Scott MacIntyre is returning to familiar turf to perform a duet on ‘American Idol,’ just as the show announces season 9′s Top 12 finalists. MacIntyre, who finished eighth in season 8 after singing Survivor’s ‘The Search Is Over,’ is vision-impaired, and both his story and his musical chops won him admiration and a nation full of fans. Less than one year later, the singer-songwriter is set to release his first full-length, post-’Idol’ album, ‘Heartstrings,’ March 11 (available on iTunes and at MacIntyre’s website )

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Scott MacIntyre: The Best Part of ‘American Idol’ Is Getting Voted Off

Filed under: Poll This week’s Top 8 girls and Top 8 guys performance shows — arguably the most important of every season — decide which contestants will make up the enviable Top 12 spots. Even though contestants were encouraged to bring their A-games this week, some early favorites continued to fall off — (get it together, Andrew Garcia), while a few underdogs continued to surprise us — (‘sup, Alex Lambert?)

“American Idol” season eight is almost over, so we put together our top five favorite moments involving Adam Lambert, Kris Allen , Allison Iraheta , Anoop Desai , Scott MacIntyre …. It was tough limiting the list to five–this was a really good season, one of the best ever.

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American Idol season 8: Your top five favorite moments

, Blogosphere , Life After ‘Idol’ — Scott MacIntyre is opening up about his past battle with kidney failure. Read more about the disease that nearly cost him his life [ NBC Philadelphia ] — Adam Lambert’s popularity is tapping into one of America’s biggest cultural debates. Get the story [ NY Times ] — One season 7 alum has just landed a record deal

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‘Idol’ Lunchtime Lowdown 04/13/09

, Hot Topics Oscar-winning director Quentin Tarantino will be next week’s guest mentor on ‘American Idol.’ Contestants will sing songs under the theme ‘Idols at the Movies,’ reports EW.com , with performances by Miley Cyrus and Jennifer Hudson scheduled for Wednesday night’s results show. Tarantino was previously a guest judge during season 3′s ‘Movie Soundtracks’ week — the same week Fantasia wowed America with her rendition of ‘Summertime.’

“I’m definitely going to miss the group songs, believe it or not [laughs] … But we are actually one of the only groups, apparently, that talks and jokes two minutes before we walk on stage.” Read more of what Scott had to say when he spoke to reporters about leaving the show.

, Fans Read fan reactions to the latest elimination and post your own thoughts in the comments.

, Hot Topics AOL TV editors Sandy Deane and Kelly Woo, along with Urlesque editor Stephen Lenz, dish about the DVR debacle, which performances rocked and who should go home this week. Listen now!

— Kellie Pickler returns to the ‘Idol’ stage tonight. Read what she has to say about coming back and Simon’s “naughty little minx” comment from season 5 [ Fox News ] — Attention ‘Fringe’ fans: One of the show’s co-stars was spotted in the audience last night

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‘Idol’ Lunchtime Lowdown 04/08/09

, Hot Topics The good news: ‘American Idol’ cut down to a one-hour performance episode this week. The bad news: It didn’t finish on time and cut off a contestant. And that contestant was front-runner (and controversy-generator) Adam Lambert.

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‘Idol’ Runs Long, DVRs Cut Off Adam Lambert’s ‘Mad World.’ Cue Outrage