DAVID COOK WINS AMERICAN IDOL BY 12 MILLION VOTES
Click link for Video! (I just posted the 6 minutes the show ran over 10 pm, just click the song link for “Time of my Life”. I’ll have Brooke’s duet and a few other things in the morning…)
Ryan Seacrest says there were 97.5M votes last night.
- 56% - The Winner
- 44% - Runner up
Recap with video after the Jump…
- Mikalah Gordon is in Missouri, hosting David Cook’s Hometown party. Matt Rogers is in Utah for David Archuleta’s Hometown party. Viewing parties. Where rejected American Idol Extra hosts go to die…
- The Top 12 and the So You Think You Can Dance dancers perform “Get Ready” Much pointy posing and crazy dancing ensues. Motown is super cheesy! Not only do we get the pose, there’s SMOKE!
- The Davids make a quick change into brown. They sing “Hero” from Spiderman. Cookie is wearing a leather jacket and a wallet chain. Their vocals don’t blend well, at all. This song (not them) kinda sucks. Nickelback: Ew.
- OMG. Cross promotion. BOO. TPTB have worked in an obnoxious preview of Mike Meyers new movie, “The Love Guru”. The Davids went to a screening. After, they palled around with Mike Meyers in character. Um. No? After the vid, Meyers is wheeled out onto stage on a carpet thingy, in character. He’s doing some really annoying “I predict a David will win” shtick. This is almost as bad as Robin Williams on IGB.
- Syesha Mercado takes the stage with Seal to sing “I Have Been Waiting” Wow, this is kind of a mess. Who can sing off pitch the loudest and the longest?
- Jason Castro sings “Hallelujah”. The mosh-chicks need to cool it. The performance lacked the WOW factor of the first time, but it’s still WONDERFUL. Very emotional, very moving. Melinda Doolittle is digging her some Jason! The idiot edit continues: Ryan Seacrest says interviewing him was like “pulling teeth.” I dunno, Jason seemed pretty articulate to me on the interview circuit last week…
- Ford Commercial “Let the Good Times Roll” features highlights from all the Ford commercials. David Cook and David Archuleta are back on stage. They are both awarded Escape Hybrids. I’d rather have a Mustang, thanks.
- The Top 12 girls perform the hits of Donna Summer. They’re all dressed in red. Amanda Overmyer looks THRILLED. No, actually she doesn’t. Her solo sounds like she’s underwater. Carly Smithson belts it out crazy! Here comes Donna Summer. Wow. They literally have to help her down the stairs. She looks a little crickety. Keeping up with the music would be nice! Ryan Seacrest is sitting on the stairs, practically on top of the dancers. (Eta: I completely missed him dancing–funny!) . Paula Abdul grooves to “Last Dance”. Syesha sings a little duet with Donna. Donna comes alive!
- Carly Smithson and Michael Johns get a consolation prize duet. They sing “The Letter”. This is pretty f*cking hot. Carly’s wearing a short black/silver dress with black tights. Michael has a black t-shirt and jacket. Yes, HOT.
- Jimmy Kimmel is next. Finally, some humor. Thank you! He just parked his car. He wants to know how much to tip Sanjaya. What would Ryan Seacrest look like without the metrosexual extras? Flash a picture of Chris Sligh.
- The Top 4 guys sing Bryan Adams’ “Summer of 69″. Jason Castro…Ouch! The Davids are introduced, singing “Heaven.” The guys don’t blend so well together. Byran Adams takes the stage with his acoustic guitar, singing “I Thought I Saw Everything”. He’s still in need of some serious dermabrasion. Bryan is improving this medley, for sure. “I Need Somebody” closes the deal. Mini-pointy pose! Yay! Bo Bice is in the audience…
- Jordin Sparks video. She shills for the new Disney American Idol Theme park experience.
- David Cook and ZZ Top sing “Sharp Dressed Man.” It’s hard to take ZZ top seriously, but this is pretty good. Cookie sounds alright singing the Southern rock. The Topsters look exactly the same as they did 20 years ago. Blake Lewis! I think this is the first time we’ve seen Cookie play in a band. If he doesn’t win he can get COOK tattooed on his back and start a fake band.
- Throw to the Cook viewing party. Mikalah interviews Cookie’s music teacher. That was useless.
- Graham Nash and Brooke White sing “Teach Your Children Well”. It’s a bit rough. Not much time to rehearse? Brooke is her usual nervous self.
- Cookie on a Guitar Hero commercial? That’s what the chat peeps are telling me… Here’s one with Archie.
- The Jonas Brothers take the stage. The mosh pit goes wild. Sort of.
- Time for a recap of bad auditions. I’m surprised we had to wait this long. Renaldo Lapuz takes the stage in full regalia to sing “I am Your Brother.” The USC Band and cheerleaders join him. This is really weird and bad. Paula and Randy take the stage to join them. Simon stays put, wisely. Cut to commercial with a confused Renaldo, still trying to sing.
- One Republic sings their giant mega hit “Apologize.” David Archuleta joins them on stage. This is actually a pretty good match. Archie, stop squinting! David stays on stage as Ryan cuts to Utah, where his grandfathers are interviewed by Matt. His mom’s dad doesn’t really speak English. You can’t hear anything anyway over the screaming crowd.
- Jordin Sparks takes the stage in a shiny gold dress to sing her new single, “One Step at a Time”. She’s very peppy!
- Gladys Knight circa 1972 singing “Midnight Train to Georgia” with Jack Black, Ben Stiller and Robert Downy Jr. cut in as Pips. Cute. I’m glad none of this involves dead people.
- Carrie Underwood performs her new single “Last Name” I couldn’t even tell you what she’s wearing. Too busy trying to keep the site up! I’m winning. At the moment. ETA: Carrie forgot her pants!
- Time for a George Michael medley for the Top 12. The girls sing “Faith” the boys sing “Father Figure” Hearing the guys sing “naked naked” is pretty funny. It makes David Hernandez giggle. I love watching Jason Castro galloping across the stage. The kids sing “Freedom” and then introduce the “biggest star in the world,” George Michael. He’s got sunglasses on. He’s singing “Praying for Time” in a much lower key than I’ve ever heard. He seems to be having trouble hearing through his ear monitor. He doesn’t sound like himself. Paulers crying! OMG, two shot with a crying Paula. There’s a screen with a big molten hot lava bomb behind him. An ode to Randy? Oh, he has a cold. That’s why he sounds like crap.
- Time for the results. The Davids stand center stage looking really nervous. Randy tells them he’s so happy it’s the two of them standing there…it’s been one of the strongest years ever… and they are both winners. Paula tells them it’s the start of their careers. Simon is smiling. He says, “I want to congratulate both of you last night, because on the night I thought it was a terrific show, I went back home to watch it, it wasn’t quite so clear cut as we called it…In fact, David, I will take this opportunity to apologize to you, because I was verging on disrespect last night.” Holy f*ck, Simon just apologized to Cookie! Major backtracking here, people. He congratulates them both and says that he appreciates that they were “triers.” He claims he doesn’t care who wins, he thinks they both did terrific.
- Calling the winner. Telescope dude presents the results. Ryan says they are both fantastic guys. Archie looks less nervous than Cookie. He’s grinning. Cookie has his eyes closed… Ryan begins…the winner of American Idol 2008 by more than 12 million votes is…David Cook!!! The Davids hug for a long time. Archie smiles. Very sweet. Cookie gives him his props. Shots of the family…Cookie Mom and fam are ecstatic. Daddy Archuleta is gracious, Mom is smiling. Simon is grinning from ear to ear. “Give it up for David Archuleta!” says Cookie as Archie joins the rest of the cast off-stage. Cookie begins to cry. “I started this season much to Simon’s chagrin as the word nerd…I’m at a loss for words…” Cookie’s mom and brother Andrew join him on stage and he cries some more. He hugs Andrew and says, “This is all your fault.” And, “This is amazing, thank you.” The Top 12 join him on stage to sing the winning coronation song, “Time of My Life” The song sucks. He’s “looking for that magic rainbow and finding my wings”–but what the hell! It’s a f*cking coronation!! Paula is crying. Cookie gives Archie a big hug. Brother Andrew is crying. Cookie walks out into the audience and on to the catwalk. He motions for the Top 12 to join him. He’s got his arm around a still grinning Archie. Fireworks! The confetti flies!!! Cookie puts his face into his hands, overwhelmed. That’s my brother! Andrew mouths into the camera. The camera cuts away. American Idol 2008. It is done.
Related Posts
Extended Guitar Hero commercial with David Cook:
http://community.livejournal.com/davidcookai7/221239.html
One thing is for certain. This finale topped last season’s by a mile.
It is so refreshing to read the latest Carrie snark. What happened to the performer who was too wooden and robotic?
Me thinks the one performer who got short changed was Kristy Lee Cook. She lasted longer than MJ, yet got no solo last night. MJ was front and centre of very song he was in. Weren’t MJ and Carly pimped enough during the show?
I think AI owed Jason that solo given the way he was treated during his exit. And he absolutely shone on that vocal. Too bad the camera didn’t flash to Simon when it was over.
Right after Cook was pronounced as winner, the camera did show JeffA in the audience standing and applauding. That was before the judges’ reactions were shown. Interesting edit job.
Had heard ‘Apologize’ on the radio, never took the time to find out One Republic was the band behind it. Has anyone bought that CD?
And Archie’s duet with Ryan Tedder was quite illuminating.
I thought that was a good finale last night. So much better than last year because they kept the focus mainly on this year’s contestants as I feel it should be:
Favourite things about the night:
1) Two very classy guys - for the last few months, the judges and TPTB have been acting like asses and some of their fans have managed to act even worse, but the two David’s have been class acts throughout. Nice to see that you can compete and still be on friendly terms.
2) Syesha and Seal - they were smoking hot (and that was a fab dress for Syesha)
3) The Pips - Since Gladys is still alive, I can support this kind of re-writing of history and those guys were hilarious.
4) One Republic and Archie - that was amazing. They suited each other so well. Nice note for Archie to go out on proving that he can more than share the stage with a current pop act on a hit song (which has vaulted back into the Top 25 of iTunes this morning).
5) ZZ Top and Cookie - Sure, the band is a little old school (formed in 69 and last hit was a while ago), but it was obvious that David was having fun singing with them. I wish they had done their patented guitar spin, though.
6) Donna Summer Group Number - That was simply terrific. The girls looked great (finally, somebody figured out how to dress Carly) and sounded in good voice. Amanda was hilarious. Donna Summer was off the chart. The woman still has it. I loved her handing her mic to Syesha. A Diva who is not a diva. Yay!
7) Bryan Adams Group Number - Another fantastic group number and Bryan seemed to really enjoy all the cheese of the performance.
8) Ryan dancing - he is such a good sport.
9) Michael Johns - he was everywhere. Do you think they are going to sign him? LOL. The producers did much better picking songs for him than he did.
10) Oops. I’ve run out of room in the top 10. But I want to mention Brooke singing with Nash (so great for her), Jason with his solo (allowing him to prove the critics wrong), Randy wearing red (that made me laugh, dude has no fashion sense, but at least he is consistent) and all the top 12 back.
And Congratulations to Cookie!
Things I did not like:
1) Jordin’s dress. Seriously, she needs to fire that stylist. Like somebody said on Pulse, she looked like she was wearing a golden teapot.
2) Simon apologizing. Dude, just own your opinions even if you are proved to be dead wrong. It comes off as cheap and pandering. Plus, it telegraphed the ending. Way to suck the suspense out of the show. Simon’s ego knows no limits.
3) Mike Meyers bit went on too long (but it was cute when he tried to shave Cookie and the two David’s collapsed in laughter).
4) Carrie singing, again. Seriously, she’s fantastic and the song was great, but does she have to be on 10 times every season?
5) That coronation song. How do they manage to get worse every year. I couldn’t believe that Magic Rainbows. Gah!
I missed my subway stop this morning and 20 minutes were added to my commute and its all David Cook’s fault. Why? Because I was so stoked about his win last night I was online way later than I should have been (and the night before way later than I should have been because I was voting for him and posting here) so I fell asleep on my train and went way out of my way. Ah, well, he’s well worth it.
This clip below I think is a revelation about Archie. He seems relaxed, comfortable and much more articulate than in any other interview I’ve seen him do. I think he was truly relieved and will do better without the burden of this win, I’m not sure he would’ve been able to handle it without losing part of what makes him (Good Lord, I sound like Paula, let me shut up now.)
My Fox Utah
Here is the link to Brooke White and Nash I do not think thier was a link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_TYVwHmJVI
Dorothy Lucey, the entertainment reporter for my local Fox L.A. affiliate, phoned into the morning show, Good Day LA. She was at the show last night and said that George Michael was not Nigel’s so-called biggest star in the world. GM arrived terribly late so his song was not fully rehearsed, and Nigel didn’t realize it would run so long. She said GM actually bumped the “biggest star in the world,” which was . . .
. . . Iron Man?
Loved the Guitar Hero/Risky Business commercials! Absolute GENIUS!
You know my husband became ENRAGED at the opening because Archie was wearing a t-shirt?! What was the deal with that anyway? He was one of the few contestants that wore a jacket from the very beginning. Visually, I didn’t think it was right either. What could possibly have been the purpose of that?!
Season 5’s finale was amazing and ever since they’ve been going down a notch. I don’t think many would disagree. Season 5 was special all the way around.
I didn’t get into it like I have in previous years. Donna Summer can still sing but, seriously. Bryan Adams…always have enjoyed him but, come on. I loved ‘Apologize’ and I was impressed with Syesha on everything she sang. She has real stage presence and we have not seen the last of her.
I like the song ‘Praying for Time’ but George Michael looks like a vampire and I couldn’t get past it.
Jordin has really learned to own the stage. She did really well and I realize I’ve been too hard on her since last season. Loved the shot of Blake in the audience mouthing the words along with her.
Then, when DC won and he started crying. Gawd, I lost it. I’m used to seeing him have it all together. I am really, really happy for him and I’m looking forward to both of these guys’ albums in the coming year.
MJ, thank you for this site and for all the great information, spoiler-y or not, you gave us. And for always keeping it real.
My husband actually watched parts of it with me (he hates Idol) and even he said that as pretty as Carrie is, as nice a voice she has, he couldn’t pick her out of a group of 10 other blond singers. Heh. I think when they mentioned Carly & MJ left too soon, it was more indicative that Kristy and Syesha should not have gone so far, rather than Brooke or Jason…
Yes, the least they could do was give Jason a solo after the way they treated him. But, didn’t that song go to the top of the itune’s charts after Jason sang it before? TPTB were probably thinking “money”.
Great show and looking forward to music from David and David.
Why didn’t Syesha sing Donna Summer’s ‘Last Dance’ instead of ‘Fever.’ That would have been the perfect song for her.
mj - I don’t know if you care, but if want to correct the song title of the Gladys Knight song for the archives, it was actaully “Midnight Train to Georgia”. :)
deleted - too long!! I’ll try again…
I am still wondering if Jason got the solo because of his fan base and the things they did to show their love. I admit I sent in two donations to IGB on his behalf. And a post card or two… Having 150 balloons delivered to the studio may have shown the love. Oh, and Jason did beat out David C. and David A. in votes that one week.
Congratulations again to David Cook! This has to be a bittersweet time for his Mom. I don’t want to say anything else.
Can we get the videos and songs on i-tunes and are they on their yet? Please let me know. Thanks.
First off love your blog :)
Im sooo glad i set up the dvr to tape 15 mins longer, just a gut feeling this was gonna go over!
Love the show, all and all I am very happy…was in tears last night when they said cookie won…LOVE HIM!! Was in tears again today at work when I was watching the clips again!!
Some things about the show, Digged the hero’s number with the two Davids. Thought the Mike Meyers thing was dragged out a bit but had me cracking up when he tried to shave Cookie :)
Thought the Syesha number with seal was pretty good, some messy parts but not bad and that girl can sing…plus she looked hot and has great stage presence
Loved Jason singing Hallelujah again and seeing him shaking and so sincere and looking into his eyes…./melt
Liked the girls singing however im with alot of you and wanted to kick Amanda in the ass and boot her off stage…my god could she be anymore obnoxious?!?
LOVED ryan dancing on the sides, that gave me a good chuckle!
Carly and Michael singing….love these two and love them singing together! Would of liked it if it was more raw and the music wasnt bailing so loud in the background, but LOVE THEM!
Jimmy Kimmel had me cracking up and OMG it was Sanjaya…that made my daughters night..she loved him last season haha
Loved the guys singing with bryan adams….my he has aged, i feel old now :(
LOVED david cook and zz top!!! BRooke, she was greating singing with Graham Nash!!
OMG i almost missed the guitar heros commerical!!! was letting the dog out came back and was like holy crap is that cookie with no pants!!!! Had to rewind and pause and /drool and /swoon
Jonas Brothers….another event that made my daughter VERY VERY happy!
Renaldo…was cute but dragged out and an excuse for me to get up and get a drink
Loved Archie with one republic…he should of sang that song during the competition
Jordan sparks, loved her but she sooo could of done without that dress…it did nothing for the girl!
haha Love the gladys knight bit, downloaded that to my ipod :)
Carrie Underwood, well i was scared i would see her underware…was that a dress or just a shirt? and those upshots of her had me scared a little, but that girl can sing! love her!
George michael…omg dragged out…way too long but was nice to hear him sing
And finally Cookie wins!! I was crying and screaming and so darn happy! And to see his family and how classy of a guy he was to include archie in his singing….awww I love him!!!
All in all loved the show, and im beyond happy that cookie won, he deserved it!!!
Thank you, MJ, for putting up with this crazy Cook lovah. I’m so happy that my favorite finally won.
Does anyone know if there are mp3’s anywhere of the group songs, duets, etc from last night?
Yes, I have it. It’s a pretty good pop/rock album. It can drag a bit in the middle, because a lot of the songs bunched in there sound really similar. But overall, it’s pretty good. My favorite song, by a comfortable mile, is “Come Home.” It’s just one of those I identify with, and it is GORGEOUS.
I love 1R’s sound. They’re probably my favorite band right now. They’re about to release the third single from the album (”Say (All I Need)”), so while “Apologize” has definitely been a smash (and scared Ryan Tedder into worrying that the song would make 1R a one-hit-wonder) and what catapulted them to the top, there are some other great songs on the album too.