I wish Joey Cook hadn’t stuck so closely to her personal goal of not changing up the arrangement on her song because she could have done better if she’d given herself more freedom).

Nick and Quentin both did good but for me weren’t fantastic – I think as a lot of the contestants try to push outside of their comfort zones we are seeing some of their weak spots for better or worse.

The bottom two this week included Rayvon and Qaasim: When I first heard the results I thought I knew for sure who I wanted to continue – I’ve been a huuuuuuge Rayvon fan for awhile but the truth is, he’s been slipping for me as he struggles to make the judges and America happy. He feels so far removed from the calm, confidence that shined when he sang My Girl a few short weeks ago and his hail mary performance last night was just okay for me. It felt frenetic and forced which is the opposite of Rayvon in my humble p.o.v.

Rayvon last night:

Rayvon singing My Girl:

What do you think? Wasn’t he better before? Maybe it was just the nerves? I don’t know… But it’s Rayvon so I was still rooting for him and then Qaasim did this:

And don’t get me wrong – I still prefer My Girl Rayvon but this was sooooo much better than Rayvon’s performance last night and he is such a stellar performer. In this moment, I’ll be honest I was rooting for Qaasim.

The truth is, I didn’t really want either to go – but I’m not sure who I did want to go because this Top 8 truly is my Top 8 – I like all of them, finally, which is a nice place to be but also sad because it means someone good is going home. Last night’s elimination was tough because I loved the person who stayed but also loved the person who went home. In the interest of not spoiling the results for anyone who hasn’t had a chance to watch yet, I’ll be all mysterious and not say who went home.

Who would you have saved?

PS: Who else is Team Harry?