Headlines: Kelly Clarkson CMT Awards, Clay Aiken Headed to Amazon

Clay Aiken joins Amber Rose and Big Brother contestant Cody Calafiore in Amazon series – Looks like Clay Aiken is lining up to teach some New Dogs, Old Tricks. The American Idol alum has signed on to join Big Brother contestant Cody Calafiore and model and activist Amber Rose in the series, EW can exclusively reveal. The spin-off of last year’s college comedy What Happened Last Night will hit Amazon in September. Even beyond those three stars, though, New Dogs, Old Tricks reads like a who’s-who of small-screen celebs, with Jessie Godderz (Big Brother), David Otunga (I Love New York 2), Clayton Snyder (Lizzie McGuire), Eric Roberts (Heroes), and Shelley Regner (Pitch Perfect) also attached in various roles. – Read more at Entertainment Weekly

‘The Voice’ Winner Brynn Cartelli on Her Dreams Coming True – Via Extra

Youngest-Ever ‘Voice’ Winner Brynn Cartelli on Her Big Victory – You had several interesting song selections – one week you would lean toward the Top 40, then you would cover Jackie DeShannon or a song written by Patty Griffin. Each week I had a different idea – I had a million ideas. I wanted to find a really good collection of songs from different genres that I could make my own. It depended what I wanted to bring to the table that week, what I wanted to show, what I wanted to say. I hate when I get pinned down to a genre. I have a sound, a lane I want to go down, but I never want to be stuck in my song choices. Kelly was so supportive of my crazy song ideas. – Read more at Rolling Stone

‘The Voice’ Season 14 winner Brynn Cartelli on her never-seen first audition: ‘I blacked out that whole thing’ – Brynn Cartelli was a frontrunner throughout the just-wrapped 14th season of The Voice, and after she triumphed on Tuesday’s finale, the Washington Post called the 15-year-old pop singer’s win a “game-changer” for the show, due to her unprecedented marketability and commercial appeal. But Brynn almost didn’t get to play the game at all. She actually first participated in Season 13, going through the entire preshow process and eventually even giving a Blind Audition for the coaches — but she turned no chairs. That unsuccessful first Blind Audition never aired. “I honestly don’t even remember what I sang,” Cartelli laughingly tells Yahoo Entertainment of her Season 13 experience. “I blacked out that whole thing.” – Read more at Yahoo.com

What happens next for ‘American Idol’ winner Maddie Poppe could well make or break her chance at lasting fame, experts say – “She is never going to have more momentum than she does right now, so the stakes are huge that the next step is the right step,” said Brian Mansfield, a music writer and “Idol” expert. With her dazzling victory Monday night, there’s a glow around Poppe that has brought her instant national acclaim. But the music she puts out in the next eight months to a year likely will determine whether that fame is lasting, said Luke Matthews, a DJ with Star 102.5 and a pop culture enthusiast. – Read more at Des Moines Register

American Idol Winner Maddie Poppe on Her Debut Album, Meeting Kermit and That ‘Awkward’ Finale Hand Holding – “[The producers] mentioned that Ryan might bring that up, because I guess he had found out about it earlier in the day,” Poppe said. “I was fine with it, but before we sang that song together, Caleb said, ‘Hey, hold your microphone in your left hand.’ … I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, he’s going to try to hold my hand during this, isn’t he?’” Sure enough, hands were held. “I’m such an awkward person, so I didn’t know how to react,” she said. “I just started smiling and I just let him kind of let [Caleb] take the reins. My dad was saying, ‘It didn’t like you were very affectionate towards Caleb on stage,’ but I was just so nervous. I didn’t know what to say!” – Read more at TVLine

‘American Idol’ Runner-Up Caleb Lee Hutchinson Shares How He Lost Over 60 Pounds – “You know, it’s a journey, its not an overnight thing. And throughout my life, it’s gonna be something I deal with,” he told ET’s Lauren Zima back in April of his physical transformation. “Just in this past year of my life, I’ve really tackled a lot of things that I put off, and I feel like I’m becoming a man I can be proud of and like I’ve been prepared for this moment that I’m in.” – Read more at Entertainment Tonight

Kelly Clarkson Hilariously Reveals the Secret to Her Recent Slim-Down – It’s no secret that the 36-year-old singer has been looking amazing these days, slaying her outfits on The Voice and looking noticeably slimmer. ET’s Sophie Schillaci asked Clarkson about her fitness and fashion at a press conference on Monday for The Voice’s season finale, and the beloved coach had a hilarious response. “I have to shout out my whole glam squad,” Clarkson replied, before joking, “I literally hired Harry Potter and SPANX, it’s all like a sausage.” – Read more at CBS8.com

Adam Lambert covers summer issue of Attitude Magazine – “Obviously Queen really inspired me. I don’t think this album is genre-specific. I think there are a lot of different influences on it. There’s rock, there’s FUNK, there’s soul, there’s disco, Seventies singer-songwriter pop and some Eighties flavours, too. That being said, there are a lot of modern influences as well, so it’s sort of a fusion.” – Read more at Attitude

Adam Lambert on Freddie Mercury’s Sexuality: ‘I Don’t Know How In the Closet He Actually Was’ – The “What Do You Want From Me” singer said that while Mercury had a tendency to answer questions about his sexuality in a facetious way, he still occasionally answered the questions. “There were interviews where they were asking if he was gay and he said: ‘Yeah as a daffodil… gay as a daffodil,’” Lambert said. “And I don’t know if they thought he was being flippant, but he never really said, ‘No, I’m not.’” – Read more at Billboard