American Idol is and always has been a solo singing content, made for one star to rise above the others in winning celebration. But for just one night in Hollywood, they have to come together to make beautiful music….or, fall flat on their faces.

Seeing who will fly and who will fail is all part of the excitement. For us, anyway. For many of the contestants, group night is a total nightmare of nerves and tension.

Some, like Tatiana Del Toro, have difficulty even finding and forming a group. Others, like Danny Gokey and Jamar Rogers, manage to find perfect harmony.

The episode began focusing on Tatiana early. She’s the dark-haired girl with the laugh. She became emotional early in group practice and tried to jump ship, moving to a different group, but changed her mind and decided to stick with her original companions.

The group Tatiana almost joined was called Compromise, because they experienced nothing but high drama and horrible tension all night. The group was made up of Nathanial Marshall, a girl named Nancy Wilson who was not featured before now and pretty Kristin McNamara who I don’t remember at all. Nathan tried to act as a mediator between Nancy and Kristin, to no avail. “It’s not only you here,” Nancy told Kristin during the evening, driving the latter to tears.

Rose Flack joined the Divas, which also consisted of Bikini girl Katrina Darrell, Jasmine Murray and Lauren Barnes. Katrina grew tired and left the group early, growing very emotional at the end of the night. Nathan, who broke down during the first round of Hollywood auditions, also became highly emotional before the evening was through. “It’s not just your dream at stake!” He sobbed to his teammates at one point.

At morning light’s dawned, groups managed to pull it together or sink further into trouble. Katrina’s team tried to fetch her from her room but she would not comply. The Bikini girl did finally arrive - late. Most surprisingly of all, her team actually took her back.

The judges finally arrived, and Simon Cowell greeted them with an ominous statement: “Forget the words, you’re out,” he proclaimed.

White Chocolate was the first group performance of the episode - and I think they were the best of the hour. This team consisted of Matt Giraud, Kris Allen, Justin Williams and India Morrison. India offered up some raps, the background vocals were spot-on, and Kara DioGuardi happily announced, “all of you are through.”

The Action Squad (Alex Wagner-Trugman, Ann Marie Boskovitch, Emily Wynn Hughes and Ryan Pinkston) delivered a rather boring performance, and I didn’t think they blended well at all. Only Alex and Ann Marie will remain from the group.

Next came the group of best friends Danny Gokey and Jamar Rogers, which also included Taylor Vaifhuana and another girl who barely caught the camera’s eye and evidently doesn’t have a name. I’m not even sure what their group was called, because the emphasis is very decidedly on the pair of friends alone - and only that as an extension of being focused on Gokey. At any rate, they sang “Somebody to Love” like they’re the group who originally performed the song, offering up a beautifully harmonious number. Danny was told to step forward, but in the end the entire group was pushed through to the next round.

Standouts of the day included Texas boy Jeremy Michael Sarver, Matt Breitzke, Jesse Langston and Adam Lambert (whose incredible vocals blew me away). All are through to the next round of Hollywood, which is all about purely solo performances.

The Diva team finally appeared on stage, each one of them looking more uncomfortable than the next. Catfighting broke out on stage immediately and the performing wasn’t that hot. All of them, save young Jasmine Murray, will now be leaving Hollywood. It was always a foregone conclusion that Katrina wouldn’t make it into the competition - she seriously doesn’t have the vocals - but I always liked oddball Rose Flack (though I’ll say again, get the girl some shoes). Katrina the Bikini girl was not happy with being eliminated, and said the other girls were all fake.

Other early favorites were eliminated as the day wore on. Austin Sisneros, David Osmond and my favorite Deanna Brown could not survive Group Night in Hollywood.

The group featuring Tatiana Del Toro, referred to as “Tatiana’s Group,” was the next to take the stage. Muna Hiluf was also in the group, but no time was spared for much but Tatiana. Honestly, I thought the group looked terrible and I didn’t like Hiluf’s singing, but they made it the next round as one.

The evening closed with the performance of Team Compromise, who had nothing but drama drama drama all through practice. Nathanial Marshall was very showy, Nancy Wilson stumbled on the lyrics and Kristin McNamara really, really sang it out for the judges. Nancy was eliminated on the spot, spared a moment to swear viciously at Kristin and stalked off with plenty of ‘tude.

She’s not one of the seventy-five Hollywood contestants who remain. Next week this group will sing out their hearts and make one last-ditch effort to wow the judges, winning a place among the Top 36 contenders. Somehow, Hollywood always loses its flavor when group night is done. But soon enough, some of these singers will be heading to the big American Idol stage - and that’s when the real fun begins.

(You can find all the American Idol 8 posts here.)