American Idol Controversy: David Cook's Version of 'Eleanor Rigby' Not Original?

American Idol is arguably the world's most famous talent show. Singers audition from across the nation for a chance to showcase their talent on national television in hopes of winning the top spot and becoming the next American Idol phenomenon. Throughout its seven seasons, American Idol voters have proven time and again that when contestants are singing, they have to take certain criteria into consideration in order to get votes. The most important being song choice; we've seen contestants continually fall because they fail to choose songs that truly showcase their talent.

While song choice is the most important factor, originality is arguably just as important. Whether we want to accept the fact or not, each singer falls into a certain genre. This season on American idol we have rockers, we have soul, we have country, we have pop, each singer fills a niche, and being able to showcase their niche in songs that may not fall in their specific category pose certain obstacles for some.

During top 12 week and top 11 week, the American Idol contestants chose from the Lennon/McCartney songbooks. This meant two weeks of Beatles songs, and two weeks where the singers had to take uber famous tunes and try to make them original. As we witnessed some of these worked- David Cook's rock version of 'Eleanor Rigby', and some of them didn't- Kristy Lee Cook's country version of 'Eight Days A Week'.

We've all said it before, and I'm sure we'll say it again, David Cook is Season Seven's Chris Daughtry; however, up until recently, many made him out to be even better than Daughtry but now, his originality is in question. Seattle band Doxology is claiming that during the Top 12 week, David Cook sang their version of 'Eleanor Rigby' and failed to credit the band. Doxology first performed their version of 'Eleanor Rigby' on July 30, 2006 and it is now a track on their album 'Demonstration'.

While it isn't unusual for Idol contestants to sing different versions of old favorites-Cook sang Chris Cornell's version of Michael Jackson's 'Billie Jean' just two weeks after his 'Eleanor Rigby' performance-- not crediting a band properly is a lot like false advertising. Idol makes it well known that while contestants do have some help with song arrangement, they are largely responsible for what they sing and the style that they sing it in themselves. So on that particular evening, judges and audience alike were led to believe that David Cook arranged that version of 'Eleanor Rigby' by himself, but now we are finding out that this might not be the case.

The one thing that many fans like about David Cook is that he sticks out among the crowd and he brings original presence to the stage, but he is in a battle for the top spot and there are several other worthy competitors that he is fighting against. With such a talented group of singers in Season 7 of American Idol, it's hard to tell whether or not this Idol controversy will affect the voter's opinions of David. It is very well known that Carly Smithson had her own record deal before being on the show, yet it ended up falling through and contestant David Hernandez was also rumored to have been a stripper at a gay strip club before auditioning for Idol. So we've seen plenty of controversy both this season as well as in several others.

So will this be a problem for David? On thing that helps with his credibility is that in the two weeks since, he has sang versions of songs and has given bands and singers their due credit-so this could possibly just have been an honest mistake. If that is the case and if an explanation or apology is issued, voters will most likely give the singer the benefit of the doubt because he brings such a talent and such a presence to this season of American Idol. Hopefully his voice can help him through the controversy so that he can remain a contestant on the show.

Sources:

Doxology. MySpace.Com