Update: USA Today says 122 million votes last night. 6+ avg. votes per viewer.

We’re just hours away from finding out who won American Idol 2011. While we wait lets take a run through the winner predictions and see where we all stand.

Last night the judges called it for Lauren after giving her seven of the nine “Round votes.” Randy and JLo each gave Scotty one Round vote while Steven Tyler put all of his support behind Lauren.

Branden noted that while he preferred Scotty it was looking like all the show’s manipulation to push voters to Lauren would probably work. That’s another vote for Lauren Alaina to win this season of Idol.

All season long your votes in our polls have kept Scotty well ahead of Lauren. Sure, our unofficial polls were wrong with James, Pia, and Haley’s eliminations despite out-ranking Lauren but I’ve got faith in you all. This week’s results, see below, show nearly a 2:1 lead for Scotty McCreery.

Don’t forget Dial Idol which took a hit this year with the introduction of online voting via Facebook, but based on their testing methods they’re calling it for Scotty by roughly a 3:2 margin.

I can’t help but feel overwhelmed by productions pushing and shoving of Lauren!-Lauren!-Lauren! down our throats, but I’m standing strong against it. With three straight years of a guy winning this competition I’m not convinced Lauren can overcome the odds. My prediction goes to Scotty McCreery for the win.

We’ll know soon enough, but in the meantime be sure to vote in our poll and share your thoughts on who will win and why.

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You won’t have to wait to buy the American Idol 2011 winner album or even Lauren’s (zing!) because Idol has just released compilation albums for both of the season’s Top 2 featuring their songs from last night and throughout the season. Both albums contain 14 songs and can be picked up for $9.99 each. Not too shabby of a deal. Of course you can also just buy the individual tracks if you’d rather.

Direct links to buy Scotty’s and Lauren’s performance compilations:

• Scotty McCreery American Idol 2011 Album – $9.99 in iTunes
• Lauren Alaina American Idol 2011 Album – $9.99 in iTunes

The Lauren Alaina American Idol Season 10 compilation includes new single “Like My Mother Does,” along with her standout performances of “Any Man of Mine,” “Candle in the Wind,” and “The Climb.” The Scotty McCreery American Idol Season 10 compilation boasts his version of Lonestar’s “Amazed,” “Gone” by Matchbox 20, and Elvis Presley.

Full Disclosure: Yes, buying these albums through our links supports the site.

Original content from American Idol 2011.

Tonight is the very last episode of the American Idol 2011 season and in an effort to make up for last night’s snoozefest we should be getting one heck of a finale show in true Idol fashion, but without last season’s winner…

While FOX has been fairly tight-lipped about who will be on the show (because we all know interest and anticipation are the last thing you want for your big show, right??) there have been lots of leaks and tips. Considering last night’s 7% drop in ratings over last year’s finale show (the very same “last year” that produced the worst sales ever with its winner…) they should be doing everything they can to promote the show.

Here’s what we know so far for finale show performances, allegedly of course as FOX won’t confirm bookings:

Carrie Underwood returns to sing alongside Lauren Alaina while Scotty will duet with Tim McGraw. Lady Gaga will perform “Edge of Glory.” Bono and The Edge will be doing some of their songs from the Spider-Man Broadway show.

Pia Toscano will have a duet with Charice while, I’ll be pleasantly surprised if true, Jack Black teams up with Casey Abrams. Haley Reinhart’s parents let slip a rumor that she may end up doing a performance on tonight’s finale to debut her first single, but others report it’ll be a duet with Tony Bennett. Even James Durbin gets a power performance. He’ll join forces with Judas Priest. No word on that Steven Tyler and James Durbin duet discussed earlier in the season.

The Top 13′s girls will team up with Beyonce while the Top 13′s guys will join forces with Tom Jones… Wait, what? Sure, Jones is worthy of the finale but no one semi-modern was available? Anyway…

Then there’s the judges table who will offer up a rendition of “Dream On” by Steven Tyler minus Aerosmith and JLo may have a duet with her husband Skeletor Marc Anthony.

Oh, I can confirm who will not be performing tonight. Lee DeWyze was most definitely not invited to perform on this season’s finale show. DeWyze confirmed the news while his album sales predicted it.

So yeah, lots going on with tonight’s show. Hopefully most of those are true and there’s even more we don’t know about just yet.

Which guest performer are you most excited to see on tonight’s American Idol finale?

Source: THR

Original content from American Idol 2011.

Yesterday I gave you my “American Idol” 2011 Top 10 Moments, which featured some of the best performances and most shocking moments. And our readers requested I compiled my Top 10 Worst Moments list. So here it is. Warning: this is a “Worst” list so don’t be surprised if you’re offended in any way (and I won’t argue with you in the comments).

10. Karen Rodriguez sings “I Could Fall in Love.” Karen was obsessed with Selena and unfortunately for her, it got her cut from the show pretty early. She just couldn’t quite get in the zone.

9. Casey Abrams sings “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Casey screamed and acted angry during most of his performances, but this one was the worst. He had some great moments, but this was not one of them.

8. Jacob Lusk sings “No Air.” Not only was this a terrible performance, it was terrible timing. If Jacob wanted to break into the Top 3, this was not the song to sing. I mean who sings a duet alone on “American Idol” anyway? Bad idea.

7. Clint Jun Gamboa’s attitude. There’s a reason why such a great singer couldn’t break the Top 12. Hopefully he realizes why. And I don’t want to hear an “it was editing” defenses. When he wasn’t being mean to contestants, he was being cocky and arrogant.Voters couldn’t forget him kicking out sweet young singer Jacee Badeaux.

6. Julie Zorilla sings “Break Away.” Julie seemed like she’d end up being a front runner, but I think this bad performance sealed her fate, knocking her out just shy of making the Top 12.

5. The eliminations of  pre-Top 13 contenders Jacee Badaeux, Colton Dixon, Brett Lowerenstern and Robbie Rosen. This season could have been a whole lot different with these great singers. Unfortunately, they weren’t able to get in on the judges’ and producer’s pimp-fest in time. At least Jacee and Colton get another shot next season. Brett and Robbie, sadly, were wasted on the Top 24.

4. Randy Jackson. From his obvious insecurities with the new judges to his CONSTANT name drops to his uneven critiques to his obsession with getting Haley Reinhart off the show, Randy was a complete tool this season. He’s so annoying, he warrants that run-on sentence. Why is he the only original judge remaining?

3. Naima Adedapo sings “What’s Love Got To Do With It.” Naima was a good performer but not the best singer. She really showed that with this performance. I can’t believe she wasn’t immediately eliminated after it. From my original review: “She got off to a bad start then stayed flat during most of the song. I don’t even know what key she was trying to sing in.”

2. Jordan Dorsey sings “OMG.” That was the worst performance of the entire season. Bad vocals, bad dancing, bad, bad, bad. On top of that, Jordan had a seemingly bad attitude. He caught a lot of flack for his very diva manners during Hollywood week. Attitude matters when America votes. Future Idols, remember that.

1. The results shows. From group numbers to countless minutes of filler, they seemed to be more painful this season than ever. They really need to cut the results shows down to 30 minutes.There were a few decent results shows. But ONLY a FEW. By far, it was the worst part of the season.

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Tonight we learn who will win American Idol 2011, but does it really matter? Based on recent seasons there’s a chance the season’s big winner won’t be the one wearing the crown when it comes down to debut album sales.

Going all the way back to season two you can see the winner, Studdard, being eclipsed by his challenger, Clay Aiken, though both had excellent sales numbers (1.7M and 2.7M, respectively). This scenario peaked in season 5 when Daughtry went on to sell almost five million albums while Taylor Hicks sold 705,000. But take a look at last season when winner Lee DeWyze became the absolute worst commercially performing Idol winner evah with just 136,000 debut albums sold. More people visited this site yesterday than bought Lee’s album since its release. Runner-up, Crystal Bowersox, outperformed DeWyze but still sold under 200,000 albums.

Can that trend end tonight? If Lauren wins tonight American Idol’s sales could be in serious trouble with a repeat of DeWyze’s sales-bomb. IdolHeadEd has an interesting breakdown of this season’s iTunes Idol Top 25 commercial sales to date and Lauren Alaina has just two entries: 19th and 25th. Meanwhile Scotty McCreery has 4th, 9th, and 24th. Those McCreery numbers aren’t the most inspiring either. Haley Reinhart fans can take solace knowing she holds the top 3 iTunes sale spots along with #10 and James Durbin earned spots 5th, 6th, and 7th.

I know American Idol producers have been fighting tooth and nail to finally get a female winner after three seasons, but Lauren Alaina looks positioned to be more Lee DeWyze than Carrie Underwood and the producers will have to learn the hard way to keep their fingers out of the pie. If they wanted the big bucks, and I think we all know that’s what this show is really about, then they should have stuck with Haley Reinhart rather than railroading her in to oblivion.

Perhaps the more important question, if Idol’s ratings continue to trend downward since 2006 but still win the season, why are the album sales doing so poorly compared to the multi-million unit sales of the early seasons?

Past season winners’ and challengers’ debut album sales:

Sales #’s source: Washington Post

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