American Idol' Eliminates Lacey Brown, Gets a Visit From Ke$ha

American Idol delivered its first Ford commercial set to an unlikely tune last night — the Hives' "Tick Tick Boom" — which was quite appropriate for Rolling Stones week since the Swedish garage rockers' charismatic frontman Howlin' Pele Almqvist has borrowed 70 percent of his mind-blowing stage show from Mick Jagger. If Idol can somehow get even one percent of its massive viewership to revisit the band's incredible 2000 disc Veni Vidi Vicious, Season Nine has redeemed itself.

The show also featured amped-up version of the Rolling Stones' "Jumpin' Jack Flash" by Season Seven winner David Cook, plus Orianthi performed her single "According to You." And Ke$ha rocked her feather headdress alongside dancers balancing giant TVs for heads during a rendition of Animal single "Blah Blah Blah" that featured an uncredited cameo by 3Oh!3 (perhaps Ryan Seacrest didn't recognize them?).

But the night's real task was Season Nine's first Top 12 elimination. Paige Miles, Tim Urban and Lacey Brown landed in the bottom three, and minds were certainly blown when Urban — who turned "Under My Thumb" into pseudo-reggae slop — was declared safe. Miles, who struggled with laryngitis but managed to pull out a decent "Honky Tonk Woman," triumphed over Brown, who had sung a surprisingly interesting "Ruby Tuesday" set to a string quartet on Tuesday night. Randy Jackson, Ellen DeGeneres, Kara DioGuardi and Simon Cowell unanimously agreed not to use their one-time Judges' Save to keep Brown in the competition.

That means, of course, that Siobhan Magnus (who Rock Daily declared "Lady Lambert" but our readers seemed to perceive more as "Gal Gokey" for her "Paint It Black" screech) will sing another week, along with strong contenders Crystal Bowersox and Didi Benami. Was Brown's time really up? Give RS your take in the comments.

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Song Stories

“I'm Yours”

Jason Mraz | 2008

Jason Mraz re-emerged after his disappointing second album with this lead single, a Jack Johnson-esque ditty about giving yourself fully to someone else. The success of the reggae-tinged song (it earned two Grammy nods and a spot on the Billboard singles chart for well over a year) was something the folk-pop singer never predicted when he wrote it in 15 minutes at home. "I played a happy-hippie chord progression that would probably work without 50 different Bob Marley songs," he told Rolling Stone. "I thought, 'It's too novelty. This is a nursery rhyme,'" concluding that "you can never guess what's gonna be a hit."

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