Carrie Underwood took a gamble when she recorded her own version of Randy Travis’ 1988 country classic “I Told You So” for her sophomore album ‘Carnival Ride,’ but she took an even bigger risk when she released it as the album’s fifth single. Now, Underwood is joined by Travis on a duet of the song, signaling that the risks paid off tenfold.
The new version of the track sounds fresh despite featuring artists that have already done solo versions of the song, and Underwood’s soft, angelic vocals complement Travis’ rustic, gritty vocals perfectly. There are moments where “Told You” comes off sounding a little too much like a cut-and-paste job, but overall Underwood’s harmonies take the song places it has never been.
Even though Underwood is as commercially-friendly as country singers come, her ability to connect with the country style of yesteryear is undeniable, and proves that she could have been just as bright a star had she been around as an artist twenty years ago.
As if Carrie Underwood even needed additional “authentic country cred,” her duet with Randy Travis on “I Told You So” should keep the dissenters quiet once and for all.
Buy on iTunes.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Track review: Carrie's "I Told You So" (ft. Randy Travis)
Flashback: Haley Scarnato's "Tell Him"
Over the course of her stay on Idol's sixth season, Haley Scarnato was never really able to excite the judges with her singing abilities. She was, however, able to raise a few eyebrows in addition to generating a few positive comments when she kicked off "British Invasion" night on Top 11 week. Relive the moment below:
This night marked the beginning of the "leg fascination" that swept the nation, which stayed with (or haunted) Haley until she left the show during "Latin" night on Top 8 week. Although she could never live the legs thing down, Haley's display here was one of the most memorable moments of the season.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Kelly performs on SNL
After nearly a week's worth of promo, Kelly Clarkson took to the stage at 30 Rockefeller tonight when she was the musical guest on NBC's Saturday Night Live, hosted by SNL alum Tracy Morgan. Although she did not make any appearances in the show's skits (thus we did not see the revival of Olestra nor the blind, singing train lady), Kelly performed "My Life Would Suck Without You" and second single "I Do Not Hook Up." Watch the performances below:
"My Life Would Suck Without You"
"I Do Not Hook Up"
The episode was the best one yet this year, and was probably the most solid one since the Nov. 1, 2008 episode with Ben Affleck as the host and David Cook as the musical guest.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Kelly performs "My Life Would Suck Without You" on 'Regis & Kelly'
Continuing to promote her fourth studio album in its opening week, Kelly Clarkson hit #1-rated morning talk show Live with Regis & Kelly yesterday to perform the album's first single, "My Life Would Suck Without You." Watch the performance below:
Kelly also chatted with the co-hosts about Idol and All I Ever Wanted, plus she performed "Walk Away" for the studio audience.
This all comes before her big musical guest appearance on tonight's episode of Saturday Night Live, where she will perform two songs including "My Life Would Suck Without You" and another song (most likely "I Do Not Hook Up").
In other news, HITS Daily Double has kept its estimates at 220-230k for All I Ever Wanted's opening week, which would be her lowest opening sales week yet.
'Idol' BB 200: 'Jennifer Hudson' #42 (3/21/09)
In what has been a battle for the #1 spot among Idol alums on the Billboard Top 200 chart, Jennifer Hudson continued to make things interesting by taking over for David Cook for the chart week of March 21.
Jennifer's disc sold 11k copies for the week, down 12% from the previous week. It rose five spots to #42 and has sold 656.9k to date. Cook's self-titled album, on the other hand, rose two spots to #45 despite taking a 16% sales drop. It sold 10.8k copies, good for a 1.017 million total.
Carrie Underwood was up next with her Carnival Ride at #53, up eight spots from the previous week and down only 1% in sales. It sold 9.6k for the week and has moved 2.672 million in all. David Archuleta's David Archuleta tumbled 18 spots thanks to a 24% slide in sales, selling 5.3 copies for the week. That pushes his debut's total to 659.8k.
David Foster's Hit Man CD/DVD combo saw a surprise 54% sales bump, advancing it #169-112 on the chart. It moved 5.1k units for the week and has now totaled 160.4k. Daughtry and its debut disc were up six spots to #133 despite being down 3% in sales, selling 3.9k copies for the week to make its total 4.397 million.
Melinda Doolittle's debut followed at #136, down 15 spots from the previous week. The album sold 3.8k copies, off 18% from last week, putting its total at 33.8k. And rounding out the Idol representation on the Billboard 200 was Elliott Yamin's My Kind of Holiday, which saw a huge 766% increase to 3.2k copies and a re-entry at #162. Now, this would seem very strange at first glance, but the reason his Christmas album saw such an impressive sales week in mid-March is because Circuit City closed its doors for good this past week, which led to shoppers scrambling to pick up any and all items at bargain prices. Even though it has no sold 26.7k copies, look for it to disappear next week.
Full sales figures and chart positions courtesy of 2m on Pulse as follows:
042 047 Jennifer Hudson - Jennifer Hudson 10,998 -12% 12,502 656,881
045 047 David Cook - David Cook 10,811 -16% 12,852 1,017,212
053 061 Carrie Underwood - Carnival Ride 9,628 -1% 9,748 2,671,768
106 088 David Archuleta - David Archuleta 5,258 -24% 6,890 659,794
112 169 David Foster - Hit Man... 5,118 54% 3,329 160,398
133 139 Daughtry - Daughtry 3,913 -3% 4,026 4,396,883
136 121 Melinda Doolittle - Coming Back to You 3,822 -18% 4,689 33,839
162 --- Elliott Yamin - My Kind of Holiday 3,221 766% 320 26,682
Total sales are in bold.
Friday, March 13, 2009
'Idol' odds 'n ends: Jordin to tour with Jonas Brothers
The following are Idol-related odds and ends that happened this week:
>It was announced on Wednesday that Jordin Sparks would be appearing with the Jonas Brothers on a select few stops of their 2009 world tour. Although the dates on which she will perform with them have yet to be released, it would be a good bet that she will be at the Jobing.com Arena on Aug. 11 in Phoenix, Arix.
>Carrie Underwood got a day-late birthday present when boyfriend Mike Fisher scored a goal for the Ottowa Senators on Wed., March 11. Carrie was shown celebrating the goal and Fisher said he scored the goal for Carrie as a b-day present in a post-game interview. Bet Tony Romo could never do that!
>Amidst a hectic promo week, Kelly Clarkson's Walmart Soundcheck performances were added to the retail giant's Web site earlier this week. In addition to being interviewed, Kelly performed a medley of hits including "Walk Away," "Since U Been Gone," "My Life Would Suck Without You," "I Do Not Hook Up" and "Because Of You."
>Katharine McPhee last night unveiled her first vlog since signing with Verve Forecast on her official Web site. Watch it below:
Kat's fake piano-playing is genuis, as it displays her fun personality that is often overlooked. She also revealed a personal e-mail address, kat@katharinemcphee.com, that she will use to correspond with fans.
>The most recent issue of Playboy featured an interview with Micheal Johns in the "Rock the Rabbit" segment. In the interview, he discussed his musical influences, which range from Paul McCartney to Otis Redding, and his T-shirt design concept that involves making a maze out of many bunnies repeating.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
'Idol' Hot 100: "My Life Would Suck Without You" #9 (3/21/09)
A tiny decrease in sales and a huge increase in airplay combined to keep Kelly Clarksons' "My Life Would Suck Without You" in the Top 10 of Billboard's Hot 100 chart for the chart week of March 21.
The song, which rose one spot to #9, will most likely see an even larger jump next week thanks to her album's release and a healthy plateful of promotional appearances this week.
Also advancing this week was Carrie Underwood's latest single "I Told You So," which rose #68-62. Expect one more week of modest gains until it skyrockets two weeks from now thanks to a performance on Idol and the release of the single as a duet with Randy Travis, slated for this coming Tuesday.
The last Idol-related chart entry to be revealed this week was Jennifer Hudson's "If This Isn't Love," which rose seven spots to #85.
Full chart positions courtesy of bks over on Pulse are posted below:
09 10 Kelly Clarkson, "My Life Would Suck Without You"
62 68 Carrie Underwood, "I Told You So"
85 92 Jennifer Hudson, "If This Isn't Love"
Carrie's "I Told You So" duet with Randy Travis released next week
As previously announced, Carrie Underwood will perform her new single "I Told You So" on the results show of Idol next Wednesday. But today more details began to come to light, as a press release was sent out via her official Facebook artist page. The release read in part:
Underwood will perform her current hit single “I Told You So” with fellow Opry member Randy Travis, who will also be participating as Idol’s “Opry” mentor for the show’s contestants. Carrie’s version of this 1988 #1 classic by Travis can be found on her Carnival Ride album, and fans will soon be hearing another version on the airwaves as a new studio recording pairing Carrie and Randy arrives at country radio next week. A digital single of that recording will be available for sale at online music providers everywhere to coincide with their American Idol performance.
Meanwhile, Carrie's cover of "Home Sweet Home," which is being used as the farewell song on this season of Idol, is currently sitting at #2 on iTunes' Top 100 overall songs chart and has its sights set on #1.
Analysis: So that was the "secret," eh?
Now that the top secret twist is out in plain view, it's time we take a look at the repercussions (if any) that will be felt as a result. First of all, it's not nearly as bad as many suspected. The rampant rumor was that the judges would get to have the bottom two finalists have a "sing-off" and then they would decide who would go home each week. That would have been downright awful.
In the actual scenario, the judges will only get grant immunity to one finalist once during the entire season, and the option expires Top 5 week. What's important to stress is that the next-lowest vote-getter would not be eliminated, rather there would be a double elimination the following week. That is doable I guess, but it's a little pointless. The only thing it will be held onto for is the possibility of an Adam/Danny/Lil pre-Top 5 exit, which is just not going to happen anyway. So we'll see if there's any valid reason for this threat being brought into the judges' arsenal.
Oh, and Ryan - under this system, Chris Daughtry and Tamyra Gray would not have been able to be saved, as they were both eliminated during Top 4 week. So next time maybe you should have your aide(s) do your homework for you.
Now, back to the actual results. It was no surprise that a combination of Jorge/Megan/Jasmine were going to be eliminated last night, so they did their best to hype up the suspense. Putting Megan with Jasmine for the first "bottom 2" was a good idea, as she was probably really in the bottom 3 or just outside it. Putting Anoop with Jorge was deceiving, though, as he in fact received much more votes than they made it seem like he did. Allison Iraheta most likely should have been standing down there but to make it seem more believable, they decided to place someone who delivered a not so great performance in synthetic peril.
Jasmine's elimination proved that wild card picks don't always work out. Plus, there were a half-dozen girls that belonged in the Top 13 over her, but the judges had to find out they made a mistake the hard way. Doesn't matter, they won't learn regardless. Jasmine did the best she could do with "I'll Be There," but it did come across as being very pageanty and usually doing ballads sandwiched in between better and more memorable performances will lead to an exit. She did her best to control her emotions but keeping in mind that she's still only 17, she should not be ashamed of anything about her time on Idol. Ryan was actually useful last night as he comforted her.
Then there was Jorge, who would have been out early regardless of what he sang Tuesday and only got into the finals thanks to a fluke of a performance in Group 3. But picking a song with "Goodbye" in the title is never a good idea, so that just added to the Peurto Rican's problems. Simon might have been a little too blunt when he said "No. Sorry." after being asked by Ryan if the judges were going to exercise their saving grace on Jorge. But that's just Simon for you.
Kanye West performed his single "Heartless," which pretty much described the performance itself. The fact that it was pretaped was extremely noticeable and took away from what little excitement there was.
The highlight of the night was without a doubt Kelly Clarkson's return to the Idol stage to perform "My Life Would Suck Without You." She was her very own self in her pre-performance chat with old pal Ryan, giggling and joking about herself. The fact that she did her performance live added to the energy, as opposed to that other guy who was just used as filler. It goes without saying that Kelly is just in a league of her own in comparison to the current batch of hopefuls. There's just no way to say any of them match up to her at the moment, performance or vocals-wise.
Next week's theme, Grand Ol' Opry, should be fun for most, not for some (I mean you, Megan). Wonder if Adam will pick a Dolly song? Maybe Danny will do a hoe down to further show off his awesome dancing skills? It all remains to be seen. Plus Carrie Underwood will perform "I Told You So." You can't go wrong with that, now can you?
IDOL LIVE's predictions so far are not going too hot. For my original predictions, I incorrectly predicted Megan leaving 13th and Michael departing 12th, so I'm 0-2 in that respect. As for my pre-results predictions, I got the two eliminated finalists right, but the order wrong (predicted Jorge 13th, Jasmine 12th). So I'm also 0-2 in that department. It should be easier from here on out because we (hopefully) won't have to deal with any more of these ridiculous double elimination.
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