Redemption songs

Finalist Katharine McPhee performs Somewhere Over the Rainbow during the fifth season of American Idol, in 2006. McPhee is the latest Idol alumnus to be dropped from their record label. (Kevork Djansezian/Associated Press)

It would be premature to suggest that American Idol, that seemingly unstoppable juggernaut, is in crisis. Yet the show’s producers and top FOX brass might be shifting uncomfortably in their seats as they roll out the seventh season on Jan. 15. Less than a week before the premiere came the unsettling news that Season 5 runner-up Katharine McPhee was dropped from her record label, the latest in what seems like a pattern of Idol attrition; Season 5 winner Taylor Hicks and go-nowhere Season 2 winner Ruben Studdard were “released” from their label deals days earlier. Compared to the previous season’s American Idols Live!, Season 6’s summer concert tour flatlined: it had only half the dates (30 compared to 59 in ‘06) and less than a third of the ticket sales (200,000 compared to almost 650,000), resulting in a relatively pathetic comparative gross ($12.1 million US compared to $35.2 million).

And while it’s still the top-rated show on ye olde television, Season 6 marked Idol’s very first drop in ratings — it premiered strong (37.7 million viewers), but the final episodes averaged only 30 million, compared to 36 million in ‘06. Surely the Idol team are more than a little concerned about how to guarantee a lucky seventh season — and by “lucky,” of course, I mean “lucrative.”

For viewers, Idol is merely an amusing spectacle, but for contestants, it’s a veritable octopus of potential earnings. Show creator Simon Fuller stakes a claim on all opportunities that fall in the laps of Idol graduates. We’re not just talking management contracts, though Fuller finagles astounding arrangements, demanding an astronomical 25 to 30 per cent cut of their earnings. (Most managers get 15 to 20 per cent.) The dude also rakes in the profits from Idols’ future film roles, merchandising, songwriting royalties and sponsorship deals. Ergo, Fuller has a vested interest in the continued success of each Idol alumnus.

As a way to build anticipation, Season 7 is messing with the formula. Before the audition round even gets off the ground, judges Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul and Randy Jackson and producer Nigel Lythgoe have been gushing about some of this year’s hopefuls (which include a slew of former reality-music-show types and one failed Irish pop star). It seems an oh-so-sneaky strategy for urging viewers to make emotional investments in Idol wannabes before they have even seen them.

Blake Lewis performs during the sixth season finale of American Idol, in 2007, at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles.(Michael Becker/FOX/Associated Press)

Possibly inspired by contestant Blake Lewis’s beatboxing skills on last year’s show, the producers are also taking the daring step of allowing wannabes to perform with instruments. It’s a decent gimmick, as gimmicks go — for the record, Canadian Idol beat its American brother to the punch — and should lend added musicality to the proceedings. But for all the innovations, the producers are overlooking the most obvious improvement needed for post-Idol success: Write. Better. Songs.

Without a doubt, American Idol has changed the way the public experiences pop singers. There’s some truth in all the grumbly op-ed pieces condemning the franchise for contributing to the death of the musician-as-artist, but Idol has given viewers who wouldn’t otherwise know a melisma from a crescendo an appreciation of vocal prowess. Alas, even the world’s best singer can only do so much to redeem a piss-poor tune. The songwriting atrocities committed in the name of American Idol — namely, the singles meant to “launch” the career of every winner — are manifold. All the beatboxing in the world couldn’t help last year’s runner-up Blake Lewis out-warble teen diva Jordin Sparks when they took on the aggressively schmaltzy ballad This Is My Now, a tune chosen from millions of submissions by amateur songwriters. (The single never made it to No. 1 and fell off the Billboard charts entirely after only four weeks.) And oh, the emasculation poor longhair Bo Bice suffered as he staggered through the Céline Dion-goes-New Country dreck that was Inside Your Heaven. Eventual winner Carrie Underwood tackled the gooey song with gusto, though now she has likely blocked that bit of pop treacle from her consciousness.

The Idol brass presumably hire the best in the business to concoct these tunes, which adhere to a straightforward formula: generically soaring, fist-pumping melodies plus vague yet “inspirational” lyrics involving elevation, gratitude and a surfeit of abstract (generally secular) representations of faith/fate. As an ironic tribute, Slate music critic Jody Rosen compiled the opening lines of the first five Idol singles:

“What if I told you it was all meant to be?/ Everybody’s looking for that something/ One thing that makes it all complete/ Have you ever reached a rainbow’s end?/ And did you find your pot of gold?/ It’s been a long and winding journey/ But I’m finally here tonight/ Picking up the pieces/ Walking back into the light/ I’ve never been the one to raise my hand/ That was not me and now that’s who I am/ Because of you I am standing tall.”

American Idol judge Simon Cowell. (Rene Macura/Associated Press)

One of the show’s legacies is the inadvertent attention it has drawn to the art of good pop songwriting. I say this in part because of the catalogue of classic tunes the show has hauled out of the archives and revitalized through well-directed performances. Some highlights: Fantasia Barrino’s take on Summertime, Carrie Underwood’s explosive run at Heart’s Alone and Kelly Clarkson channelling Aretha Franklin on Respect. While the judges always seem to be censuring singers’ “pitchiness,” the Number 1 target of their wrath is song choice. They’re correct in insisting that it’s the perfect marriage between song and singer that can make or break an Idol.

The four most successful Idol alumni, in order of earnings, are Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Clay Aiken and Season 5’s fourth-place runner-up, Chris Daughtry. Taking Aiken as the exception that proves the rule, the only commonality is that every one of them has worked with a team of crack songwriters who’ve found the right formula to play up each singer’s strengths. Clarkson’s career was in the crapper until two Swedish geniuses (Lukasz Gottwald and bubblegum guru Martin Sandberg) dreamed up the insanely hooky ditty Since U Been Gone; Underwood was a generic New Country lightweight till Muscle Shoals songwriter Chris Tompkins and Josh Kear lifted her up where she belonged with the good girl-gone-bad barn-burner Before He Cheats. And Daughtry? Well, his dirge-like, blustering It’s Not Over (penned by Mark Wilkerson of the middling rock band Course of Nature) was the post-Nickelback punch necessary to make Daughty’s self-titled disc the bestselling album in Soundscan history.

In an ideal world, Season 7 of American Idol would play up the writing factor, even encouraging the new crop of hopefuls to develop the skills to engineer a killer pop song themselves. If Simon Fuller were smart, he might realize that securing his brood’s writing credits on future hits could be the best business move he has ever made.

Sarah Liss writes about the arts for CBCNews.ca.

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