Home cooking: Sprint crowd rains love on ‹Idol champ
His career as a rock star is still in its infancy, but David Cook has already reached a momentous peak. Friday night at a very sold-out Sprint Center, he ignited the kind of long, convulsive roar that many entertainers wait all their lives to live through.
Cook is 25, and he hasnt released a major-label album yet. But he the headliner of this year …American Idols Live tour, which rolled into his hometown on Friday for the first of two shows. And when he arrived on stage sometime around 9:30 p.m. ‘ wearing a Tony Gonzalez home jersey ‘ the Sprint Center shook and shivered like it hasnt since Garth Brooks was in town.
More Idol Headlines After the JUMP…
American Idol David Cook Back In Kansas City
BLUE SPRINGS, Mo. — This weekend, the road finally lead home for American Idol David Cook. After almost two months on tour, the American Idol show has arrived at the Sprint Center for a two night run.
On Friday, the City of Blue Springs unveiled a mural in honor of Cook.
‹Idol devotion knows no bounds
No offense to Syesha or Carly or Jason or Michael.
But much of the love outside the Sprint Center before their American Idols Live concert Friday was aimed squarely and largely at hometown boy and this year winner, David Cook.
Former contestants of the hit show have been on a cross-country tour since their July 1 kickoff in Arizona. But even before Cook and his companions hit Kansas City, one fan posted this on the …American Idol discussion board:
On The Road With David Cook
With the summer tour nearing its final stretch, we thought it was high time to speak with the Season 7 winner himself, David Cook. In the midst of touring so many cities and doing so many performances, David is also recording a new album. We wanted to know what challenges he faced with such a busy schedule and what impressed him most about his newfound celebrity. We caught up this month while he and the other Idols were making their way across the East Coast.
…Both the tour and the record are going really well, were actually ahead of schedule on the record. And were now on the home stretch of the tour, David reported. Touring holds special appeal for him because …getting immediate reaction from such a large crowd is huge. A lot of the people who come to the tour are obviously fans of the show. They know these songs and theyre able to sing along. It just a really celebratory vibe for all of us.
This Idol Gives Back
Twenty-eight million people watched Sarasota own Syesha Mercado shake, shimmy, sob and sing her heart out on American Idol this season’ coming from behind each week yet never losing her million-watt smile. In the process, this determined young dynamo earned the devotion of legions of voters and finished a remarkable third place on America No. 1 most-watched television show.
In Sarasota-Bradenton, where Syesha had graduated from the Visual and Performing Arts program at Booker High School in 2005, had sung the national anthem at spring training games for the Pittsburgh Pirates at McKechnie Field since the age of nine, and had participated in both Take Stock in Children and the Sarasota Family YMCA Achievers program, it quickly became a cultural phenomenon.
New …American Idol Judge Kara DioGuardi Threatens Paula Abdul
This week addition of a fourth American Idol judge has left the loopy Paula Abdul, a series-long Idol staple, walking on eggshells. The …Forever Your Girl singer is convinced the introduction of 37-year-old songwriter Kara DioGuardi is show producers way of edging her closer to the door.
…Paula is trying to put a happy face on this situation, but she feels very threatened that a younger, internationally successful female is joining the cast of judges, an Idol snitch dished in this week edition of the National Enquirer.
Will new ‹Idol judge cover for absent Paula?
The decision to bring Kara DioGuardi onboard the crazy train that is …American Idol has, for the most part, been one met with support. That said, the reasoning behind adding a fourth judge might be slightly more complex than weve be lead to believe.
…They want another female in case Paula misses a taping, a source close to the show told OK! magazine.
Another …Idol source confirms that Abdul attendance last season was a source of extreme consternation.
Rachael Ray crashes “American Idol” auditions, gets Simon Cowell critique — on food, looks
Rachael Ray stopped by the “American Idol” auditions in New York recently and received the Simon Cowell treatment.
“We brought food and Ed McMahon and found our way in, ” Ray told me. “We got criticized by Simon. We had a great chat with Paula [Abdul].”
Abdul even stopped by Ray’s show the next day. “She brought me tea for my raspy voice, ” Ray said.
And what of Cowell? “Simon said I looked good. He said he liked my soup. He did not like my brownie. Thankfully, he had to speed off to the next location. I think I got off the hook.”
Kellie Pickler “Beautiful” Top 20 Showing
Kellie Pickler gives a repeat performance this week, remaining at the top of the chart on GAC Top 20 Country Countdown, guest-hosted by comedian Henry Cho.
Kellie ranking comes for her video “Dont You Know Youre Beautiful, ” a song that positive and uplifting and aims to make listeners consider their best qualities.
“Everybody needs to be complimented, ” she told the national radio show GAC Nights: Live From Nashville. “Everyone needs to be told that theyre loved, and everyone needs to be shown affection and told that theyre beautiful. Because I think in today society ‘ especially women, as well as men ‘ we suffer with such low self-esteem, and we constantly compare ourselves to other people and other things and want what we dont have, and that just human nature. So it nice to really get a message out there that it not about all those things.”
Ladies Love Phelps
Carrie Underwood and Michael Phelps are allegedly planning a non-eating first date. Meanwhile, Lindsay Lohan could be text harassing Phelps. And all this means we need to cool it on the Phelps talk before the overexposure sets in.
Carrie Underwood performs at NSU
Country music star Carrie Underwood, a former NSU student and American Idol winner, thrilled local fans during a performance Friday night.
NSU’s Downtown Country performers presented a musical tribute to Underwood, dubbed “Carrie Me Home.” Following the tribute, Underwood was introduced and honored by NSU President Dr. Don Betz, who said Underwood graduated magna cum laude with a mass communication degree. He also presented her an award.
Slideshow: Carrie Underwood performs in Tahlequah
Country music star Carrie Underwood, a former NSU student and American Idol winner, performs in Tahlequah, Okla., Friday, Aug. 29. Here are a few photos from the event.
Carrie comes home to NSU
TAHLEQUAH ‘ While Northeastern State University Downtown Country music troupe paid tribute to former member Carrie Underwood Friday night, dozens of audience members faced the other way ‘ trying to get a snapshot, an autograph, a glimpse of the guest of honor.
Underwood ‘ a 2003 Downtown Country member, 2005 American Idol winner, 2006 NSU graduate and current country music star ‘ returned to her old college stomping ground Friday to help with NSU Centennial Countdown. NSU marks the centennial of its status as a state institution March 6.
Rundgren Brings Sgt Pepper to Vegas
Tonight there is an alternative to Love for Beatles fans in Vegas. The creators never performed the “Sgt. Pepper’s” album live when it was released over 40 years ago. But tonight at Texas Station a group led by Todd Rundgren (with Lou Gramm, Christopher Cross, Bo Bice and Denny Laine) will re-create the Beatles classic. The Buffet spoke by phone with producer, songwriter and musician’s musician Todd Rundgren:
Richard Abowitz: Why tour the “Sgt. Pepper’s” album now?
California Auto Club Speedway news 2008-08-29
Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt, Bo Bice and Randy Couture Added to Pepsi 500 Pre-Race Ceremonies
San Bernardino County, CA (August 29, 2008) — Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt, stars of the MTV hit series, “The Hills” will serve as honorary starters and wave the green flag to start the Pepsi 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Auto Club Speedway on Sunday, August 31. They will be joined during the pre-race ceremonies by American Idol season four runner-up Bo Bice, who will perform “The Star Spangled Banner, ” and mixed martial arts star Randy Couture will serve as honorary race official and pace car driver, leading the field to the green flag from behind the wheel of the official Chevrolet pace car. Giving the command to start engines will be TV icon Drew Carey, announced earlier as the event’s Grand Marshal.
Music City J.A.M., Franklin Jazz Festival share the stage
Two major local jazz festivals ‘ Music City J.A.M. (formerly known as Music City Jazz, Blues & Heritage Festival) at Riverfront Park and the Franklin Jazz Festival in downtown Franklin ‘ cross paths this holiday weekend.
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Should you brave downtown traffic to be rocked by stars such as Peter Frampton, Melinda Doolittle and Kirk Whalum, or mosey into the Franklin Square for sets from lesser-known artists such as Buckwheat Zydeco and Orquesta MaCuba?
Former ‹American Idol Finalist Kevin Covais Strips Down For ‹College
It may or may not be your idea of great cinema, but when deciding whether or not to see …College this weekend, the new comedy starring Drake Bell, Andrew Caldwell, and Kevin Covais, well, there one thing you really should know, Covais laughed.
…I strip down to my underwear in the movie, he said, tongue planted firmly in check. …Seriously, they should put that on the poster. See me stripped down to my tightie whities ‘ how can people not go?
(Note: Covais nickname on …American Idol was Chicken Little. Weve taken this paragraph off to allow you to make your own obvious pun.)
American Idol’s Kevin Covais Makes a Splash in ‘College’
Kevin Covais is on top of the world. After being one of the youngest finalists on American Idol Season 5 (he was 16!), he is now setting his sites on the big screen with a role in the film College, out in theaters today. We talked to Kevin while he was finishing up the film, where he told us about trying to sneak into a club with fellow cast members (just for fun!), and his secret life as a rapper. Watch the trailer for College right here on Fancast.
How did you get the film?
I got involved with the film ¦I got plenty of opportunities for music, which Im still exploring and growing ¦but I found there was an even greater response for acting and potentially casting calls. This was one of the first sides that I read for was College ¦for Morris, which Im playing. I put my audition on tape from New York because I missed already a lot of high school. So I put it on tape and sent it to the big wigs over here in California. And, about a month later I got the call.
‹College feels like four wasted years
…College sucks, observes one character in this new movie, and one can definitely say the same thing about …College. Like a fraternity hazing, the film is sexist, gross, and simultaneously homophobic and homoerotic; like a freshman dying of alcohol poisoning, it not funny in the slightest.
The script by Dan Callahan and Adam Ellison does the cast no favors. Only Covais, stuck playing McLovin Lite, displays any kind of charm. Here hoping he gets another chance at acting, preferably in a non-stomach-turning movie. (Bell …Drake & Josh co-star Josh Peck got rave reviews this summer for …The Wackness while Bell is stuck in this mess. That got to be the widest chasm between Nickelodeon stars since Kenan Thompson got cast on …Saturday Night Live while Kel Mitchell went on to host …Dance 360.)
College (2008) Student Weekend of Raunch and Geek Empowerment
Pity today teenage audience. Their latest cinematic temptation is yet another tiresome fraternities-are-wild offering in which three high school seniors take a weekend trip to a promising college campus and have, like, a totally insane time. With its rapid-fire bombardment of one gross-out moment after the next, Deb Hagan …College strains to sell itself as one crazy ride (raging parties! hot lesbian sex! bare breasts!), and chances are it wont disappoint those looking solely for unadulterated raunch.
The jokes are as flat as the beer in ‘College’
It’s only right that the end of the summer movie season leaves crumbs at the megaplex. And setting a comedy at a frat house should make you slightly more tolerant of its looking like it was found between the cushions of a hand-me-down couch. But even by those standards, “College” is wrong. The grime, filth, slop, vomit, and crotch-nibbling pigs double all too easily as a recipe for this movie’s failure. It hasn’t been made so much as excreted. Things never get better than the movie’s poster, which features a kid with his head in a toilet. Incidentally, that image doubles, concisely, as apt film criticism.
‘College’ lacks wit, intelligence, feeling
In 1927, the great Buster Keaton made a nearly perfect short feature in which his stone-faced humor and acrobatic agility turned his simpleton character into something of an Olympian. It was called “College, ” and I only wish my assignment was to tell young readers how wonderful that film is.
Such is not the case, however, for I must write about a new film of the same name, a case of celluloid disease lacking wit, intelligence and human feeling. Director Deb Hagan’s “College” apparently seeks to limit enrollment to obnoxious fools and loudmouthed drunkards.
Stevenson feels good about making final four of Idol
Earl Stevenson elimination from the top four of Canadian Idol earlier this week isnt going to stop the man with ties to Moose Jaw from pursuing his musical dreams.
On Thursday, the CTV singing competition finalist, who once lived in Moose Jaw, told the Times-Herald he intends to make Toronto his new home for a while, as he continues to pursue a music career.
…Im feeling pretty good about it, he said, adding the celebrity of Canadian Idol wont swell his ego, even though he is often recognized on the streets of Toronto.
…I dont want it to change me, said the resident of Lloydminster, Alta.
His mother, Lloydminster Bobbie Stevenson (formerly of Moose Jaw), said her son was a little disappointed he couldnt stay in the competition long enough to work with Brian Adams.
However, she said Earl always approached the competition as a week-to-week challenge, just focusing on doing the immediate job at hand.
