Former American Idol contestant Benson Boone dropped by The Ellen DeGeneres Show to perform his single “Ghost Town.”
Ellen introduces him as on track to win American Idol last year, before he dropped out to peruse his own music. He DID make the Top 24 contestants before leaving the competition. But win the show? Probably not! Nevertheless, Benson shared in a press statement that he stepping away from American Idol was a hard choice. “It was a very hard choice,” he said. “I didn’t really know who I wanted to be as an artist yet, and I didn’t want to show the world someone I’m not.”
“Social media is the biggest opportunity to get people to know you personally,” Benson said, who first found notoriety on the social media platform Tik Tok. “Hopefully, they will not only like my music, but they’ll understand and like me as a person, so I’m more than just a song to them.”
Benson based “Ghost Town” on a friend’s toxic relationship
“Ghost Town” is one of the first songs Benson ever wrote, and he based it on a friend’s toxic relationship. “I saw the situation from an outside perspective and wondered what they could have done differently,” Benson said. “Ultimately, the song is about making tough decisions. Love can hurt more than it can help. Sometimes the best way of showing someone you care is by letting them go.”
After leaving American Idol, Imagine Dragons’ frontman, Dan Reynolds, invited Brenson to collaborate with him in Las Vegas. “It was really scary and intimidating,” Benson remembered. “But it was the greatest three days of my life.” In October 2021, Reynolds signed Benson to his Warner Bros. imprint, Night Street records.
