We kicked off with a supremely awkward group number (what else is new?) in which the final 12 performed Lady Gaga's "The Edge of Glory" with no discernable sense of timing or harmony. Thankfully, some enterprising individual backstage made certain that Lakoda Rayne's microphones were turned down, but there was no disguising how shaky Chris Rene sounded and Rachel Crow pretty much shouted her lines. An inauspicious start, to say the least.
Paula Abdul took product placement to a whole new venue last night. At a press conference for "The X Factor," Abdul strolled down the red carpet in a...