And just in case you were curious, yes, my roommate did just ridicule me for listening to more than three Kelly Clarkson songs in a row.
Artist: Kelly Clarkson
Album: Breakaway
Release Date: November 30, 2004
New Rule: American Idol is henceforth canceled. The show’s previous winners and runner ups will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis
Justin and I agreed to the first part of that rule on principle, but the second part took some work. Justin voted to have them all killed outright. I, on the other hand, wished to show some mercy. Kelly Clarkson was the first one that I wanted to save from Justin’s axe. Out of all the 16 winners and runner ups, she’s pretty much the only one that’s been able to prove herself as a legitimate force in pop music. Too many of the others have either drifted into obscurity or irrelevancy, or they’ve stuck around and annoyed the hell out of us all. Even though the classification will make some people scoff just on reflex alone, Breakaway is a terrific pop album. It’s got more than enough of the big, brassy numbers (“Since U Been Gone”), and a fair helping of the cheesy ballads, with enough filler in there to generate a complete album. For added fun, Clarkson has done this repeatedly, and even went through a brief period of reinvention in the process. So let it here be known that Kelly Clarkson will be spared the onslaught when her American Idol brethren are taken out back behind the woodshed.
Taylor Hicks, though? Yeah, he’s so gone.
Kelly Clarkson – Since U Been Gone [iTunes] (YSI)
==TJ==
Filed under: Album A Day | Tagged: 2000s, Album A Day, Kelly Clarkson
How about Jennifer Hudson? Doesn’t an Oscar win, a Golden Globe win, a Grammy win put her in a different category?
Yes, though she was already safe since she was neither a winner nor a runner up (she came in 4th place, I believe)
Let’s see if I got this right. You ridicule the #1 show in America, and put down the winners. Only Kelly Clarkson is spared? The girl with the canceled tour?
Who are you? ??? What did you ever WIN??Yeah, and Taylor Hicks has been working non-stop at his greatest talent, which is ENTERTAINING IN LIVE PERFORMANCES, RECORDED A PLATINUM ALBUM, STARTED HIS OWN RECORD COMPANY, and now He stars in THE NATIONAL TOUR OF GREASE FROM BROADWAY, and fills the seats in the theatre and wows the critics, and you think, “HE’S SO GONE”? Did you do any research???You even put his name on your article to get hits and get someone to read it with interest cause you know people are interested in him. Why do I bother to respond to such idiots…truth is, nobody cares what you think. They will still cheer each night for all the American Idol winners, and they will still be singing to crowds when you are old and gray…….
Down girl.
Yes, I do ridicule the #1 Show in America. And just so we’re clear, Kelly Clarkson was the argument I used to justify keeping even some of them around. I’m not suggesting she’s the only talented one. I recognize there are plenty of other ones.
As for Taylor Hicks, he won a competition designed to generate new pop artists, and then became a glorified one-hit wonder. His subsequent successes aside, he failed to live up to the hype that AI generated for him.
No one can live up to the hype American Idol throws at these people……unless they choose to continue to hype them to the max…..like they did Daughtry……and it worked. The difference is whether the artist will sign a contract with 19 Entertainment giving them most of the profits that come in. Taylor decided to go his own way, as he knew how controlling management contracts can be. Remember, Kellie Clarkson had a spat with Clive Davis about her album My December, and it flopped, and so did the tour. That is how they can kill your CD if they want. They did that to Taylor Hicks, even though his music was as good as anything else on the radio. Yet they did not release ANY SINGLES until the CD was 2 months old. Daughtry’s CD was released before the winners CD, which has never been done before or since. But that is old news. Did you see Taylor’s appearance on IDol this last year, singing a song he wrote, released on his own record label, and guess what, Simon Cowell gave him a standing ovation!!!!! Why???? Because…What other American Idol winner has started their own record label, and has control of their career the way Taylor does. In the long run, he will be the most successful winner…. and Simon knows it!!!