Its not fair for gayle
Dramatic irony struck a second time yesterday night (July 20) as Gayle Nerva, 17, was voted off the competition after she chose the attitude-laden song Leave (Get Out) to perform for the No. 1 hits theme night.

The song title spoke volumes about her fate in Singapore Idol 2 , as did first-to-be-axed Norman Then's High and Dry from the previous week.

“I wanted so badly to go a bit further. I really wanted to sing so many genres and to improve each week. I feel really disappointed that I didn't get enough votes. But there's only so much you can do. You can't please everybody,” says a bubbly but disappointed Gayle in our interview this morning.

She's got one consolation, though: her fans are definitely turning up in droves to cheer up their fallen Idol. Throughout our interview, we witness a swamped Gayle receive SMS after SMS on her cellphone from adoring fans, faced with the impossibility of answering to all of them.

Both Gayle and Norman — the first two to go home ever since the Spectaculars started — were resurrected from an earlier exit from the reality talent quest as the judges' choices for the Wildcard show.

However, it looks like audiences didn't quite take to them as they hoped.

Dick Lee commented that the song didn't suit her voice, while Ken Lim said she failed to adequately control the song.

“I don't know, man,” says a sighing Gayle as she recalls the judges' comments, “It sounds very simple but it's a difficult song. And it's monotonous and the same note all the time, you know!”

Gayle's exit is especially devastating as she has been searching for a comfortable ground to connect with the audience throughout the show's season — and finally found it right at the very moment that Gurmit called out her name as the ousted one.

“It was getting better. When Gurmit said, ‘Gayle, you're going home,' I found it then — in terms of relating to the audience better, getting comfortable with them, and them with you, and instead of seeing them as being the fans while I'm the performer.”

A somber Gayle says she expected to be ousted when she found herself placed in the bottom three, beside Jay and Paul.

“Jay's voice is brilliant and Paul has this really sweet way of singing, even though he does an emo kind of rock. His fanbase is really strong too. I just went, ‘ Okaaaaaay , I'm gonna be going home.'”

However, she didn't get to say all her goodbyes as the finalists were whisked away rapidly to a different place following her farewell song. “I didn't even get to hug all of them… they left so fast! When I went to the mosh pit to hug my friends and turned back to look, it was like, ‘Hey, where have they gone?!'

Undaunted, she left them a stuffed toy (which she calls ‘Mr Snuffy'), some balloons, and left Emilee and Nurul — her closest pals in the competition — a note each at the Idols' lodge (which was unveiled as Hang Out Hotel at Mount Emily in the debut episode of Rated E last night) before heading for home with all her barang.

As the bottom-placed ‘unlucky trinity' Gayle, Jay and Paul hugged, the other Idol contestants behind them broke into tears again, not unlike last week's flash flood.

Even her fans wept buckets. “There was this one fan, Wei Ming. He was crying nonstop and he apologised for not voting enough. I was so sorry for him! I can't imagine him thinking it's his fault.”

Still, at least one person is glad that she's out of the competition: her own mum.

“My mum's happy ‘cos I haven't been going home in a while. She's like, ‘Yay! MediaCorp returned my daughter to me!' Even today, when I came back for interviews, she was like, ‘Huh, not finished yet? Still have to return to MediaCorp?'”

In the meantime, the feisty Gayle, who just completed her ‘O' Levels at CHIJ Toa Payoh Secondary Girls' School and put further education on hold for the competition, says she may just have to look at going back to school now and will most likely pursue a design course at LASALLE-SIA College of the Arts next.

“It's good for me to explore, say interior design or photography — you never know till you try something new… there are so many options for me now. It's a big world. I'm still so young and can do so many things.

“But I want to perform and have concerts. You know all those artistes that sing on National Day? That's so cool lah ! Or those charity shows, where they do those fun stuff.”

Design course or not, Gayle vows to pursue music till her dying breath.

“I won't ever get out of music. It's my life. Everyday I sing and even fall asleep listening to music. I can't imagine if I'm deaf or something… I think I'd die!”

Now that the competition is over for her, Gayle sensibly urges audiences to vote for singers, not lookers. “Look beyond that and see if they're qualified. These people work very hard for everything.”

With Gayle's departure, the Top 12 competition now shrinks to 10 contenders, namely Hady Mirza, Joakim Gomez, Jonathan Leong, Paul Twohill, Jay Lim, Nurul Maideen, Rahimah Rahim, Mathilda D' Silva, Emilee Kang and Jasmine Tye.

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Was a supporter of gayle...her voice is nice and she got the package. For screwing up my fav band creed song, paul should be out. I guess this sg idol ...the female fan base are more; so the gals are on a losing side. Who to support next...perhaps jonathan and hadi.
Stupified @ 9:49 PM