David Cook Wins ‘American Idol’
David Cook was announced the winner of this season’s ‘American Idol’ – which shocked more than a few people who thought for sure that the young and talented David Archuleta would be the one.
Cook, 25, who was tending bar and playing in a band before he auditioned for the singing competition, stood back to applaud rival David Archuleta, 17, and then bent over crying after host Ryan Seacrest said he had won by 12 million votes.
“This is amazing. Thank you,” said the Blue Springs, Missouri, native, who in addition to being crowned this year’s “Idol” will receive a recording contract.
Throughout this year’s months-long competition, Cook wowed both the show’s viewers and judges with updated, rock versions of pop classics like Lionel Richie’s “Hello” and Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean.”
On Tuesday night’s show, however, the judges said the babyfaced Archuleta had outperformed Cook with his pitch-perfect renditions of John Lennon’s “Imagine” and Elton John’s “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me.”
Acid-tongued judge Simon Cowell criticized Cook for choosing a song he had never performed before during his last chance to woo voters and called the evening “a knockout” by Archuleta. Cook sang Collective Soul’s “The World I Know” instead of reprising one of his best-loved performances of the season, as Archuleta did with “Imagine.”
Apparently America disagreed and they decided that Cook was indeed the better choice.