American Idol 8: Why Kris Won

Ho. Lee. Cow. How did that happen? I mean, Kris Allen, a guy who wasn’t even featured in the preliminary shows and who was not predicted to even be in the finale won it all! Heck, even Kris himself couldn’t believe it! But hey, that’s why we’re here, right? We can answer the question: Why did Kris win?

As I noted last week, when Danny lost, surprising situations like these are among the best times to write these columns. Many people will have watched the show and wondered, “What the heck happened here?” All season long, we’ve looked through What ‘American Idol 8’ Contestants Need to Know to figure out why contestants lost. Now it’s time to turn the tables and figure out why Kris won.

The first and most important rule throughout the competition and continuing right up to the final performances is to sing and perform well. Kris certainly started off his finale well, “winning” the first round in Simon’s eyes – and the eyes of many others as well. Unfortunately for him – or so it seemed at the time – he kind of let it slip away for the second and third song. Mind you, we can’t really blame him for the horrible coronation song. I mean, even co-writer Kara said it was wrong for him! Why would they do that to the poor guy? I have to say, though, he sang it a lot better after winning as compared to how he did on Tuesday night.

Even if we agree with Simon that Kris lost two out of the three “rounds” of the finale – and certainly not everybody does agree, as, for example, our columnist Joseph Banks called it a draw – he only missed it by a little. There was no slam-dunk here. And even then, as noted above, the songs he was forced to sing played a role in how well he did.

Indeed, looking at the second rule, Kris has made good song choices throughout the competition. As his final choice, he picked the song that gave him the “win” in the first round. The other two rounds had songs he had no say in – producer pick and coronation song. So he cannot be criticized for those and certainly should get credit for the one choice he was allowed to make in the finale, and for his selections throughout the competition.

It is also worth noting that as part of those choices, Kris was extremely creative in the way he used the songs. He put his own spin on almost every one and showed us what kind of artist we can expect him to be.

In that, he also followed the third rule, which is to be consistent and sing different genres. Or, more properly stated, sing songs from different genres in a way that still made sense for Kris himself. Kris came to our TV sets without a big background story and virtually unknown. He had to prove himself through his performances – and he did. I can’t recall a single one that was bad (please don’t write me to tell me of a specific one that might have not been a great one – I’m not saying he never had a sub-par performance, just that I can’t recall one, which is indicative of how people thought of him). Unlike Danny, who fell one week short of the finale, it never appeared that Kris was coasting – he put himself into every performance and it showed.

By putting himself into his performances and, as I’ve noted, modifying them into his own style, Kris made himself stand out as unique among the contestants this year. I’ve mentioned in other articles that Kris is the creative guy of the season – last season, it was David Cook; the season before, it was Blake Lewis. He followed in their footsteps by taking the songs he had and rearranging them to make them his own. Don’t get me wrong, Adam was certainly creative as well and changed up songs to suit him, but that’s generally not how he was thought of, like Kris was.

And that’s also why people mostly remembered Kris, in conjunction with the fifth rule. Plus, as the show went on, he became known as – and remembered as – the underdog or the dark horse. He wasn’t Adam or Danny, who had been predicted as finalists. His back story was not well-known or told over and over. He had to push and fight his way to the finals through his music (and, according to some readers who have contacted me, his looks apparently didn’t hurt either).

In doing that, he showed us the full package that is Kris Allen. As I indicated earlier, we know exactly what kind of artist we are getting with Kris. We have a good idea of what kind of album he will release. And on top of that, he showed us his personality. What was one thing mentioned specifically in that rule? “Nothing charms an audience more than a self-effacing sense of humor.”