What Happened To Kris Allen After Competing On 'American Idol'?
American Idol has produced some of the biggest music stars of our generation. Jordin Sparks (Season 6), Kelly Clarkson (Season 1) and Carrie Underwood (Season 4) are amongst those who went on to have incredibly a success careers after emerging as general winners in the pageant.
Just making it into the demonstrate is in itself an enormous platform, as some contestants who failed to win have gone on to end up. Jennifer Hudson (7th position, Season 3), Chris Daughtry (4th position, Season 5) and Adam Lambert (runner-up, Season 8) have turn out to be world superstars in spite of falling wanting claiming the main prize.
On the opposite hand, while being crowned a season winner of American Idol is a super achievement, it carries no guarantees of consequent good fortune. Caleb Johnson (Season 13), Candice Glover (Season 12) and Lee DyWyze (Season 9) are examples of winners who have not been in a position to hit quite the same heights as some of their friends.
In 2009, Arkansas-born Kris Allen emerged the overall winner for American Idol Season 8. It had been an extended journey in opposition to the belief of a dream that Allen had held since he was a young boy rising up in Jacksonville, Arkansas.
So just where on this spectrum of luck does Allen rank and what has he been up to since his crowning second in 2009?
'American Idol' And Early Success
Allen dropped out of college to pursue his musical goals, taking part in gigs in Little Rock and Fayetteville at night after running as a shoe salesman to make ends meet all the way through the day.
This lifestyles impressed him to write his first album, Brand New Shoes in 2007. It wasn't that a lot of a good fortune, because it best offered less than a thousand copies. At this level, he reportedly decided to return to school and complete his degree. He was once, then again, persuaded through his brother, Daniel to audition for Idol, which was on the time airing on Fox.
Allen successfully auditioned for the reveal in Kentucky and headed to Hollywood for the start of the competition. From the onset, he found the percentages firmly stacked in opposition to him. He was once no longer deemed probably the most early favorites and very little of his performances had been aired at the start.
He handiest controlled to reach the semi-final degree of the competition after the judges pit him against another contestant in a sing-off that by no means made it to air.
After a couple of grueling weeks, he was once finally voted within the Top 3, along Adam Lambert and Danny Gokey. More than 100 million votes were forged to decide the winner and despite the fact that the numbers weren't published, Allen emerged victorious.
Speaking to journalists soon after, Allen said he thought that Lambert would have been simply as much a worthy winner. "I feel like Adam deserved it just as much as I did," a report by Rolling Stone quoted Allen. "He was the most consistent person all year, and seriously, one of the most gifted performers I’ve ever met."
Allen went on to ride the quick post-Idol euphoria, together with his coronation song No Boundaries (co-written by pass judgement on Kara DioGuardi, in addition to Cathy Dennis and Mitch Allan) emerging to 11th in the US Billboard Hot 100.
Following his good fortune on American Idol, Allen signed a report deal with Jive Records, the place he went to work on his first post-show album. Titled Kris Allen, the album featured 12 songs in total, nine of which have been written solely or collaboratively via him.
Collaborators on the album included Chris Daughtry and Joe King of the band, The Fray. The album loved relative good fortune, especially in the early days. The single Live Like We're Dying used to be a canopy of The Script tune of the same name. It debuted at number 11 on the Billboard 200, and offered 80,000 copies in the first week. Overall sales to date overall to round 346,000.
Jive Records Disbanded
In October 2011, Jive Records used to be disbanded. Allen's contract used to be taken up via RCA Records and 19 Recordings. His second major-label album was once titled Thank You Camellia, and was once released in May 2012. This album contained Eleven tracks.
Shortly after the release of Thank You Camellia, Allen and RCA Records parted ways. Since then, he has been generating and liberating music beneath his personal label, DogBear Records. At DogBear, Allen has produced two further albums: Horizons in 2014 and Letting You In in 2016. The latter by no means made it into the Billboard 200, however Horizons controlled to debut at No. 80.
In 2019, Allen launched 10, a selection of re-worked songs from his outdated albums in reference to a decade since his success on American Idol.
Allen has been married to Katy O'Connell since 2008. They have three youngsters, two sons and a daughter. When his third born son, Marlo James Francis arrived in August 2019, he took to Instagram to gush over his love for him. "Welcome to the world my new little man Marlo James Francis Allen!" his post was quoted in People.
Allen could also be a passionate and dedicated philanthropist; he has labored with and supported organizations such as World Vision, Heifer International and Direct Relief.
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