Kelly Clarkson won't let new contestants use her songs on the television show.

Clarkson's spokesman insisted it's nothing personal.

But the stance prompted a public scolding from judge Simon Cowell, who said on Tuesday: 'By ignoring the show, you're ignoring the audience who put you there.'

Clarkson, who has become a major star since her win, is not allowing her songs to be licensed for other uses, said a Sony BMG spokesman. And 'it has nothing to do with Idol'.

Her hit, Since U Been Gone, earned both sales and critical respect. And her album, Breakaway, scored a Grammy nomination for best pop vocal album.

Cowell said he hoped Clarkson would change her mind.

Read more...

Man Charged for Stalking Ex-'American Idol'

A California man stalked a former "American Idol" contestant, sending her threatening voice mail messages and showing up at her grandmother's Florida house uninvited, authorities charged.

Daniel Robert Young, 59, was being held without bond after his arrest Tuesday.

Police said Young had placed at least 38 voice mail messages since mid-September to former "AI" top-ten finalist Jessica Sierra, police said.

In the calls, police said, he told Sierra, 20, that he loves her and was willing to go to jail for her. He sent her a necklace, a bracelet and dozens of long-stemmed roses after seeing her singing on the Fox talent show, police said.

"It was like the more I stopped answering my phone and stopped talking to him, he got even more mad," Sierra said. "He was like, `Answer your damn phone when I call you.'"

Sierra, a Tampa native, appeared on the show last year.

When he arrived in Tampa on Tuesday from California, Young called Sierra's cell phone twice and asked her to pick him up, a police spokeswoman said.

"I told him, `I'm not coming to pick you up,'" Sierra said. "He said, `If you don't come pick me up, I'm taking a cab to your grandparents' house.'"


Read more...

American Idol hopefuls face trouble back home

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Twin brothers whose videotaped performance on Fox TV's "American Idol" earned them a trip to Hollywood face trouble back home in Memphis, with one of them in jail at the time the show aired, police said on Thursday.

It seems doubtful Terrell and Derrell Brittenum, 28, will make the next round of the top-rated show after their taped Chicago audition drew praise from "American Idol's" panel of judges.

Terrell could not even watch himself on the show that aired on Tuesday because he was sitting in the Shelby County jail, where he has been held on charges of forgery and theft by deception since January 10, Shelby County Sheriff's spokesman Steve Shular said.

"Unfortunately, he didn't have access to the (jail) television at the time," Shular said.

The twins' mother called police to say Derrell would turn himself in, but he had yet to do so and was being sought by authorities, Shular said.

The charges relate to the purchase of a car in June in Rockdale County, Georgia, where the brothers are suspected of using another man's identity.

A spokesman for the television show would not comment on the "personal lives of their contestants," or on future episodes. Early episodes focus on tryouts around the country to select semifinalists who come to Hollywood to compete in weekly elimination rounds. The winner gets a shot at fame and a recording contract.


Read more...