July 2007 News Archive (Page 6)

A new reality show (Hey Paula) and a new man (JT Torregiani) aren't enough for Paula Abdul.

The American Idol judge will release her first perfume in the upcoming months. It's name? Sexy Thoughts.

"It's fun, it's flirty, it's chic," said Abdul. "It's sexy... It totally captures the spirit of who I am."

The singer, never one to be shy, also admitted she agreed to launch the perfume after spraying it on herself and asking those around her, who eventually gave the scent a positive review.

On starting the business and launching the fragrance, Abdul joked that she was looking for the right smell for Idol partner Simon Cowell.

"In the middle of coming up with my fragrance line, I asked the question, 'By any chance do you have anything that smells like cat pee, and cow poop and, like, farts?' I want to put those elements in a bottle, and call it Ode to Simonella. I 'm going to put it together and I'm going to surprise him next season, and douse it all over the chair."

Katharine McPhee finished in second place on American Idol last year.

And she has something in common with this year's runner-up: both her and Blake Lewis are very easy on the eyes.

Need evidence? Check out the photos below. And read through the interview McPhee recently gave Stuff magazine:

On being McNaughty and McNice:
“There are different sides of me. On American Idol, people saw the side that is very professional and put together. But there’s this other side of me that’s outgoing, energetic, and wild—and did really stupid things in college.”

On dating older men (her boyfriend, Broadway actor Nick Cokas, is 42):
“When I turned 21, I thought it was a good age to explore. You’re no longer a teenager, so it’s OK [to date older guys]. I gravitated toward them, and I love them. They’re just wiser, and they’re less about themselves and more about you.”

On her new album cover:
“People made a big deal out of that. They said, ‘She’s a slut, blah, blah, blah.’ But I’m really not showing that much skin. It’s all suggested.”

On what younger men need to know about women:
“Women sometimes act out, and men get frustrated. They don’t get that all we want is, for a few seconds, for you to be all about the girl—to snuggle her and give her kisses and tell her ‘Your lips are so pretty today. I love your lips.’”

On being popular with the fellas:
“I was prematurely developed. As a freshman I looked like a junior; I had boobs. Some of the older kids saw me in the yearbook and said I was cute.”

If he were a race horse, Chris Daughtry would have finished out of the money in 2006.

While he may have failed to win in season five's American Idol competition, 2007 has been a year of vindication for the 27-year-old North Carolinian. His debut album "Daughtry" opened at No. 1on the Billboard 200, is currently double platinum and still riding high in the top 10 after 27 weeks in stores. By way of comparison, "Daughtry" is No. 6 on Billboard, while the 2006 Idol winner Taylor Hicks' self-titled debut isn't even in the top 200 any longer.

Moreover, when Hicks came to Milwaukee, he played the 2,500-seat Riverside Theater. On Friday, The Milwaukee Journel-Sentinel reports that Daughtry will headline Summerfest in the 23,000-seat Marcus Amphitheater.

Through most of the American Idol competition, Daughtry was clearly the judge's favorite, and he appeared stunned when he was voted off the show, finishing behind Hicks, Katharine McPhee and Elliott Yamin. At the time, he speculated his fans might have been so confident of his success that they failed to vote.

Obviously, the momentum he has built since then has erased most of the sting of that setback.

"I've been pretty lucky," he said recently by phone. "I don't feel I've had any painful moments in music. If getting voted off American Idol is the worst thing that happens to me, I'll be very lucky."

One measure of his popularity came when the established rock band Fuel, invited him to take over as their lead singer. Daughtry had won raves for his performance of "Hemorrhage (In My Hands)," and two days later the band extended its invitation to Daughtry to step in for the departed Brett Scallions.

Although flattered, Daughtry declined because "I didn't want to be a replacement for someone else."

One of the oddities of American Idol is that you can become famous very fast and be seen by millions of people but still be largely unknown as a musician because you're performing cover tunes often from before you were even born.

Daughtry was asked whether it was important to write the songs on his debut to establish his own voice as a musician.

"Well, to be honest," he said, "I don't think they care about you as a musician on American Idol. That's not what that's about."

Although ratings remained very high, American Idol came under increasing fire this year for an alleged nasty streak. Rosie O'Donnell took the show to task for its alleged cruelty and racism. Judge Simon Cowell was criticized for comparing one early contestant to a bush baby. Later, near the end of a "trick show" show on which no one was voted off because it was a charity-event episode, eventual winner Jordin Sparks was reduced to tears when it appeared she was leaving the show.

Although Daughtry has been too busy to see much of the 2007 season, he shrugs off the criticism, saying, "If you're on American Idol, you know what the show's like."

Kelly Clarkson has signed with Nashville-based Starstruck Entertainment for management. Clarkson's career was previously handled by Jeff Kwatinetz at the Firm in Los Angeles.

Starstruck Entertainment is currently home to country artists Reba McEntire and Blake Shelton. Narvel Blackstock, CEO of Starstruck and McEntire's husband, will serve as Clarkson's personal manager. Trisha McClanahan, Starstruck VP of marketing, will assist with day-to-day operations.

Startstruck Entertainment was founded by Blackstock in 1988 as a full service entertainment conglomerate. McClanahan joined the company in 1990. Starstruck Management Group is the artist management arm of the corporation.

Clarkson's latest RCA album My December was released June 26. She will continue to be booked by Creative Artists Agency in Los Angeles.

Kelly Clarkson, the original American Idol, came out with her latest album last week.

Now comes new that one of the more recent,beloved American Idol contestants will also be releasing a CD later in the year. That's right, Blake Lewis fans, get excited.

"I've been working for such a long time writing a lot of songs in different genres," Reality TV World reported Lewis told TV Guide on Wednesday. "The first album is really a testament of who you are."

Similar to Idol sixth-season champ Jordin Sparks, Lewis finds himself with a busy summer ahead, working on his debut album while at the same time preparing for American Idol's 2007 concert tour, which kicks-off Friday, July 6 and spans 56 dates and 35 states over the course of two-and-a-half months.

Lewis said he hit the studio on Monday, June 18 in Los Angeles to begin laying the groundwork for his debut album, with electronic musician BT already signed on as a producer.

"I just recorded my first track last night," Lewis said. "I've already written seven songs."

In addition, Lewis said fellow beat-boxer Doug E. Fresh - with whom he performed a memorable duet of the rapper's 1986 hit "The Show" during Idol 6's finale - is currently "in talks" to beatbox on one of the album's tracks. However Lewis' eagerness to perform with others from the industry doesn't stop with Fresh.

"There's a couple of emcees I'd like to work with," he said. "I'm going to have four or five people beatbox between tracks."

Lewis also doesn't want to just collaborate with some of his musical inspirations, as he's planning to pay them homage through the album's sound.

"I'd classify it as electro-funk-soul-pop if you need to label it," he explained. "I really love the sounds of the '80s so I hope to ring some of that back. I'm really inspired by electronic music."

Lewis told TV Guide his debut album can be expected to drop before the end of the year "because they want it out by Thanksgiving or Christmas."

As Taylor Hicks continues his summer tour, he made time for the following interview...

Julie Greene: Welcome, everyone, to this podcast for Antpod.com and HMLoop.com. This is Julie Greene with The Herald-Mail newspapers. We're talking with "American Idol" season five winner Taylor Hicks, who is currently on tour and will be performing at The Maryland Theatre in downtown Hagerstown on Friday, July 6. Taylor, welcome and thanks for joining us today.
Taylor Hicks: Thanks for having me.

Greene: Other than the popularity, what is the main difference between being on tour pre-American Idol versus post-American Idol?
Hicks: The budget's different.

Greene: And how does that affect ... ?
Hicks: It's allowing me the label. ... It's a different type of level that you can be able to have more utensils to get your art across.

 Greene: People who watched American Idol know you were a working musician before the show. How did your interest in music begin?
Hicks: I was about, I don't know, 7 or 8, and started listening to Otis Redding and Ray Charles, and a lot of AM stuff. ... The '70s were great for AM singer-songwriters. I followed the path and luckily, you know, picked up an instrument, a guitar ... and started working my way through learning my craft - and still learning my craft.

Greene: Have you had a chance to write some new songs?
Hicks: You know, I've started on some ideas, and you know, going right back out for the summer tour, it's been ... tough, you know, to get in the writing process. I'm taking some time off in the fall and gonna really try to get some good songs going.

Greene: I wanted to ask, what's on your iPod right now?
Hicks: Leo Sayer, from the '80s. Some Ronnie Milsap, some Derek Trucks ... just, you know, all kinds of different people.

Greene: Going back to American Idol, how does it feel to be a part of a cultural phenomenon like American Idol?
Hicks: It's very interesting. I'm very blessed that I was able to get through and, you know, expose my singing ability and have it be received in the way that it has. ... It's been great. I've enjoyed it. I've enjoyed it. I've enjoyed the ride, and I'm out here trying to make the best of the music."

Greene: Do you watch the show?
Hicks: I do watch it. I watched a little bit last season. I was very happy to see Jordin Sparks and Blake Lewis be in the finals, and I was happy for Jordin, who won it.

Greene: What did you think about Sanjaya Malakar making it to the finals for season six, despite his not being well-received by the judges?
Hicks: I think. definitely. Sanjaya was a visual performer.

Greene: Did you vote for anyone from season six?
Hicks: We did a few - we did some voting here and there. We voted for Blake one night and Jordin the next. We just, we kind of just, we had fun with it, just like everybody else has fun with it.

Click here to read the full interview.