After three years, Clay Aiken remains the Anomaly. Until I logged on this morning, I had forgotten about the significance of this date. It seems so long ago, and three years is a long time in pop culture terms. Clay endures. I was sad, for a little while, when Clay didn’t win, but that ceased to matter to me after the sales numbers for TITN/BOTW proved he had tremendous commercial appeal, beyond the allure of a television show and its toll-free voting numbers. After the release of the first efforts of four winners, Clay still held the record for first week sales of a debut single. I don’t think Kreskin is needed to predict that no one from season five will touch that. With “Measure of A Man”, Clay holds the record for first week sales of a debut album. Each year, only the elite among artists have first week sales of over 613,000, with a rare few surpassing 800,000, or even a million. No one from AI is even close. Clay was RCA’s top selling artist for 2003, and one of the most remarkable success stories of the year. He has an American Music Award and a Billboard Music Award to mark those astonishing times. A year later, Clay released “Merry Christmas with Love”. Niche albums are not expected to break records: Clay shattered the debut week sales record for holiday albums, formerly held by some guy named Garth Brooks, and tied Celine Dion for highest first week chart placement for a holiday title. Ever. Clay’s name --- and often his first name alone --- is a cultural touchstone, showing up regularly in music and entertainment columns, but also in columns about sports, politics and other fields entirely unrelated to his career. No one ever asks “Who?” He is often referred to as a “winner” of American Idol. Clay was not first in his season, but he has proven to be deserving of being called a winner in the music industry. Clay, of course, has toured six times in three years, as part of the AI ensemble, as a co-headliner with Kelly and on two pop tours and two holiday tours, one of which he created and wrote. His tour numbers have ranged from excellent to okay overall, with the oversized houses for JNT 05 pushing his per show average down. There are, of course, all of the things that are tangential to Clay’s singing, but are important to his personal development: author of a New York Times bestseller, small forays into acting on Scrubs, Ed and SNL, “Proud of Your Boy” for the Aladdin re-issue, executive producer of his own Christmas special, special correspondent for the Emmy Awards on “The Insider”, and extensive humanitarian and philanthropic work as a UNICEF ambassador, co-founder of The Bubel/Aiken Foundation, National spokesperson for Toys for Tots, work with Ronald McDonald House, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, NEA Read Across America and many, many other causes to which he has lent his name. While not directly related to his career in entertainment, they help to paint a picture for the general public of the kind of person Clay really is. It took over two years and the cross-over appeal of country - pop for anyone to approach and, it appears, to soon overtake Clay’s overall sales records for debut CD: it’s too early to know what Carrie will sell in the long run, just as it is too soon to guess how many additional copies of MOAM will be sold to people who discover Clay when he releases his “highly anticipated” sophomore effort. MOAM will get that triple platinum certification in time and perhaps sell tens of thousands of copies or more to new fans over the coming year. It happens, so we’ll see. What of the others who have come from that show? How does Clay stand in relation to them? With a debut CD that sold fewer copies that Clay’s, but with the tremendous success of her sophomore album, Kelly now has the highest number of CD sales overall and a couple of Grammys on her mantle. It took until her second CD, but she has now clearly escaped the AI stigma. She’s had several tours, with decent box office, but she has completely conquered radio, releasing a string of top ten singles. Her future seems quite promising. Ruben and Fantasia both had strong debut sales, with Fantasia also enjoying considerable critical acclaim. Ruben had notable success with his second (niche) CD, a gospel album that went gold and spent many weeks at the top of the gospel charts. They both received nominations for Grammys, as well as BET, Soul Train and NAACP Image Awards. (Fantasia also had a bestselling autobiography and will star in a Lifetime television movie based on her story.) Neither tours strongly, but that seems to be an inherent weakness of the urban market, where even artists who debut to sales of 800,000 and higher often combine with other big names to tour --- and still often fail to break into the upper echelon of concert draws. Though some appear to believe that one or both have not been particularly successful, the urban market has embraced both artists, even if neither is considered a superstar. Ruben’s sophomore CD, due sometime this year, promises a return to his signature sound. I list both as “time will tell” --- their next albums will say a lot about whether or not they will grow in this industry. Carrie has become the darling of country pop and is benefiting from being in a genre that accepts rather than derides singers who were introduced on AI. Her album, I have heard, is strong musically --- her sales certainly are! Her debut CD, now six months old, continues to sell briskly and she has also won a prestigious country music award. I’ve heard that Carrie is set to tour as the opening act for Kenny Chesney, something Clay has never done. (It will be interesting to see how she does with subsequent headlining tours.) I guess her follow-up could be a year away, but she has started out very strong indeed. With the fifth season of AI about to end, I’ll flip it on for the first time this year for finals night --- just as I did last year. It’s not worth my time to follow a show I find so formulaic anymore, but I’ll check out the two who will compete for the title --- with the mute button at the ready during the all-too-predictable judges’ comments, of course. *g* It helps, when sales and reviews come long, to have seen a couple of performances. Newspapers and blogs have started the annual ritual of “You don’t have to win to be successful” and any number of eliminated contestants have taken up the refrain. That depends on the definition of success, I suppose, but do you have to win to succeed on a grand scale? Unless you are Clay Aiken, yes, you do. Yes, it is possible for non-winners to have a solid or a modest career in music. Other than the Anomaly that is Aiken, of course, Bo, who is closing in on 700,000, has the highest sales among non-winners. His promotion was hampered by his health problems, but the bigger problem with his debut seemed to be the label’s decision to try to turn a country rocker into a pop star, resulting in weak material that didn’t fit the artist. Now, with a current single getting a bit more airplay than the first, the album looks to be headed to decent level of success. He will be just one of two runners-up to get a second shot from RCA, and the other has outsold him by two million. With luck, his follow-up will be a better reflection of the artist. Josh is next, and he is solid gold as a country artist on a smaller label. He has also gained respect in his genre, with several nominations in top categories for country music awards. He’s off to a very good start. Kim was all over the radio with “8th World Wonder”; her sales are modest, at around 300,000. Like Josh, though, she is a a smaller label that is dedicated to taking the time to nurture her career. It will be interesting to see how her sophomore CD fares. Justin, Diana and Tamyra all sold short of 200,000 total of their debut CDs. To date, Justin has been unable to gain traction with any of his announced endeavors. Diana has found some success of Broadway with “Hairspray” and Tamyra, in addition to various acting roles, has become part of the 19 stable of songwriters. Several former contestants --- John, RJ, George --- have sold a few thousand of their CDs, souvenirs for those who followed them. Others --- Frenchie, Jennifer, Josh S. and Diana, as mentioned above --- have had success or opportunities for further exposure on Broadway or in movie musicals. Stars, staples or gypsies, who knows, but they’re taking advantage of opportunities. A dozen others have shown up on cable television, circus tours, men’s magazine covers, low budget movies (erotic and otherwise) or sing in small venues in their communities. It is a very good thing when people are able to realize their dreams to any degree at all. I don’t denigrate that, but I do like to keep things in perspective. There are very few stars from American Idol. In real-world terms, in comparison with their industry peers who came up through different means, the people from AI who have had real and considerable success are Kelly, Ruben, Fantasia, Carrie --- and Clay, the five winners of American Idol to date. Platinum artists all. And as for Clay’s future: from a long-ago disappointment to the promise of the future, my opinion has never wavered. His is a blue-moon talent, and he has it in him to be a career artist. Some have wondered if it is better for Clay’s sophomore album to be a commercial success or garner critical acclaim, but I have always believed that, given the material and top-notch production, it could be both. The Vox, of course, will be there, more supple, more varied, more powerful and more nuanced than ever. Clay’s voice always wins him the respect of anyone who has the ears to listen. I was fascinated with all of the small indications of what might make up the “initial album” that Clay spent a year working on with Jaymes Foster, but I have had to let that go. A conceptual album of favorite love songs it will be, with some original “gems” as well --- and critical and commercial success will still be determined by what songs are chosen, how Clay sings them and how the material is produced. I’ve thought a lot about it: even if it’s a collection of familiar Top 40 fare, sung to perfection, it will be a fun thing to add to my collection, and it could sell very well to people who loved Clay from his television roots. Critics aren’t likely to rave, but I think they might be very favorably impressed with more eclectic choices, songs that have some depth of meaning and are finely crafted lyrically, made new when performed by the finest voice of his generation. If others have had success reinterpreting a song or a songbook, why would I predict less for the man who makes every song his own? Tonight, an artist is hard at work. He has dreams, but he is a practical man and he knows the task before him. He seeks perfection. He will give his best. That night three years ago is merely a shadow, a memory, a milepost on a lengthy road. Along the way, there have been incredible successes, worthy challenges, and a few ridiculous frustrations. Clay may not be ready to give an album his name, but he always gives his best effort to his work --- and his best touches on brilliance. He may not be where he belongs, but he is where he needs to be for now, learning, growing, trying new things, reaching new heights as he develops his artistry. Every time he steps before a microphone, in a studio or on the stage, he reaches deep within and finds a way to surprise and to delight. When Clay Aiken sings, he makes a special kind of magic with his music. Now that’s a winner to me..

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~berkeleylovesourclay