Live-Blogging My FOX Utah

[Photo courtesy of MyFOXUtah]
... because it's fun, and I'm up. David Archuleta's local FOX affiliate, FOX 13, is having their hometown "hero" live in studio today, and crazy people (like me) the world over have woken up at (or stayed up till) ungodly hours to catch the teen phenom on the live stream of the show.

"Crazy", Gnarls Barkley
by greateggs

10:49am ET: I am mad. It seemed they were being extremely repetitive with the stomach-signing joke until Kerri Cronk said "The time now is 8:36." It is, in fact, 8:49 in Utah. And now my stream (and everyone else's) has gone blank. WTF? They need a better production team there, even if only for the sake of David Archuleta. I'm done here. The day is heating up here in NYC.

10:42am ET: Still no mention of David, with 18 minutes and a break left in the show. Perhaps he was just saying goodbye to the anchors earlier, though the hand-waving was not of that nature.

10:41am ET: Big Buddha looks beat. Good. We want more David.

10:40am ET: Oh geez, it looks like another weather report is just around the corner. They should let David do it again, properly? this time. Although properly wouldn't be funny.

10:38am ET: Ne'rmind. He is still very much in the studio, waving his hands around explaining something to the news anchors. Lots and lots of hand waving.

10:36am ET: Apparently DArchuleta flubbed a lyric in "Waiting on the World to Change", stopped and said "Sorry." I think he's gone; they're talking about him in the past tense.

10:34am ET: No mention of any more DArchuleta. If he's gone, that was kind of anticlimactic, though completely my fault.

10:25am ET: David is looking confused in studio, holding a bottle of Aquafina. Product placement! Maybe it was Dasani. That would be less sacrilegious and make more sense.

10:23am ET: Is he leaving the studio now? I missed the lead-up to the performance. The guitar is packed and the news anchors were standing up, looking anxious. And we're back to not paying attention to David. They're standing up again, or just looking extra-pert in their seats.

"Waiting on the World to Change"
by greateggs

10:19am ET: My stream was wacky and when I finally realized that they weren't on some sort of permanent break, I found David in the middle of "Waiting on the World to Change" by John Mayer. He definitely changed the song up quite a bit. It's a lot more melodic than John Mayer's version. Apparently the Archuletas are still quite friendly with Dean Kaelin, as he is playing the guitar (and backup singer) to David.

9:57am ET: They said earlier that David would back later. I'm assuming this means in the last half-hour of the show, since that's what Today does. I'm taking a quick break.

9:56am ET: Oh gawd. I avoid the Food Network during certain hours and avoid The Early Show or the Today Show (I can't remember which one it is) for this precise reason: to avoid Emeril Lagasse. And now he has found his way back into my line of vision, on My FOX Utah, of all places. Go away.


[Photo courtesy of My FOX Utah]
9:53am ET: Break. They've taken the keyboard away, but not the mike. He's remaining seated. Okay, I take that back -- he just got up and is wandering a little aimlessly around while they take apart the seat-and-microphone setup. His father is chatting with the news anchors, and now David has disappeared out of the camera's sight. He's back, standing out of everyone's way. Wandering back to the chair. No one is paying any attention to him, not even the PAs/crew. He just waved for his father to get out of the news desk, and Jeff flew by in front of the camera seconds after the show returned.

9:52am ET: That was nothing short of amazing, especially when he hit the falsetto notes. He looked immensely relieved when he finished, having prefaced his performance with "I haven't practiced this in a while."

9:48am ET: They're building "Crazy" up without naming it. Big fans would know.

9:47am ET: Who's he become closest to on the tour. He's being diplomatic. Jason Castro and Kristy Lee Cook, he says. Carly Smithson. All of them.

9:46am ET: I am so not paying attention to David. This is bad. They're staying put in Utah -- they won't need to move to Los Angeles to record his album, apparently.

9:45am ET: For some reason or another, I definitely don't get a dad-and-son vibe from these two. I get more of a father vibe from Jeff towards David, but David never seems to act like Jeff's his dad. Maybe I'm crazy, or maybe I don't really know all that much about father-and-son relationships, since I'm an only child and not a guy.

9:44am ET: Someone thought DArchuleta was "uppity"? Are you KIDDING me? I never got wind of that, but I would've dismissed that, of course.

9:43am ET: I don't think I've ever said this on the blog, but I've said it probably a million and two times in real life: are we sure David is Jeff's child? And Lupe's, for that matter? He looks nothing like either of 'em! Or his siblings, for that matter.

9:42am ET: Oh my. What a surprise. Jeff Archuleta is sitting beside him. He is quite a sight for 9:43am in the morning.

9:41am ET: Poor Studio 5 KSL. They thought they'd be the first to unravel the mystery. And David didn't even know he was doing "Crazy" when a fan asked about it two days ago. He's sitting at the anchors desk again, swinging a leg.

9:40am ET: Okay, I was too preoccupied with blogging about that to actually realize the immensity of that statement. WE'RE FINALLY GOING TO GET TO HEAR HIM PERFORM THE BURIED AUDITION SONG!!!!

9:39am ET: Yep, he's sitting with a keyboard. He's so doing "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley. I hope he got to brush up on it after he got home yesterday ...

9:37am ET: It's not right that they put Big Buddha in these situations. You know they're all laughing at him. More sound effects. This is really uncomfortable; he looks like he's about to give birth, not "stir pots of jelly" (WTF at the metaphor?!).

9:35am ET: More joking about asking David to sign their stomachs. They think they can get the "blonde bombshell" (Kerri Cronk) to convince David to do it. I'm going to the bathroom since I know they're not going to show David for a little while longer.

9:34am ET: I'm really curious about what song David's gonna sing. I have a feeling My FOX Utah is milking this for all it's worth and won't show the singing until much later in the show. They still have an hour and 25 minutes to go.

9:33am ET: More wacky sound effects with the weather guy. What the heck? He made a joke about asking David to sign his stomach.

9:32am ET: Holy moly, the missionary in the white-and-pink "towel" is smokin' hot.

9:31am ET: Actually, that's not that surprising. I think many of the roads immediately surrounding Mormon temples reflect their proximity. And there are plenty of Church Streets in rural Massachusetts. I can vouch for that.

9:30am ET: Parrish Lane, really!?

9:30am ET: Although I shouldn't be complaining, because that's usually the only reason I tune into local news in the morning.

9:28am ET: I think they're going to be doing the weather again after the break. The folks in the Shoutbox were right on the money -- why DOES this station do so very many weather reports? I think I've seen four since I started watching forty minutes ago.

9:27am ET: OH the dude was a RETURNED missionary. Oh, then who cares? He's not really besmirching the mission of the mission, heh. He had his Church membership taken away.

9:27am ET: Big Buddha looks so small from this angle. I can't believe I know this guy's name. I should just go all the way and move to Utah.

9:24am ET: Hahahaha he is so awkward. I wish I had caught that on camera. Or made a screen cap. Is that a keyboard they have in the corner? He looked like he was trying to tug it into the main studio. The news anchors are not paying any attention to him. He looks like a production assistant in the corner. Ah, little David.

9:22am ET: He's going to be singing some songs he did during the auditions!? OMG does that mean we're going to get a taste of "Crazy" before tomorrow's show??? The live webcam they have in studio is showing him awkwardly not knowing where he's supposed to go during the break. It looks like he's about to apply some Chapstick, but I can't be sure. He just sat back down and is playing with ... his Chapstick! Love it.

9:21am ET: Someone asked him to sign their stomach and he said he didn't do it. That's NOTHING David, you just wait. I read yesterday that some girl asked if he wanted her to be his first kiss, if she could have his Chapstick, and if she could have a piece of his hair. He declined politely, of course.

9:20am ET: A question from Amy in California comes up as Katy or someone in Logan, Utah. Fantastic crew they've got there.

9:19am ET: There you go. He just said "giss". And again. He talks so much with his hands. He's not as chirpy as he was last time he was on this show -- the price of fame?

9:18am ET: They all had to ride the girls' bus once!? It was full of candles, apparently. He hasn't driven his new Ford car yet. I wonder if the rumors are true about the green car still being in some garage in LA.

9:17am ET: He says certain words strangely. "Jeedged" for "judged" and "giss" for "guess". This is something I noticed a while back.

9:16am ET: The garbage truck HAD to come by window just now, when David finally sat down to talk. DArchuleta's not sure how many songs he's recorded yet.

David Archuleta, Weather Boy
by greateggs

9:13am ET: They asked David to do the weather, and it was great. He is a natural. "The rest of the place looks pretty good except over here ... Rain is a good thing, I guess." With plenty of crazy bouncy sound effects. Yeah, the weather guy got him out of there as soon as he could.

9:05am ET: He was wearing a bright white t-shirt with what appeared to be black-and-white graphics or images screen-printed on the front. He looked bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for 7am.

Those Mormon missionaries-cum-calendar boys ... interesting. I'm not sure how they were even contacted if missionaries can only call home twice a year?! I loved the guy they interviewed on the subject, who was sitting in the grass, obviously picnicking alone, who said the missionaries looked like they belonged in Las Vegas. I'm sure I'm not the only one who would say so (especially if you are reading this), but Mormon boys are hot. Not to imply that I think DArchuleta is hot.

9:03am ET: There he is. "The Real Deal." He just got back up from the anchors' desk, quite awkwardly, but in a typically teenaged-boy way.

8:59am ET: Some back story on DArchuleta's vocal coach Dean Kaelin: his intentions are unclear. He was (and is?) part of the somewhat infamous "Team Archuleta" who not only tried to combat the Dadchuleta rumors, but tried to banish all bad things being said about David. That's fine, but after the show wrapped up, Mr. Kaelin began to sell a 60-paged "behind-the-scenes" book of DArchuleta's time on American Idol -- for a small fee of $5. Or was it $7? And this is for an e-book, so none of that "oh, that barely covers shipping and handling" stuff. Shady?

8:56am ET: International fans are getting yelled at for writing in Korean and Chinese characters. Share the love, people. We know that they know that we know they're not being understood, but love (and music) is universal, my dears.

8:51am ET: It's 6:51am in Salt Lake City right now. 5:51am on the West Coast, where some of the eager beavers in the MyFoxUtah "Shoutbox" are from. There are also some really crazy fans from places like Korea, Denmark and Malaysia. Dean Kaelin, DArchuleta's vocal coach, just came on to give tips on how to stand out at an American Idol audition, since the AI auditions are going to Salt Lake City and Utah for the first time ever. Most interesting news of the morning: it's only 47* in Logan, UT. While it's like 80 or 90*+ in Southern Utah.