Periodically, I like to check up on ex-Idolists to see how they are faring in the real and challenging post-Idol world. I have to admit to being surprised by the success of two of them, given how harshly I evaluated them during their respective seasons.
Biggest Hits
Adam Lambert: Adam has been getting rave reviews on Broadway for his role as Emcee in Cabaret.
Nick Fradiani: Since October 2023, Nick, the Idol winner in 2015, has been starring as Neil Diamond in the Broadway musical A Beautiful Noise. I routinely dismissed Nick’s Idol performances with the Simon Cowell Treatment, assessments justified by his debut album charting the lowest for an Idol winner’s first album up to that point. Now, he joins the elite company of 15 other Idolists who went on to Broadway:1 Fantasia Barrino, Clay Aiken, Constantine Maroulis, Diana DeGarmo, Frenchie Davis, Jordin Sparks, Adam Lambert, Todrick Hall, Syesha Mercado, David Cook, LaKisha Jones, Ace Young, Kat McPhee, Taylor Hicks, Katie Webber.
Side note: I preferred Jax, who finished third in Nick’s season and has had three hit songs: Like My Father, Victoria’s Secret, and Cinderella Snapped. She won iHeartRadio Music Awards in 2023 for Best New Pop Artist and TikTok Songwriter of the Year. I suppose she qualifies as a recent ex-Idol “Hit,” especially considering her nearly 15M TikTok followers.
Lee Dewyze: Lee won Season 9 in 2010, which this Muser thought should have been won by runner-up Crystal Bowersox. In an interview, Lee said that winning concerned him because he saw himself as a songwriter rather than a singer2 and didn’t think his voters would support that version of him.
As it turned out, they didn’t need to support him as a pop hitmaker because he is the Idolist with the most TV and film syncs – songs chosen to synchronize with onscreen images such as a TV show, film, video game, or trailer. His foremost sync is Blackbird Song from The Walking Dead. The song also has over 20 million streams on Spotify.
Big Hit
Kaeyra: Kaeyra inexplicably and unjustifiably was eliminated during Top Twenty Week in 2023. In July 2024, she was signed by Warner Records Poland, as she has deep roots in Chicago’s Polish community. She has since released a popular single, Sour, with 4.8+ million listens on Spotify.
Hits
19 Recordings has the sole ability to sign Idolists to record deals, meaning no other label can sign them without going through 19 Recordings first. For many years, 19 guaranteed a recording contract to every winner. However, since 2021, they shifted towards offering development deals to any Idolist of their choice rather than guaranteeing contracts to winners. Such deals help the Idolist craft an identity in a highly competitive marketplace, gain live concert experience on the road, and work on new music. Then, 19 can decide if a full record deal is a worthwhile investment.
19’s stance supports my raison d’être for the blog. They know Idol’s winner may not be a post-show winner in a highly fragmented and competitive marketplace. They also know that some ex-Idolists go on to become hitmakers, regardless of where they finish in the show. They also see the diamonds in the rough, Idolists with potential that need time to develop fully.
Here are the four ex-Idolists currently under contract with 19 Recordings.
- Chayce Beckham: Winner in 2021. In April 2024, his song 23 reached number one on the Billboard Country Airplay chart. He has 2.9M monthly listeners on Spotify.3
- Chris Stough: Top 3 2023. 132K monthly listeners on Spotify, including five songs with a million or more streams.
- Haven Madison: Top 8 2023. 48.3K monthly listeners on Spotify, including the song Kiss the Ground with 1.6M streams. In the interests of full disclosure, I CRUSHED all of her performances, EXCEPT when she was singing songs she wrote rather than doing Idol-karaoke. So, yeah, I’ll take a victory lap for recognizing a capable singer-songwriter. 🙂
- Huntergirl: Runner-up to Noah Thompson in 2022 (she should have won). 42.3K monthly listeners on Spotify, including the song Red Bird with 1.8M streams.
Label deals aside, each of them faces significant challenges to justify the investment being put into them. It’s extraordinarily difficult for new artists to breakout in Country music, and Haven will be trying to find her way amid a current crop of brilliant hitmakers in the female pop field. Which leads to my last category.
Misses
Noah Thompson: Noah, the 2022 winner (I repeat, Huntergirl should have won), was dropped by 19 Recordings in May of 2024. In the immediate afterglow of his victory, Noah had initial success with his first single One Day Tonight. But his EP failed to make an impact on the charts.
Wé Ani: Top 5 2023 and should have won easily, in the ears of this Muser. In January 2024, Wé Ani released her first post-Idol single The Standard as an artist for 19 Recordings which drastically under-performed her earlier independent releases. In spite of her impressive social media following (1M TikTok and IG), Wé Ani is no longer listed as one of 19’s artists, and is releasing music independently. She has been collaborating with Sony to promote their products on social media using her music.
- I hope I didn’t miss anybody. ↩︎
- I referred to him as Off-Key Lee. ↩︎
- It can be challenging to understand Spotify’s streaming numbers. Here are a few broad data points: Spotify has about 11 million artists, and it considers 225,000 of them “professional and emerging artists.” That is the actual competitive landscape, and such artists have above 10 thousand monthly streams. About 4,000 artists (of the 225K) have 3 million monthly streams. ↩︎
Ray's Musings 
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