Pod Insights 60 Songs That Explain the '90s “Since U Been Gone”— Kelly Clarkson About this episode Rob contemplates the art of making an ironic cover song sincere as he enters the dark realm of the 2000s hit TV show, ‘American Idol’. He follows the inevitable success of Season 1 winner Kelly Clarkson, who proves with her impossible-to-sing hit song, “Since U Been Gone,” that she is more than just a pop princess. Later, he is joined by ‘Breakaway’ tour-goer and Clarkson connoisseur Jodi Walker to discuss Clarkson's vocal capabilities and what her discography did for 2000s TV culture.
Host: Rob Harvilla
Guest: Jodi Walker
Producers: Chris Sutton, Olivia Crerie, and Justin Sayles
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Transcript 13,623 words · 7 speakers
0:03 Speaker 00 What's up everyone, I'm Nora Princiotti.
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1:30 Speaker 03 One time I went to the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in San Francisco, this annual giant free weekend blowout in Golden Gate Park. Lot of acoustic guitars, lot of banjos, lot of mandolins, lot of fiddles, things of that nature, lot of weed. Who said that? I didn't say that. This is the mid 2000s and I'm watching Gillian Welch, the phenomenal singer songwriter Gillian Welch and her longtime accomplice David Rawlings.
2:00 Speaker 03 Gillian, she was part of the "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" crew that triggered a minor bluegrass wave back when that Coen Brothers movie and that great soundtrack came out in late 2000. One year around then, my Yahoo Fantasy Football Team really sucked, so I renamed them Team of Constant Sorrow. That's pretty good. She didn't sing that one, though. Gillian Welch, so many incredible songs. Elvis Presley Blues, "The Way It Will Be," "I Dream a Highway," the whole time the Revolver album, really. You know, this rad lady.
2:51 Speaker 03 Well, okay, for sure, that's Gillian and David harmonizing majestically, as always. But that's a Radiohead cover, obviously. That's their cover of Radiohead's "Black Star." Earlier Radiohead, too. That song's off The Benz from 1995. Finally, we get Americana royalty to confer some legitimacy onto Radiohead. But let's try to get Gillian Welch majestically singing one of her own songs.
3:35 Speaker 03 Well, okay, that's a song Gillian and David wrote. That's "Look at Miss Ohio," which is for sure one of Gillian's best songs. But that was actually mainstream country superstar Miranda Lambert's gentle and devout and very excellent 2011 cover of "Look at Miss Ohio." Gillian Welch is based in Nashville, but she's not at all part of like pop country, radio monopoly, truck nuts, industrial complex Nashville. She's not part of the super commercial machine. Miranda Lambert used to be part of the Nashville machine, but the Nashville machine is a notorious he-man women haters' club. You can get arrested for playing too many women on country radio, so she kind of broke away as well.
4:17 Speaker 03 Miranda's version of "Look at Miss Ohio" is great, too, obviously, but I was hoping, please, let's just let Gillian cook.
4:43 Speaker 03 There we go. That's Gillian Welch doing the original "Look at Miss Ohio" back in 2003. Gillian Welch writes phenomenal melodies that unfold in super slow motion. The average Gillian Welch melody takes 20 minutes to sing and to appreciate in full. So, okay, I'm in San Francisco. I'm at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. Gillian Welch and David Rawlings are kicking ass super slowly, and my buddy Nate is like, "Hey, you ever hear of the Truffle Man?" And I'm like, "Who?" And Nate points, and I look, and holy crap, it's the Truffle Man, emerging out of the forest, out of the primordial mist. You know the GIF of Homer Simpson backing slowly into the bush? It was like
5:28 Speaker 03 that, but in reverse. The Truffle Man sells pot truffles. The Truffle Man is suspiciously regal and silent and Adonis-like, and he's got the thing, you know, the old-timey carrying thing where there's a long bar across your shoulders and two ropes hanging down either side with bowls on the end? The Truffle Man is holding, he's balancing these two giant bowls of chocolate pot truffles in one of these deals. It's like he was etched in hieroglyphics onto a wall in a pyramid. And I have no previous pot truffle experience, but my future wife and I, we both go, "This is a good decision." So, we each buy one, and we eat them, and then we go back to watching Gillian
6:11 Speaker 03 Welch and David Rawlings cook, and nothing happens. And so, like, 10 years later, I do this stupid cliche thing, right, where I go, "This is bullshit." I'm getting another one, and I get another one, and 10 minutes after that, I'm cartoonishly obliterated. And also, Gillian and David are covering "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun."
6:46 Speaker 03 When the working day is done, oh, girls, they wanna have fun.
6:48 Speaker 03 And naturally, at first, I wonder if I personally am manifesting this somehow. If these two pot truffles have given me the supernatural power to alter concert setlists in real time, like with the power of my mind. But like, I need you to imagine me getting super high for the first time in my whole life, right this second, whilst Gillian Welch and David Rawlings are harmonizing extra slowly and extra majestically on a somewhat comedic and lighthearted, but also gentle and devout cover of Cyndi Lauper's 1983 smash hit, Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.
7:28 Speaker 03 Time has slowed down to an exquisite crawl in my freshly pot truffle-addled brain. The song lasts two hours in my head, and I do an exaggerated, chemically-addled version of the thing you do, right? When a revered, authentic, non-machine, prestige-type, serious artist busts out a surprise cover of a super-famous, fun, frivolous pop song. At first, I go, ah, ha, ha, what a goofy cover song. This is hilarious. And then 20 minutes into the song, I'm like, this is actually, it's super beautiful. And by the time the song's over, an hour later, I'm openly weeping, right? You can hear the crowd. This version you're hearing is apparently from the 2002 Merle Fest midnight jam.
8:12 Speaker 03 Merle Fest is an annual blowout in North Carolina with a lot of acoustic guitars and banjos and mandolins and fiddles and things of that nature. But anyway, you can hear the crowd giggling at the silliness of Gillian and David covering Cyndi Lauper whilst they're also audibly basking in the sincere greatness of it.
8:34 Speaker 04 Girls wanna have fun. Girls, they wanna have fun.
8:50 Speaker 03 It's fun, but it's not mocking this cover song. It's silly, but crucially, it's sincere. And I understand this while I'm standing there, while I'm swaying erratically there, stoned out of my gourd at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. My vision has been affected by the pot truffles as well. You know the way the Predator looks at people in the Predator movies? Like the infrared rainbow heat vision the Predator uses to hunt people for sport? I have acquired Predator vision in the mid-afternoon,
9:32 Speaker 03 staggering in a large crowd at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. And somebody's like, Rob, you all right? And I'm like, hell, yeah, man, absolutely. But really, I'm thinking, oh, my God, I can see this dude's pancreas. And I do not like it. Meanwhile, I like this unexpected cover song very much. But I also need everything to be a joke, right? And so at some point, deep into Gillian and David's version of Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, I think, another great moment in white people. But because I'm stoned out of my gourd, I do not realize that I didn't think another great moment in white people. I said it out loud.
10:15 Speaker 03 And perhaps I even kind of sort of yelled it because several people in front of me turn around and stare at me. And some of those people are amused and some of them are less amused. And my face turns bright red. And I feel like now they can see my pancreas via Predator vision. And I'm super embarrassed because I too am white, obviously. And I ought to shut my pie hole. Long story short, I had to drive myself and my future wife back home. I had to drive from San Francisco back to Oakland, across the Bay Bridge whilst catastrophically stoned. And that was stupid and dangerous and also unpleasant, but we made it. And my wife reports that when we got home, I put a jazz CD in my circa 2004 laptop.
11:00 Speaker 03 I started playing a Lester Young CD and I collapsed on the couch and I put the laptop playing jazz on the coffee table right next to my head. And I would not speak to my wife for several hours. I think we all learned a valuable lesson that day. Specifically, we learned that there is no such thing as a truly ironic cover song.
11:38 Speaker 03 At first, you may think you're doing an ironic cover song, but you ain't. Do you know Travis, the band Travis, ultra-sensitive, crooning, Scottish gentleman? Travis blew up with their 1999 album called The Man Who. It's a bad album title. Travis were specifically huge in like that post-Britpop but pre-Coldplay moment. I really loved this album in 1999. I'm looking at The Man Who tracklist for the first time in forever. And is there really a song on this record called "The Last Laugh of the Laughter"? What? Bad song title.
12:19 Speaker 03 Bands, albums, songs, Travis can't name things for shit. Let me hear that one, actually.
12:41 Speaker 03 Yeah, I remember that one. Delicate wintery piano, aching falsetto, a Scottish dude singing in French for some reason. That's Travis. That's so Travis. I still love this record. But anyway, on the deluxe edition of The Man Who, Travis do a live cover of Britney Spears's "Baby One More Time." And they're quite amused with themselves, Travis are, judging by the falsetto action on the words "still believe."
13:27 Speaker 03 Hilarious, but singing the song and mocking a song at the same time is much harder than it appears. A great song, and really even a halfway decent song, will win you over as you sing it. It will convert you. Travis frontman Fran Healy, in a 2005 interview, talking about this Baby One More Time cover, he says, quote, "We did it for a laugh the first time, and as we played it, the irony slipped from my smile. It's a very well crafted song. It has that magic thing," end quote. And I quite like that expression. "The irony slipped from my smile." In 1999, Travis were
14:09 Speaker 03 a big shot, revered, authentic prestige-type rock band. Sidebar, in 2010, the Brit Awards, the British Grammys, basically, they gave out an award for the best British album of the last 30 years. So 1980 to 2010, there were 10 nominees. In ascending chronological order, you decide which of these is the best British album of the past 30 years. Sade, Diamond Life, Phil Collins, No Jacket Required, Dire Straits, Brothers in Arms, I totally forgot Dire Straits were English, Oasis, What's the Story Morning Glory, The Verve,
14:48 Speaker 03 Urban Hymns, Travis, The Man Who, Dido, No Angel, that's legit, Coldplay, A Rush of Blood to the Head, Keane, Hopes and Fears, and Duffy, Rock Fairy. Those are your 10 nominees. No Blur is nasty work, first of all, if you're Blur. Second of all, Oasis wins, obviously, right? What's the Story Morning Glory should win, and in fact does win, best British album of the past 30 years. And at the Brit Awards ceremony, Oasis singer Liam Gallagher saunters onstage, and he thanks everyone in the band except his estranged
15:29 Speaker 03 brother, Oasis mastermind Noel Gallagher. And then Liam tosses both his microphone and the trophy into the crowd and saunters offstage, and the host calls him a, quote, "knobhead," end quote. Unbelievable.
15:46 Speaker 03 That's why Oasis are the best. But so in 1999, Travis are a big shot revered, authentic prestige type rock band. And Britney Spears is Britney Spears. And so the idea of Travis covering Britney Spears, that's hilarious, right? Travis are slumming it, right? By stooping to the level of this non prestigious, super famous, fun frivolous pop song, right? No, Travis are not slumming it or lowering themselves or elevating the song or anything of this sort. Travis may have started out thinking they're playing "Baby One More Time" for a laugh. And once again, you can even hear the audience giggling a little bit.
16:30 Speaker 03 But meanwhile, for the band, audibly, the irony slips from their smiles.
16:53 Speaker 03 Now, did the world need Travis to cover Britney Spears? No. No, thank you. But that only makes their version of "Baby One More Time" unnecessary, not ironic. There are no ironic cover songs. You can't sing the song. Any singer, any song, you can't sing the song and not mean it. You either like the song and you mean it, or you hate this song and you mean it. There are hate covers. Yes, sure. Limp Bizkit covering George Michael's "Faith", that is an entirely sincere hate cover. Limp Bizkit, basically due to George Michael, what the Death Star did to Alderaan.
17:37 Speaker 03 Alderaan is the planet the Death Star blows up in Star Wars. Just to clarify, I was gonna not clarify that, but then I did. And then my editor said, "Thank you for clarifying that. I didn't know that." And I said, "You're welcome." Also, the George Michael album Faith should have been on that best British album of the past 30 years list. I'm taking off the Keane album and replacing it with George Michael. No offense to those guys. You know Keane, K-E-A-N-E. The moody, ultra-sensitive piano rock band. I meant to bring them up in the How to Save a Life episode, actually. Keane with their apparently highly regarded 2004 album, Hopes and Fears. The album that's got that song, "Somewhere Only We Know."
18:21 Speaker 03 The one that goes, "Oh, simple things, where have you gone?" Those guys, you know, sorry. That song, "Somewhere Only We Know," has more than 2 billion plays on Spotify. Billion with a B. I feel bad kicking Keane off that best British album in 30 years list. But then I heard Keane's live mashup of Dirty by Christina Aguilera and Bootylicious by Destiny's Child. And now I feel less bad.
19:04 Speaker 03 Oof. Holy moly, I'm sorry. I don't know if the ladies wailing in the background there are delighted or grievously injured. I do know, actually. Playing that for you just now was crazy rude, and I am very sorry. If you're walking your dog later and someone runs up and grabs your dog and drop kicks it across the street, that will still be the second rudest thing that somebody did to you today after me playing you a clip of Keane covering Bootylicious.
19:35 Speaker 03 Sheesh. Okay, so Keane's decision here is sincere, but rather ill-advised, which I guess is an important subcategory of cover songs. The ill-advised racially problematic cover song. Dorky white guys doing twee versions of gangster rap songs and whatnot. You think of, say, that late 90s band Dynamite Hack covering Eazy-E's "Boys in the Hood." I will not play that for you now. You're welcome. Conversely, that's crazy nice of me not playing you that. If later today, somebody else buys you a new car, that will still be the second nicest thing that somebody did for you today after me not playing you Dynamite Hack's "Boys in the Hood."
20:19 Speaker 03 Meanwhile, this is happening.
20:34 Speaker 03 Meanwhile, here in 2002, the Southern California pop punk label Fearless Records releases the first volume in their wildly popular Punk Goes Pop series, in which bratty but mostly sincere pop punk bands cover mostly non-punk pop songs. Uh, yeah, that's an Austin, Texas band called Dynamite Boy covering "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys. Sure. The Dynamite Boy singers, "Ho, tell me why," that was horrible, I'm sorry. Uh, that sounds awfully sincere to me. Uh, what else we got on this first Punk Goes Pop record? Ooh, we got Yellow Card covering the single greatest song released in the first decade of the 21st century.
21:35 Speaker 03 Yellow Card, covering Michelle Branch's superb and unsurpassed 2001 smash hit Everywhere. That's legit. Even if Yellow Card have to try awfully hard, they gotta switch up the drumbeat and whatnot, in a valiant but doomed effort to make Everywhere sound any more punk than it already is. Most of the time, the joke, not the joke, this is a relatively sincere enterprise, most of the time, the thesis of the Punk Goes Pop series is that pop punk and regular pop sound and feel basically the same. The Venn diagram of pop punk and regular pop is just one giant circle. There is no significant cultural difference, and
22:18 Speaker 03 if there is a significant cultural difference, you're in trouble. Do you want to hear the starting line cover "I'm Real" by Jennifer Lopez and Ja Rule? I don't. Sorry. I'm sure it's fine. It might be fine. I hope it's fine. Let's not find out. Anyways, this first 2002 Punk Goes Pop compilation does so well that there are now seven albums in the series. Punk Goes Pop, Volume 7, came out in 2017. There is a market, clearly, for genre-crossing stunt covers of big pop songs. And what I still want from such an unexpected cover song is maximum sincerity. I want genuine respect. I want enthusiasm. I want something
23:03 Speaker 03 approaching awe. One time, I went to the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco, this beautiful 100-plus year old theater in the Tenderloin District. Not a great neighborhood. Maybe don't wander around before the show looking for ice cream like I used to. And the Great American Music Hall has this rad ornate balcony, right? And I go to a show with my good buddy Garrett. This is the mid 2000s also. And we walk up this beautiful old staircase toward the balcony. And the staircase splits. You walk up the main stairs, and then it forks off into two smaller sets of stairs going up to the left and to the right. And Garrett's walking ahead of me, and he goes up the left staircase, and then I watch him turn around and lock
23:47 Speaker 03 eyes with a girl who's standing at the top of the right staircase. And time stops.
23:55 Speaker 03 I'm halfway up the main staircase. Garrett's above me to the left. The girl's above me to the right. Perfectly symmetrical. And Garrett and the girl are just gazing into each other's eyes. And I think, what the? They are instantly enraptured by each other. Birds are chirping. We got an angelic children's choir going. We got a mirror ball descending from the ceiling and slowly turning and bathing both of them in flattering celestial light. It's a perfect pop song to me, this scene. Every fun frivolous, radio-friendly pop song about love at first sight that I've ever heard in my life is manifested in this moment, in this slow motion enraptured staring contest between Garrett and the girl.
24:40 Speaker 03 I have the conscious thought, it's real. All those love at first sight pop songs were real. It's one of the wildest things I've ever seen. Needless to say, Garrett and the girl, they're married now to other people. For sure, everything worked out for the best. Trust me. But yeah, so we were all at the Great American Music Hall to see Ted Leo and the Pharmacist.
25:19 Speaker 03 That's not a Ted Leo and the Pharmacist song about love at first sight, unfortunately. I tried to find one. That's a song from 2003 called "The Ballad of the Sin Eater", about being an American, traveling abroad, and everyone hates you. That's a great topic for a pop song also. Ted Leo was born in South Bend, Indiana. He grew up in Jersey. He's a veteran of the New York City hardcore scene. He founded the hyper-literate pop punk band Ted Leo and the Pharmacist in 1999 in Washington DC. He's been around. Sometimes the band name is styled Ted Leo slash Pharmacist, and sometimes it's Ted Leo plus sign Pharmacist. This stuff matters. My biggest musical memory of this Ted Leo show
26:02 Speaker 03 is that during this song, "The Ballad of the Sin Eater", the band tossed a bunch of percussion instruments into the audience, tambourines and maracas and cowbells, things of that nature. And we had ourselves a little ugly American dance party.
26:29 Speaker 03 I bet Ted Leo and The Pharmacist have a great song about love at first sight, and I just can't think of it right now. What do I mean when I call them a hyper-literate pop punk band? Ted Leo is an uncommonly phenomenal lyricist. He's got a degree in English from Notre Dame. He writes these super catchy songs with such a rich sense of history and geography and vocabulary and classic rock pedigree and emotional acuity. This song's from 2001. It's called "Timorous Me."
27:15 Speaker 03 A lot of Thin Lizzy, "The Boys Are Back in Town," aching nostalgia-type greatness happening here. Speaking of classic rock pedigree. "There was an awkward pause and something that should've began just passed us by." That has wistful love-at-first-sight overtones, possibly. Although he also sings "She Said She Was a Fan," and according to the internet, I think that fan later died after falling out a window at a party, which makes this song more of a eulogy. So, okay, not that one. Maybe this is a Ted Leo song about love at first sight.
28:00 Speaker 03 This Ted Leo and The Pharmacist song is also from 2001. It's called "Under Your Hedge." And, hmm, according to the internet, this song is about how Ted got into a fight with Guided by Voices backstage after a show at Oberlin College in Ohio, the almighty Dayton, Ohio, rock and roll institution. Guided by Voices, Oberlin College, which I believe I once described as the single bluest physical location in emphatically red state Ohio.
28:33 Speaker 03 Well, I don't know if any of that's true, but this song appears to be a remarkable collision of my various interests. But it's not a love at first sight song. No, seriously, what do I mean really? When I describe Ted Leo and The Pharmacist's as a hyper literate pop punk band? I am attempting to elevate Ted Leo. That's what I mean. I'm saying a hyper literate to differentiate Ted Leo from your standard, less literate, less prestigious pop punk band. Just as sometimes people use the term pop punk so that the punk part elevates the pop part. The thinking goes, pop is not prestigious and important.
29:17 Speaker 03 Punk is prestigious and important. Pop punk might be prestigious and important. Hyper literate pop punk is definitely prestigious and important. So praising Ted Leo like this, whether I'm conscious of it or not, I'm assigning importance. I'm assigning authenticity. But Ted Leo knows that a great song is a great song is a great song. It is possible, that night at the Great American Music Hall, that Ted even spelled it out for us.
29:58 Speaker 03 I don't recall unfortunately whether Ted Leo and The Pharmacist's actually played this song that night, the love at first sight on the Great American Music Hall staircase night, but they might have played it. And that's what's important. Ted Leo did this song a lot back then. He honored this song a lot back then. It is a super famous, fun, frivolous pop song. As we often say here at The Ringer, it is a heater, a jam, and a bop. It is not a song laden with shrewd, verbose, historical and religious and classic rock type references in typical Ted Leo fashion. But you can hear in his voice the greatness that he hears in the song. There was never any irony dropping from his smile.
30:43 Speaker 03 I think you'll know what I mean when I say that he sounds more awestruck by the song the harder it gets for him to sing it.
31:03 Speaker 03 And at one point in my younger and less enlightened days, this might have scandalized me. This idea of the great and important Ted Leo covering this song. A revered, authentic, non-machine prestige-type, serious artist busting out a surprise cover of a super-famous, fun, frivolous pop song. He's covering this song ironically. Yes, he's having a laugh. Yes, I'm having a laugh. Yes, no. No, no, and no, respectively. You know, it's fascinating. In rock criticism, there's a whole, enthralling, decades-long discourse behind this idea that, for example, sad rock dudes playing guitars are inherently more meaningful and
31:44 Speaker 03 lasting and real than exuberant pop ladies not playing guitars. This discourse, this concept, it's called [BLEEP]. And I could talk about it all day if you weren't busy. Yes, thank God, it's the glorious return of my most beloved running joke, bleeping out [BLEEP]. A running joke I return to whenever I feel like lately I haven't gotten enough email from people demanding to know what the hell I'm talking about. Or better yet, just ignore me and I'll stop doing that eventually. He can't sing this chorus. Ted Leo can't. Or, you know, he can't quite hit the notes in this chorus. But I submit to you that the harder he works to sing it, and the larger the gap between
32:29 Speaker 03 the notes he's singing and the notes he's trying to hit, the better this shock cover song becomes. He sounds like a kid trying to look through the window of a candy store, but the kid's way too short. So first, the kid's up on tiptoes, and now he's jumping up and down to get even a brief look at all that candy. Because boys, because even hyper-literate, prestigious boys just want to have fun.
33:08 Speaker 03 He can't quite hit those notes. No, but he tries very hard and there is honor in the attempt. He honors himself and he honors the song. Don't take it so hard, Ted Leo. Millions and millions of people have tried and failed to hit these notes in cars and showers and karaoke rooms across the globe. She appreciates the effort, I assure you, but only she can really do it.
33:52 Speaker 03 My name is Rob Harvilla. This is the 23rd episode of 60 Songs That Explained the 90s, Cole and the 2000s. And this week, we are discussing "Since You Been Gone" by Kelly Clarkson from her 2004 album, Breakaway. That's since, capital letter U, been gone. This stuff matters. I thought this intro would be shorter. True story. Excuse me for a second.
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35:18 Speaker 03 Jeez Louise, whatever product or service they were advertising just now, get 20% off with the promo code. Oh, simple things, where have you gone? That's not true. I'm kidding. Sorry, I really like singing that song. I'm not singing that ironically. I could never get into American Idol. I'm not bragging about that or apologizing for that. I mean that as a humble statement of fact. I tried a lot. For the first 10 years or so, it felt like I tried to get into American Idol every year. I'd start watching every season, but I hit the same wall every time. Specifically, I hit this wall.
36:02 Speaker 05 She bangs, she bangs. Oh, baby, when she moves, she moves. I go crazy 'cause she loose like a flop, but she stings like a bee.
36:14 Speaker 03 I hit the William Hung wall. This is the famous, the infamous, the star making, the, at least it was memorable, American Idol audition of one William Hung. This is season three, 2004. This dude, William Hung, he's studying civil engineering at UC Berkeley, and he auditions in San Francisco by doing to the Ricky Martin hit, She Bangs, what the Starkiller base did to the Hosniyan Prime system. That's another Star Wars reference. And the judges are horrified, right? Specifically Judge Randy Jackson covers his face with a sheet of paper. Judge Paula Abdul smiles uncomfortably and bounces along. And Super Judge Simon Cowell glowers and talks a bunch of shit.
36:59 Speaker 03 And I'm out, man. I can't get into American Idol. I don't deal well with cringe, with disappointment, with humiliation, with reality TV self-abasement. And the barrage of bad auditions in the first few episodes of any season of American Idol, where some people try out and they don't think they suck, but they kind of do. And some other people know they really suck, but they try out anyway because they're trying to get William Hung famous. I can't deal with this. There's just an undertone of sour cruelty to the onset of any American Idol season.
37:35 Speaker 03 That upsets my delicate constitution. And then later, they herd all the contestants into two rooms. And in one room, they go, you win, you're going to Hollywood. And everyone goes, yay. And then the other room, they go, you lose, you all suck and you're going home. And everyone goes, ah, shit. Yeah, no, no way. Can we agree? Let's just say that I'm way too sensitive and sophisticated to deal with the cringey, bad audition element of American Idol. Also, this show doesn't work. I know you know that, but it bears repeating. American Idol premiered in America in June 2002. The first season was 2002.
38:14 Speaker 03 The 23rd and latest season of American Idol concluded very recently in May of 2025. Quick question, how many American Idol winners became actual pop stars? This is theoretically debatable. An actual pop star has a somewhat subjective definition, but is this debatable though? Or is the answer objectively two? Two American Idol winners have become legit pop stars. Carrie Underwood is the other one. I mean, look, Fantasia Barrino, season three, she's great. Taylor Hicks, season five, the guy who already looked so old. I'm shocked the Cleveland Browns didn't draft him at quarterback.
38:58 Speaker 03 No, I just wanted to say that, no. Uh, Scotty McCreery, season 10, you gotta be pretty into Truck Nut's industrial, complex pop country, but he's all right. Philip Phillips, season 11. Uh, my 13 year old son's school choir just sang that Philip Phillips song, Home, at their spring concert and only one kid almost threw up on stage. Okay, fine. Add all of those together and that's another half a pop star. 2.5 American Idol winners have become legit pop stars. To paraphrase Jay-Z, that's a one big pop star every 10 year average. To further quote Jay-Z, had a spark when you started, but now you're just garbage.
39:42 Speaker 03 Because American Idol very arguably peaks immediately.
39:48 Speaker 04 Hello Kelly. Hello. How old are you? I'm a big fan of you, by the way. Thank you very much. I'm 20. I just turned 20 this April. Oh, happy birthday. Cool beans.
39:58 Speaker 03 American Idol peaked immediately with noted Paula Abdul fan Kelly Clarkson saying "Cool beans" twice during her first fateful season one audition. This didn't even originally air on television. Kelly Clarkson was born in Fort Worth, Texas. She grew up in the nearby suburb of Burleson, Texas. Her parents divorced when she was six. After graduating high school, Kelly decided against college and tried to get a record deal instead, demos, feudal label meetings, et cetera. She went out to LA for a little while, but her apartment burned down and she had to sleep in her car for a few days. And eventually she went back to Texas, where she worked as a cocktail waitress, et cetera.
40:38 Speaker 03 And also she auditioned for this weird new TV show called American Idol in Dallas while wearing a strapless denim shirt that she made herself out of an old pair of jeans. The first song she sang was Madonna's "Express Yourself." In retrospect, it's clear to me that Kelly Clarkson's gonna be a pop star just based on the way she sings the word "gold."
41:06 Speaker 04 You don't need diamond rings or 18 karat gold. Fancy cars that go very fast, you know they never last. No, no.
41:20 Speaker 03 Yeah, that fancy upward diva trill right at the end on "No, no," that's the flashy part, but the subtly vibrating, low register downward trill on "gold" that turns the word "gold" into three distinct syllables, that's the real kill shot. Are you familiar with the golfing expression "drive for show, putt for dough"?
41:44 Speaker 03 The wailing diva no-no is the long, fancy, impressive drive. The subtle, low-register, three-syllable, workman-like gold is the high-pressure, short putt for birdie. I suck at golf. I don't know why I'm talking about golf. The American Idol audition process, in essence, is an endless series of often painfully sincere cover songs. Yes, you get up in front of the judges and you sing your favorite song and you try to mean it with every last fiber of your being and you just hope that you don't death star it. And Kelly nails it, of course. And then she says Cool Beans again.
42:25 Speaker 04 What you need is a big, strong hand to lift you to your higher ground. Oh.
42:35 Speaker 03 Good job. Cool beans. And then Kelly Clarkson clouds around with the judges for the next several minutes. She actually sits with the judges. She takes Randy Jackson's seat and Randy attempts to audition by singing R. Kelly's "I Believe I Can Fly." It was 2002. And even American Idol's attempts at lighthearted, good-natured comedy strike me as pretty cringey, but Kelly Clarkson's majestic ease, her superhero vocals and her affable, every-woman charm, her very specific combination of weapons-grade relatability and unrelatable flamethrower vocal supremacy. Yeah, man, this singing competition is over.
43:17 Speaker 03 Who is even gonna step to Kelly Clarkson on this TV show?
43:23 Speaker 05 And I wonder whose love, babe?
43:37 Speaker 03 Ah, yes. This guy. American Idol season one runner up Justin Guarini, who was auditioning with E. Jackson Fives Who's Lovin' You? And who draws out his vocal phrases for so long that I have to separate this clip into two halves. Yes, I'm aware that the slate of American Idol contestants who didn't win is arguably more impressive than the winners. Jennifer Hudson's got an EGOT and a talk show with a spirit tunnel. Adam Lambert auditioned with Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody and is now functionally the lead singer of Queen. That's impressive. Right now, some tough guy you went to high school with is bench pressing 280 pounds in his garage while listening to Daughtry and God Bless, et cetera.
44:23 Speaker 03 There's no shame in not winning American Idol. And I'll be happy to inform Justin Guarini of that myself. Whenever he gets this audition song wrapped up, his first "you" here goes a little better than his second "you."
44:48 Speaker 03 Cool beans. My personal vocal assessment of Justin is that he can drive a little better than he can putt, if you're picking up what I'm putting down. American Idol dutifully plays out the whole first season. America votes and whatnot. And I'm sure it was dramatic and unpredictable if you withstood all the cringiness and managed to watch it in real time. But if you go back now and watch Kelly Clarkson's performances, week to week, she basically sounds like the 95, 96 Chicago Bulls. And she's got basically the same array of hairstyles. Hit the deck.
45:39 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's Kelly performing as part of the final three, blowing the doors off the joint with her entirely sincere version of Mariah Carey's entirely sincere version, of Bad Fingers entirely sincere version, of Harry Nilsson's entirely sincere original version of "Without You." All right, Kelly Clarkson wins. She wins American Idol in September 2002. What does Kelly Clarkson win? What does an American Idol winner win? She wins a recording contract with RCA Records. She wins a management contract with American Idol creator Simon Fuller's management company, 19 Entertainment.
46:23 Speaker 03 She wins a presumably lifelong lockstep hand-in-hand association with American Idol itself, best exemplified by the accursed summer 2000 feature film, "From Justin to Kelly," a lighthearted spring break-themed musical romp starring Kelly Clarkson and Justin Guarini that Entertainment Weekly described as, quote, "Like Grease, the next generation acted out by the food court staff at SeaWorld," end quote. The movie sucks and the movie bombs. Discussing this film in Time Magazine, Kelly Clarkson herself says, quote, "Two words, 'contractually obligated,'" end quote.
47:07 Speaker 03 She also gets a number one hit on the Billboard Hot 100. That's specifically about how delighted she is by all of this.
47:30 Speaker 03 This song is called "A Moment Like This", and indeed, it's the song Kelly is wailing on when the confetti falls right after she wins American Idol. But as an overly meta triumphant valedictory pop song, it's lovely, even when it gets a little, you know, goopy.
47:59 Speaker 03 I mean, goopy in both the dictionary sense and the Gwyneth Paltrow sense, actually, if you're still picking up what I'm putting down. That line, "Oh, I can't believe it's happening to me", that line still cracks me up. It implies a shock, a naivete, a lack of agency, a sense that Kelly Clarkson got famous the way you or I might get hit by a bus. "Oh, I can't believe it's happening to me", suggests that pop stars don't turn themselves into pop stars. The pop star industrial complex turns them into pop stars. Hmm. "A Moment Like This" thus appears on Kelly Clarkson's debut album, released in April 2003, so at least she got it out before the lousy movie.
48:44 Speaker 03 Kelly Clarkson's debut album is called "Thankful", a title that further implies how grateful she is to her new American Idol friends and all her big shot music industry overlords, and how compliant she will be going forward. Enjoy it while it lasts, big shots.
49:16 Speaker 03 This song is called "Miss Independent". It was originally supposed to go to Christina Aguilera, and you can totally tell. This first Kelly Clarkson album, "Thankful", is a useful object lesson in the difference between being a legitimately soulful pop singer and a scare quotes "soulful" pop singer. Kelly Clarkson is the real deal. She has the alarmingly broad Stylistic range of the real deal. She can sing legit R and B. She can sing semi-snarly post-alternative rock. She can sing bouncy pop punk. She can sing the goopy theme song to your high school commencement ceremony. She can do it all. And she mostly does what the record company tells her to do, but she doesn't do all of it.
50:01 Speaker 03 And she likes doing it even less. And you can hear how little she likes it. And that bodes well for the future. The first Pink album from the year 2000 called Can't Take Me Home. The first Pink album works like this, too. You see Pink's potential, but you don't yet see her vision. You see the record company's vision. And the real lasting, career-defining hits don't come until it ain't all the record company's vision no more. Kelly Clarkson likewise here has not yet quite gotten this party started. But I do really dig this song on Thankful called Just Missed the Train. There is a primal, fluid, physical force to her voice
50:45 Speaker 03 that turns a pedestrian hook into a monster hook.
51:05 Speaker 03 I also really dug this song called Beautiful Disaster. For the melodic brightness, the overblown shininess, the Shania Twain bombast. Then I found out later that Kelly Clarkson herself didn't like this version of the song at all. And then I felt really bad about it.
51:42 Speaker 03 Oh, you liked that, did you? Did you think that was a heater, a jam, and a bop? Well, nice going. You just personally betrayed Kelly Clarkson. No, you didn't. I don't know why I felt bad for liking this version of "Beautiful Disaster." Once I found out that Kelly didn't like it at all. Discussing this song in a 2004 Contact Music bio, Kelly says, quote, "When it was released on my first record, the label wanted all the production that was on it, and I just hated it. I thought it took away from the song, and so did the producer, Matthew Wilder. We wanted to do it the way I did it on tour, with just a piano and my voice. The label thought it didn't sound big enough,
52:26 Speaker 03 but I thought the production was distracting from the lyrics. So on tour, I did the stripped-down version. I would get fan mail about that version. I sang it that way on "The View", and people wanted that piano and voice version. So I decided to add the live version to this record." End quote. Kelly means her second record, released in 2004 and called "Breakaway", which does, indeed, end with a live version of "Beautiful Disaster." And usually, when someone's second album ends with a live version of a song from their first record, you might worry that they're already running out of ideas. But in this case, this new, radically deconstructed "Beautiful Disaster"
53:10 Speaker 03 suggests that, no, don't worry. Kelly's just running out of patience for other people's ideas.
53:38 Speaker 03 And see, that's the rad thing about Kelly Clarkson. Even if it's just her voice and a piano, she's never not gonna sound big enough. Even if you owned this record, though, I wouldn't blame you if you've never even heard the live version of Beautiful Disaster, because this is track 12 on a record with one of the wildest four-song opening runs in recent pop history.
54:11 Speaker 03 This song is called Breakaway, and it's still my very favorite Kelly Clarkson song, and I'm not even gonna pretend to feel bad about that. Co-written by Avril Lavigne. In part, it's the mesmerizing duality of Kelly Clarkson, right? The superhero vocals and the everywoman charm. This is a song about growing up in a small town and never forgetting it, but still emphatically leaving it. This is a song about being grateful to everyone who helped you take flight, even all those big shot music industry overlords, but still ultimately flying away from them. Now, that doesn't mean that Kelly Clarkson goes all Riot Girl and signs with Kill Rock Stars and rejects the core tenets of capitalism.
54:53 Speaker 03 That doesn't even mean Kelly Clarkson gets her way, but it does mean that you can hear every Kelly Clarkson song, past and present, as a noble conflict, as a musical and philosophical battleground, as a righteous battle for her autonomy. And sometimes she wins, and sometimes she loses, but usually the song itself sounds awesome regardless. Because really, Breakaway, it's just about the vocal echo here, right? Make a wish, take a chance, make a change. The thought arrives before she sings the words, and you can just tell it's her idea this time.
55:43 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's her best song for sure. Okay, "Breakaway," the song is track one on "Breakaway," the album. Track three, it's time to get a little gnarly. Get a load of the feedback right here.
56:09 Speaker 03 Real Warped Tour energy here. Yes, we're right on the cusp of Ozfest energy, if you want the truth. "Behind These Hazel Eyes" is co-written by Kelly Clarkson, Swedish pop mastermind Max Martin, and Max Martin's young protege, Lucas Gottwald, AKA Dr. Luke, with Max Martin and Dr. Luke producing. From here, Dr. Luke will write and/or produce huge singles for Pink, Avril Lavigne, Britney Spears, Katy Perry, and Kesha, among many others. In 2014, Kesha sued Dr. Luke in civil court alleging emotional and sexual abuse. Dr. Luke denied the allegations and countersued, and the legal battle dragged on until 2023,
56:53 Speaker 03 when they both announced that they'd reached a private resolution. I want you to imagine that you and I are playing Monopoly, and I landed on Chance, and I got a "get out of talking anymore about Dr. Luke" card, and now I'm playing it. Hell, yeah. I don't give a hoot who else worked on "Behind These Hazel Eyes." I care about the majestic sauce Kelly Clarkson puts on the word "anymore."
57:32 Speaker 03 Kelly Clarkson once told Entertainment Weekly that, quote, "Hazel Eyes is about the dipstick who completely screwed up and now is unhappy and you're happy," end quote. I love the word dipstick there. More pop stars should use the word dipstick. All right, track four on the "Breakaway" album is honestly just completely raw as hell.
58:12 Speaker 03 There is a universe in which "Because of You," co-written by Kelly Clarkson and the song's producers, David Hodges and Evanescence co-founder Ben Moody, there is a universe in which "Because of You" is Kelly Clarkson's first big single, or at least it's on her first album. Talking to The Guardian in 2011 about whether her material has gotten darker, Kelly says, "My biggest song worldwide is 'Because of You,' and you may as well grab a knife. That song really is the most depressing one I've ever written. I tried to get it on 'Thankful,' and was laughed at and told I wasn't a good writer. So then I tried to get it on 'Breakaway,' and the label saw the results, people responding to it,
58:56 Speaker 03 and allowed it to become a single, then took credit for its success, of course." End quote. Every song is a fight. Kelly started writing "Because of You" when she was 16. It's about her parents' divorce. There are extraordinarily scabrous and confrontational metal albums that I enjoy and respect very much that don't have a single line as searing as, "Because of You, I find it hard to trust not only me, but everyone around me."
59:44 Speaker 03 "Because of You" honestly scares me a little bit. We are already, here in 2004, we already seem to be light years beyond the pleasantries and compromises and genial cover songs and I can't believe it's happening to me passivity of American Idol. What Kelly Clarkson's second album achieves is escape velocity. She'll go back, she'll drop in on American Idol periodically. She'll be a judge on The Voice for a long spell. The Voice being another big deal singing competition show that has gone 27 seasons and has, to my knowledge, minted exactly zero actual pop stars. If anyone would care to explain to me what the point of that show is.
1:00:29 Speaker 03 Morgan Wallen didn't win, he doesn't count. But what the breakaway album does is ensure that American Idol is merely the beginning of Kelly Clarkson's career and not the immediate peak of her career. And that is by far a more impressive accomplishment than winning American Idol in the first place. And she's had bigger hits and maybe even arguably better ones. But this is the heater, the jam and the bop that truly makes it happen.
1:01:13 Speaker 03 Do you mind if we start with the pre-chorus? Something you'll notice, listening to a ton of Kelly Clarkson, is the faithfully sturdy and classic song construction. The pre-choruses, the bridges, the key changes. She sings them all with an ultra-professional clockwork precision. I'll be driving or walking around or washing dishes or whatever and listening to her and I'll just call out "bridge" or "key change" or whatever and boop, there it is. You know it's coming. You can rely on her. But Kelly Clarkson's pre-choruses and bridges and key changes somehow also arrive with the sudden calamitous, pummeling, terrifying force of severe weather events. Reliable does not mean predictable.
1:01:58 Speaker 03 Professional does not mean safe. It's manipulative, for sure, to put some noisy guitar feedback right before the giant pop punk chorus hits to indicate that the giant pop punk chorus is about to hit. But it is the singular charm of Kelly Clarkson. You can totally see her coming, but she can still surprise you. I'll tell you my absolute favorite part of Since You Been Gone. Written and produced by Max Martin and Dr. Luke. I still have my not talking about Dr. Luke anymore card. My favorite part of this song is right here in the second chorus. When the words "I get" and "I get what I want" fly in from out of nowhere.
1:02:53 Speaker 03 I love that "Rogue, I get" so much. It's like she hit you in the head with a shoe from across a crowded room. Kelly Clarkson has three number one hits, and this ain't one of them. "A Moment Like This" in 2002, "My Life Would Suck Without You" in 2009, love that one, and "Stronger," parentheses, "What Doesn't Kill You," close parentheses, in 2011. Those are Kelly Clarkson's three number one hits. Whereas "Since You Been Gone" peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 100, beaten out only by Candy Shop by 50 Cent. That is hilarious. That is also a travesty. I'm guessing that even 50 Cent at this point
1:03:37 Speaker 03 would tell you that Candy Shop stinks. Chris Malanfi, the great chart guru and writer and podcaster over at Slate, it was Chris that told me that Candy Shop kept "Since You Been Gone" from hitting number one. I just busted out laughing to keep from crying. So this is objectively not her biggest hit, but it nonetheless objectively feels like her biggest hit. Yes? And that's because halfway through your first time listening to this song, you are guaranteed to no longer think of her as American Idol winner Kelly Clarkson. Instead, henceforth, she will be Since You Been Gone singer Kelly Clarkson.
1:04:18 Speaker 03 Some very famous people wait a lifetime for a moment like this. Bridge.
1:04:43 Speaker 03 I should note a pretty important element of Ted Leo's super sincere cover version of Since You Been Gone. Ted is actually doing more of a mashup. He is mashing up Kelly Clarkson with Maps by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Ted did a live karaoke version of Since You Been Gone at Joko Cruise 2016, which is some sort of music and comedy cruise ship situation. And that made it a little clearer to me what compelled Ted to cram these two songs together.
1:05:31 Speaker 03 And in my younger and less enlightened days, I might have regarded this as further sacrilege, right? The hyper literate Ted Leo, not only covering Kelly Clarkson, but conflating Kelly Clarkson with the impossibly cool and dangerous and zeitgeist defining Yeah Yeah Yeahs. But long ago, I finally learned the truth, which is that Kelly Clarkson in 2004 is the coolest and most dangerous and most zeitgeist defining rock star of her era. I really dig the vocal echoes here, too. And also that you should know.
1:06:19 Speaker 03 The saga continues. Going forward, she will fight bigger, uglier battles with various big shot music industry overlords, including that dipstick Clive Davis. Kelly will also get her own talk show, which does not have a spirit tunnel, but it does have Kellyoki. Where she sings pretty much any song better than pretty much anyone who originally sang it. Check her out doing Girls Just Wanna Have Fun sometime. Uh, no, Since You Been Gone does not make Kelly Clarkson invincible, only immortal. And Since You Been Gone did not fix it so she'd win every battle from here on out. But this song did guarantee that we'd always be voting for her.
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1:07:32 Speaker 03 We are so honored to be joined today by Ringer staff writer Jodi Walker. She is the co-host of the podcasts We're Obsessed, the Prestige TV Podcast, and the Morally Corrupt Bravo Show. Also, her first concert ever was Kelly Clarkson. Jody, thank you so much for being here.
1:07:51 Speaker 00 Rob, I'm thrilled to be here. What a gift you've given me to reflect upon Kelly Clarkson's discography and also just reflect, which I told you, you know, in a vulnerable moment, that Kelly Clarkson was my first concert. And so thank you for letting the world know here.
1:08:07 Speaker 03 You're welcome. Uh, I, I think we better just start with you telling me everything, absolutely everything you remember about that experience.
1:08:16 Speaker 00 The tough thing is that it was in my, I believe sophomore year of high school. So the memories aren't the sharpest, but-
1:08:25 Speaker 03 16 or so, yeah.
1:08:27 Speaker 00 Around there. And I think I was texting, I was texting with my, my high school- Best friends this morning who I went with to to try and remember how that became our first big concert, other than obviously being huge fans. But I, we think that one of my good friends Kat's parents had given her tickets for all of us for her Christmas present.
1:08:47 Speaker 03 Wow.
1:08:48 Speaker 00 And they drove us there. Good for them. We made matching T-shirts, I think, with kind of like puff paint. So we were squarely in the Kelly Clarkson demographic of like, not, you know, the kind of gals who might make matching T-shirts, but who were also going to Houston for a concert. So, pretty cool.
1:09:13 Speaker 03 Totally. Okay, when was this about? What era of Kelly Clarkson are we talking?
1:09:17 Speaker 00 This was a breakaway tour, for sure.
1:09:19 Speaker 03 Okay.
1:09:20 Speaker 00 This was May of 2005. So, the end of the school year, which made it particularly cool. It was also on a school night. So, we got to go on a school night, come back to school, tell people about it. But what I actually most vividly remember is that I somehow in the process of this, got food poisoning for the first time ever. And so, I returned from the Kelly Clarkson concert extremely ill and unable to do the best part, which was go back to school and tell everyone about it. So, thank goodness, I can retcon that here.
1:09:55 Speaker 03 Wait, this is a big do-over for you. You can, you can brag about this show now. Did you get like, did you all get matching tour T-shirts that you wore to school?
1:10:06 Speaker 00 We didn't have that kind of money. We had a puff paint T-shirt kind of money.
1:10:10 Speaker 03 It was a DIY. It was a punk rock sort of deal.
1:10:14 Speaker 00 We were lucky to be there.
1:10:15 Speaker 03 Okay, I, what was her audience at that time? Was it mostly teenagers? Was it mostly moms? Like, what was the archetypal Kelly Clarkson fan here in, here in 2005, at the height, maybe, of her fame, of her popularity?
1:10:31 Speaker 00 No, I would not go so far as to say that was the height of her fame. But in that time, not to cop out on the question, but I, squarely down the middle of teenage and tween age girls and moms, because most of her audience, to that point, came from American Idol. And then I think with Since You've Been Gone and with the Breakaway album. She became a lot more popular and became a much bigger pop artist, but so much of it, I mean, it can't be overemphasized how big of a moment American Idol was.
1:11:11 Speaker 00 And how that certainly bridged generations and was like a show that families got really into together. And I think that Kelly Clarkson also came at a time when pop music was changing a lot from the sort of like extreme popularity of Britney and Christina and them growing up and then getting this sort of girl next door artist from American Idol is, you know, perhaps a reason we may have gotten those tickets as a Christmas gift from our parents.
1:11:43 Speaker 03 Britney Spears tickets as a Christmas gift, that's a very different style of parenting.
1:11:49 Speaker 00 And I got, Britney Spears was, her, her debut album and follow up were some of my earliest CDs that I definitely got for Christmas, but the preceding albums I got less and less from my parents.
1:12:04 Speaker 03 Okay, I see. Okay, so were you a day one American Idol person? Do you have memories of watching Kelly Clarkson on American Idol in real time?
1:12:14 Speaker 00 I don't just have memories of watching Kelly Clarkson on American Idol. I have memories of recording American Idol on VHS tapes so that I could go back and revisit Kelly Clarkson performances. I mean, there wasn't much else worth revisiting in season one of American Idol, except for Kelly Clarkson performances.
1:12:34 Speaker 03 Okay, I was gonna ask if it was obvious in real time that she was the winner from the beginning.
1:12:41 Speaker 00 So it was obvious because she was really talented, but it's interesting to revisit Kelly Clarkson on American Idol now because, and you know, we'll, I'm sure, talk about it more, but her voice has developed so much over time and she has clearly worked at it and like this is her craft, but she was already incredibly talented and incredibly soulful. But when you watch like, I mean, it's also, I think, you know, as, as more of a TV scholar than a music scholar myself. Just to let the listener know, when you, what was going on with American Idol at
1:13:22 Speaker 00 that time was like, like, this was kind of a trash show, you know, it was not like what it became. Kelly Clarkson is a lot of the reason that it became what it became because she became so acclaimed. She was such a dominant winner in that first season that's really never been reached again. But this was like a British guy that nobody knew, kind of like two sort of washed up music people who were, I mean, somewhat at the time who were the judges. And like, singing competition shows were not a thing in the United States. So this wasn't like a respected endeavor. And when you go back and watch those early
1:14:02 Speaker 00 auditions, I mean, they make them do them fully a cappella. They're for like 15 seconds. She auditioned-
1:14:10 Speaker 03 It was very short.
1:14:11 Speaker 00 -with a Madonna song. She is wearing, I'm sure you've watched it this-
1:14:20 Speaker 03 I've watched it. It's jeans, right? It's a pair of jeans that she has fashioned into a shirt of some kind. It's, it's an intense outfit. This is not my jurisdiction, but it's, I was like, okay, that's a choice.
1:14:33 Speaker 00 This is the jurisdiction of someone, say, like me, who had also turned a pair of jeans into a purse in her childhood Texas bedroom. And that, and that was the magic of Kelly Clarkson in season one of American Idol is she, obviously, she has the voice. She's very soulful. She gives some like really performances that I still remember. She's saying, "You make me feel like a natural woman." She hits a whistle note that will ruin your life, even at that time when she's like 20.
1:15:05 Speaker 03 Right.
1:15:06 Speaker 00 She's saying on, you know, they used to have like big band night, and she's saying stuff like that there. And it is darling. She's got her hair pinned in these little curls. She's got the dress on. And she's so good. But I think the magic that you see early on is in that audition is less the music. And more the extreme relatability.
1:15:31 Speaker 03 Right.
1:15:31 Speaker 00 The only thing that shows that she's nervous is that she keeps saying cool beans.
1:15:36 Speaker 03 Cool beans, she says it repeatedly.
1:15:38 Speaker 00 Audition.
1:15:39 Speaker 03 It's very charming. That's charming as well, but cool beans multiple times also is a choice. That's.
1:15:45 Speaker 00 Kelly Clarkson sort of remained like that, like incredibly charming, but also just a little bit embarrassing. You know, like just a little bit.
1:15:51 Speaker 03 Exactly.
1:15:52 Speaker 00 She's not trying to be cool. She's saying cool beans. And at the end, when they put her through to Hollywood, she says, score. Like she, she was so sorry to Zoe Deschanel, but the original adorable.
1:16:04 Speaker 03 Sure. There we go. That's, that's, that's perfect. And from Texas, of course, and that's, that's important, right? It's just the girl next door in every sense.
1:16:14 Speaker 00 And the drawl and the accent. And I think that's also what made some of her. It, I think Kelly Clarkson continues throughout her career to have a sort of unexpected quality. Things keep coming out of her that you're not expecting and she keeps pivoting and she keeps starting a, you know, daytime talk show and then she does Kelly-okey. And, and at that time, I think it was like, you heard this really southern girl. And then procedingly throughout season one of American Idol, she kept singing these really soulful songs, these R and B songs, these old songs. And she was from Texas. And I think at that time, what we would expect from that is country and that is just not who she was.
1:16:58 Speaker 03 Right. So you said, is it, could you say that Kelly Clarkson made American Idol as much as American Idol made her? You said that it was sort of trash TV from the beginning, but it was a huge, huge, huge show. And like not prestigious, but like rock critics wrote about it, recapped it, you know, for years, for most of the 2000s, in part because that's the only thing that would get traffic. You know, other than our cute little reviews of like Taylor Swift or whatever. Like how, how did she make the show, you know, popular from the very beginning?
1:17:32 Speaker 00 I think her continued and very quick success lended a ton of credibility to allowing the show to continue to run for checking my watch here 1,000 seasons. And that credibility like extends to now, even as she has jumped ship and gone to The Voice. She doesn't really lend her credibility there, but because she won, because she was super successful. And in many ways, a lot of her success has been because she was the first American Idol. She was given this platform, but a lot of it has been like pretty in spite of American Idol as well.
1:18:08 Speaker 03 Of course.
1:18:09 Speaker 00 Roped into terrible contracts. She's talked a lot about how exhausting that time was. A big thing that made Kelly Clarkson become the like, not just pop star, but like personality and household name that she is now is her work ethic. And she was everywhere after American Idol. She was on the tour. She was on every talk show. And a big thing also, I mean, to give Justin Guarini some credit, a big thing that made, and why wouldn't we, a big thing that made that first season really popular was also their friendship. And you don't see that a lot in those like competition shows these days.
1:18:52 Speaker 00 I'm not really watching as much these days either, but the sort of
1:18:55 Speaker 03 No.
1:18:56 Speaker 00 one-two punch of this super handsome guy who was not as musically talented and who was getting kind of eaten alive by her on stage. But next to this sort of girl next door, that they sort of packaged that. And when you go back and watch her winning moment, he is so happy for her. I think, you know, then of course they go on to make the great cinematic masterpiece from Justin to Kelly.
1:19:23 Speaker 03 Did you see that movie in the movie theater, Jodi?
1:19:26 Speaker 00 I certainly did not.
1:19:30 Speaker 03 Okay.
1:19:30 Speaker 00 And I don't know why.
1:19:31 Speaker 03 It's a VHS classic.
1:19:33 Speaker 00 I'm a little bit like, did it go to movie theaters? I, it probably did.
1:19:37 Speaker 03 Like for a week or two. Yeah, this was, this was not a long run.
1:19:41 Speaker 00 It's such a VHS movie and it is a, a really tough watch. Although, you know, Grease, eat your heart out. They're doing the full Danny and Sandy.
1:19:54 Speaker 03 They totally are.
1:19:55 Speaker 00 And once again, Kelly is absolutely eating Justin's lunch vocally. But again, to always give credit to Justin, he and she would say is eating her lunch as a thespian. A big thing about Kelly is that she has never been an actor. And she has said since then repeatedly, I think like seven times on Watch What Happens Live, that she, she like didn't want to win because she did not want to make that movie. She didn't want to act and it was part of the contract and she didn't want to do it. And she, I guess willingly let Justin in it and Justin willingly came. It was not always supposed to be the first and second runner up.
1:20:39 Speaker 03 I was gonna ask, that's very kind of him.
1:20:41 Speaker 00 But she was not trying to do that on her own.
1:20:44 Speaker 03 No. Does it surprise you, you know, beyond Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood, you know, there's like a secondary, like the Jennifer Hudson's of the world as well. But like, American Idol starts out so strong in minting a legitimate lasting pop star and then falls off. You know, the percentage, you know, the hit percentage of winners to actual pop stars is pretty dismal. Like The Voice has basically nobody, you know, unless, you know, Morgan Wallen tried out. But like, why, what's the difference between what you need to win a show like this? And what you need to be an actual huge, big deal Kelly Clarkson caliber pop star? And does it surprise you that American Idol has not minted more Kelly Clarksons?
1:21:29 Speaker 00 I guess in some ways it surprises me because of, you know, Kelly Clarkson, I do believe is like one of the great vocalists of our time. But I also believe. That other great vocalist of our time, and this has happened. I mean, Jennifer Hudson got seventh place. She has an EGOT. Like, she is like one of 20 or 21 EGOT possessors. Um, I think that the mechanism around these shows does not create success. Like thrusting someone into a record contract with songs they don't want to sing, with musical movies they don't want to be in. And a lot of that hasn't changed.
1:22:12 Speaker 00 Like, it hasn't updated. To me, it's almost more surprising that The Voice hasn't created more huge successes, and especially not from its winners. I mean, most of its successes are people who, you know, finish third or fourth or whatever.
1:22:26 Speaker 03 Referral.
1:22:27 Speaker 00 Because of, I, I find the coaching aspect of that show pretty interesting. And, and even creating those relationships. And I think, like, you know, Blake Shelton, for all his faults, really, he really took on being a mentor, I think, like, for those country artists. But it is proven that Kelly Clarkson is the exception, not the rule, for lots of reasons. She got the thrust of being the first one, but she was also just such a good American Idol because she was such a good American girl who could hit a whistle note.
1:23:04 Speaker 03 That whistle note really affected you, and that's very moving to me.
1:23:08 Speaker 00 I was a teenager. I, I may have been in middle school then. I had never heard such a thing. And it did. It got me good.
1:23:19 Speaker 03 You mentioned earlier, is "Since You've Been Gone," Kelly Clarkson's best song? And is this her peak as of popularity, you know, of influence?
1:23:29 Speaker 00 It's her best song that comes from her best album. That's what I think. It is, I think, I think that "Breakaway" is her best album in totality that has this, like, super popular hit. I mean, I think you could put "Since You've Been Gone" and "Stronger" right up against each other in terms of popularity. But that comes from an album without a lot of other hits. But like, you have to give to Kelly Clarkson that even when she has albums that are a little more lukewarm, they've got one just absolute banger on them. "My Life Would Suck Without You" is extremely popular.
1:24:12 Speaker 00 And really fun and totally different than Since You Been Gone, like a totally different vibe. I think I like Kelly Clarkson most and as a teen, really loved that song and that album because it came at a time when my other beloved pop girls were sort of growing up and I like was not growing up that fast, you know?
1:24:39 Speaker 03 Right.
1:24:40 Speaker 00 I was still in high school.
1:24:41 Speaker 03 The Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera tier of pop stardom.
1:24:45 Speaker 00 Yes, and these songs like for me, Since You Been Gone was coming out at the same time as like Slave For You, a song that I loved.
1:24:53 Speaker 03 Yeah.
1:24:54 Speaker 00 But could only perform alone in my bedroom. Those were not
1:24:57 Speaker 03 That's right, yeah.
1:24:58 Speaker 00 dance moves I could hit the floor with.
1:25:00 Speaker 03 It's not a communal experience.
1:25:01 Speaker 00 But I could scream because that's the only way to sing Since You Been Gone. It is an unsingable song for, you know, a mere human, which I find a really funny part of its popularity.
1:25:14 Speaker 03 Right, the karaoke aspect.
1:25:16 Speaker 00 It's so hard to sing.
1:25:18 Speaker 03 It's very hard to sing. It's incredibly, yeah.
1:25:21 Speaker 00 But we sure would try poolside.
1:25:23 Speaker 03 Exactly. That's, that's a very tight window of like very hard to sing, but everyone tries anyway because it's so good. That's, that's, there's not a lot of songs like that really. It's, it's sort of the don't stop believing tier, I guess. Take On Me, sort of springs to mind. Just karaoke songs that are unwise to attempt, but everyone does anyway. And it's, it's endearing if not successful.
1:25:46 Speaker 00 When I think about myself trying to sing Since You Been Gone, I think about that video of the little girl trying to sing Beyonce's Countdown and she gets so high and so high that she almost throws up.
1:25:58 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's
1:25:59 Speaker 00 That's how I feel trying to sing honestly, most Kelly Clarkson songs, but especially Since You Been Gone.
1:26:05 Speaker 03 Something to aspire to. You said to me, I'm gonna quote this verbatim because I don't want to paraphrase it. I can quote beat for beat the moment at which since you've been gone, needle dropped in the stretch limo scene of the season two premiere of Laguna Beach, as can almost any woman my age. Forgive me, Jody, I don't know, I don't know what's happening here. And I was wondering if you could explain to me the significance of the stretch limo scene in the season two premiere of Laguna Beach. What's going on here?
1:26:40 Speaker 00 Well, in season two of Laguna Beach, Rob, the POV and the narration switches from Lauren Elsie Conrad to Kristin Cavallari. Still both great creators of culture right this very minute. But
1:26:56 Speaker 03 Certainly.
1:26:57 Speaker 00 Nothing could have been bigger for people who were in high school from the years of like, I don't know, 2002 to 2008 than you could have, I think, kind of hit down on Laguna Beach airing while you were in high school. And it really changed a lot. Like, at my high school, we started throwing themed parties. We thought that, you know, we needed to have a black and white party like the kids on Laguna Beach. We weren't quite renting stretch limos because that required some dollars and cents we did not have. In the season two premiere, Kristin basically becomes the main character, the narrator. And within
1:27:35 Speaker 00 that premiere, her friend, I think Jessica's dad, rents them a stretch limo to go play Lucky Strike bowling. That's where they're going in the limo.
1:27:47 Speaker 03 Okay.
1:27:48 Speaker 00 These girls are in black t-shirts, jeans and chokers in a limo for absolutely no reason. And the kind of thrust of the episode is that Jessica is in love with her boyfriend, who's awful and who cheats on her for the entire season, who goes on to cheat on Lauren in a later season. He's just the worst. And they're telling her that. She's calling him on his cell phone in the limo and she's saying, swear, swear on our relationship.
1:28:20 Speaker 00 Who among us in a low moment hasn't?
1:28:22 Speaker 03 Yeah, right.
1:28:23 Speaker 00 And they're saying, Jessica, get off the phone. He's lying to you. He's always lying to you. She snaps the flip phone shut. She's upset, but not fully learned her lesson yet. Kristen is, as ever, a monster, but way ahead of her time in dealing with men. And they say, just sort of like silent, like without naming any names, they say, put on the song, and Kristen says, because that's the one I know all the words to. And they hit play on the like, CD deck in the back of the limo.
1:28:56 Speaker 03 Right.
1:28:57 Speaker 00 And Since You Been Gone starts playing in the limo. They are scream singing all of the words. And then it fades into the actual track. As we see, ugh, Lauren, another lost cause, over in the hot tub with Steven, the shared boyfriend, the shared thread between Kristen and Lauren. And she likewise is not learning her lesson. But the kind of the most interesting thing when you actually go back and watch it is that you are, if there's sort of a hopeful note to Since You Been Gone, a breakup song, that this means that Jessica will ditch her boyfriend and that Lauren will finally ditch Steven.
1:29:37 Speaker 00 But there, it sort of ends with Kristen looking contemplative. Because the song's actually kind of about her. In those days, she was often in the sort of toxic male role. And the, you know, the lyrics of Since You Been Gone, you had your chance, you blew it, out of sight, out of mind. I'm not going to start singing. I want to, but I'm not. Um, it's kind of about Kristen.
1:30:03 Speaker 03 This is a safe space. She's the you in Since You Been Gone, you're saying. She is the antagonist.
1:30:09 Speaker 00 She's the again, and again, and again, and again, who will always,
1:30:15 Speaker 03 Okay, there we go.
1:30:15 Speaker 00 Always, always do the wrong thing.
1:30:19 Speaker 03 That was an incredible answer to that question. That was very vivid. I appreciated the different voices. I can picture that so clearly. That was absolutely wonderful, Tony. Thank you.
1:30:29 Speaker 00 You're welcome.
1:30:31 Speaker 03 Just to wrap up, you know, you sort of mentioned the talk show Kelly Oakey. Like, setting aside the music itself, like, she's not making huge hit songs now, but like, what do you make of Kelly Clarkson as a celebrity now? You know, she's sort of in a post-divorce revenge arc, you know, but like, whenever, whenever she does a Kelly Oakey song, like, it's better than the original, like, 80% of the time. Like, it's really almost appalling. You know, what do you make of her as a celebrity primarily now?
1:31:00 Speaker 00 I mean, I think it's interesting because at the time that she has sort of not completely stopped, but that her making original music and albums is kind of not the biggest part of her career. She is basically a TV mogul now. I, I sent you the 2018 Billboard Music Medley when she hosted the Billboard Music Awards that I kind of feel like really started her TV career because it's, and sort of started Kelly Oakey because it's so good. And it's like, sure, she's singing Maren Morris, she's singing Shawn Mendes, but then she hits Kendrick.
1:31:38 Speaker 03 Then she gets Humble. I was legitimately shocked by Humble. I was like, oh, wow.
1:31:45 Speaker 00 And her energy in covering it is so good. I love when she sings Khalid, too. Young, dumb, broke high school kids. It's, it's really fun. She obviously has been a voice coach for years. She's off right now, but that was a big part of it, too. But I think that that, like, Billboard Music Medley really showed kind of what she could do on TV and that she could be a host. And she's been hosting her talk show for years. She's covering all these songs. It's basically a meme. Like, you don't want to get Kelly Oakey'd because it's gonna be better than yours, gonna put you to shame.
1:32:21 Speaker 03 Yes, yes.
1:32:22 Speaker 00 And it's, I feel like it's really put her in this sort of music mentorship role. She is,
1:32:30 Speaker 03 Right.
1:32:31 Speaker 00 Even though what she's doing is really TV, she has become this, um, yeah, I don't know, this sort of like leader and it's through the Kelly O'Keefe, I feel like we've also really gotten to see how much she can do with her voice that we did not necessarily see within her own music career. And that's really fun. And I think some of her most successful covers have been when she's covering like Billie Eilish or Olivia Rodrigo and bringing, you really get to see the, the special way she's able to bring emotionality to her performances and not just like her incredible vocal range.
1:33:11 Speaker 00 And it's cool to see her do that as an adult with these young women's music who have like these big future careers ahead of them as well. And think about like all of the things that they could become, because I'm sure this isn't what Kelly Clarkson saw for herself when she strapped a pair of jeans around her chest and went to that American Idol audition.
1:33:35 Speaker 03 Uh, but I dig that idea of her as like America's voice coach. That's a very, you know, it's like, here's how you actually sing that song you haven't been hit with, you know, just for the record, this is actually how you do it.
1:33:47 Speaker 00 And here's like just bringing some wisdom to it. And I think that that's what I liked. That's what was so compelling about Since You Been Gone and about that shift from her first album to her second album was like, yes, this is a young woman with an incredible voice, with a unique voice, but there's a lot of anger here and there's like a lot of emotion here.
1:34:10 Speaker 03 A lot of resistance, defiance.
1:34:12 Speaker 00 A lot of resistance. And for me at that time in high school, that was being sold to me as like emo music, which I liked and was into, but to get it in this sort of more me package was cool. And I really feel like I've like grown up with Kelly Clarkson. And seen her in all of the pivots of her career. And she's just become this like huge, huge presence. And it'll be pretty interesting to see what she does next.
1:34:46 Speaker 03 Jody, this has been absolutely wonderful. Thank you for all your, your, your wisdom. I appreciate it truly. Please come back sometime.
1:35:00 Speaker 03 Thanks very much to our guest this week, Jodi Walker. Thanks to our producers, Olivia Creary, Justin Sayles and Chris Sutton. Thanks very much to you for listening. And now let's all go listen to Since You Been Gone by Kelly Clarkson.
1:35:17 Speaker 03 See you next week.
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