What Does David Cook Say About America?

He was the barman who shouldn’t have been in the competition who at the last round of the televised event competed against a 17 year old cherub faced young man with a well oiled voice that belied his years. David Cook played the guitar wielding rocker perfectly while David Archuleta was the crowd-pleasing croner who on paper should have won American Idol season 7.

In their commentary, the judges seemed to think that Archuleta would be crowned after they had listened to their final set of songs on Monday but America had a different view.

In some ways you’d think that a country at war and a country in economic uncertainty might choose the uplifting voice of Archuleta, but instead they chose to rock with Cook - a guy who had only come along to the auditions to support his brother. While his fellow contestants spent the series belting out tunes that suited their talent, Cook navigated his time reworking classics to fit his own style. He even converted Michael Jackson’s Billy Jean into a slow-rolling rock ballad - a move that got him huge praise from the judges. But his work was never really the sugar coated pop you’d expect of an American Idol.

So why did America vote by more than 12 million texts to choose him?

A simple answer to the question could be authenticity. While Archuleta borrowed well from a selection of classics, Cook certainly seemed to be his own man. Simon Cowell was flaberghastered when on the last song before final voting, Cook didn’t choose the crowd-pleasing (and theoretically vote-winning) Billy Jean and chose a lesser known tune - Collective Soul’s ‘The World I Know’. “Why on Earth did you choose that instead of Billy Jean?” asked Cowell. Cook replied, “For me, this whole thing has been a progression.”

Authenticity is such an overused term though - there needs to be a better way to understand the winner’s appeal. Maybe the answer was brought to life when during the gala show of the season he rocked out with ZZ-Top. The young man from Kansas City obviously having a blast, living his dream. They were perfectly matched: A group of guys who had taken advantage of their perceived freedom, taken a different path and were living their lives how they had chosen - like true Americans.

American Idol