Allison Iraheta: The Ultimate interview
PART FOUR
Carrie Underwood sang “MacArthur Park,” but when Ryan asked her what the song meant, she said she had no idea.
It’s something about a cake being in the rain. I don’t know. You can’t sing about cake.
Then let’s talk about the song you chose when the theme was rock 'n' roll. She didn’t record the song originally, but when we think of “Cry Baby,” we think of Janis Joplin.
I grew up listening to Janis Joplin and I’ve sung “Piece of My Heart.” “Cry Baby” is also one of my favorites. I do connect with that one, definitely. I don’t regret doing it on the show. I thought that was one of my best performances. It’s one of those songs I’ve always wanted to do.
It was a perfect song for you, even if that was the week you were sent home. That same show, you performed a duet with Adam on Foghat’s “Slow Ride.”
As soon as we found out we were going to be doing duets, I knew I wanted to sing with Adam. I mean, I wouldn’t have minded doing it with Danny or Kris. I love them both. Adam and I were like, “Let’s do this. Truck out.Let’s do some craziness song.” “Slow Ride” was the perfect one.
Was it difficult to choose which song would make a great duet?
There was a list and I was looking at the list and he was and I didn’t know which one to choose. “What about this one?” “No, maybe not.” “What about this one?” “Nah.” Until he said, “All right, we have to do this one,” and it was “Slow Ride” and I said, “Yeah, let’s do it.”
Were you surprised how much praise you received for “Slow Ride”?
I felt like I blanked out during that whole performance more than I usually blank out. I blank out on every single performance, but it was weird because I totally forgot about the judges. Every time I would blank out I would still have the judges in the back of my head, like watch out for the notes, but this one, I thought, “I don’t even care. I’m just going to have fun. This is a whole different world.” And after we did it, people went crazy. We knew we did awesome because it was just so much fun.
Now that the season is over, do you still hold on to anything the judges said to you?
I got good feedback most of the time. The whole personality thing with Simon, right now I feel like it’s not a competition anymore. I am who I am. I mean, I was who I am throughout the whole show. We only have two seconds to talk after the judges do so it was hard for me to let people know who I was in those two seconds, but now people know who I am. So I’m always going to keep what the judges said to help me with my career further up ahead. They did know what they were talking about and every single one of them, I used [their comments] to help me with my other performances.
Now you’re on the road all summer for the “American Idols Live” tour. I hope you can sleep on the bus.
I can sleep anywhere, bus or plane.
-- Fred Bronson
latimesblogs.latimes.com/americanidoltracker/2009/09/allison-iraheta-the-ultimate-interview-part-four.html