David Cook


David Cook Biography(Courtesy Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)


David Roland Cook (born December 20, 1982) is an American rock singer-songwriter, who rose to fame after winning the seventh season of the reality television show American Idol. Prior to Idol he released an independent album entitled Analog Heart, followed by his post-Idol major-label debut David Cook which was released on November 18, 2008 and has since been certified platinum by the RIAA. His second major album This Loud Morning was released on June 28, 2011.

Early life

Cook was born in Houston, Texas, raised in Blue Springs, Missouri, and currently owns homes in Kansas City, Missouri and Nashville, Tennessee. His parents are Beth Foraker (née Frye) and Stanley Cook. He is the middle of three brothers " Adam Cook being older and Andrew younger. He is of German, Irish, and English descent.

Cook's interest in music began at a young age. He began singing in second grade, when his elementary school music teacher gave him a part in a school Christmas performance. He proceeded to perform in virtually every Christmas and PTA program. He received his first guitar, a Fender Stratocaster, at the age of 13. He also participated in choir and drama programs in middle school and high school. At Blue Springs South High School, he performed in musicals, including The Music Man, West Side Story, and Singin' in the Rain. In addition to this, he was an active member in the Blue Springs South High School National Forensics League (or NFL), where he qualified for the national tournament twice for duo interpretation, an event that relies on performance and interpretation of a literary work.

He was also an avid baseball player (pitcher) during high school and once gave up a home run to Albert Pujols in an American Legion Baseball game. After an injury, he focused more on music. He earned a theater scholarship to the University of Central Missouri, but he abandoned theater after two semesters, graduating from the school in 2006 with a degree in graphic design. While in college, he was a member of Phi Sigma Kappa. After his college graduation, he relocated to Tulsa, Oklahoma to pursue a career in music, telling his mother, "I just want to give myself until I'm 26 years old to get a job."

Early music career

David Cook formed a band with his friend Bobby Kerr while at high school. The band was initially named Red Eye, later Axium. He wrote his first song, titled "Red Hot", when he was fifteen. He was encouraged by Evan Sula-Goff of 8stops7 to make an album when he went to Cook's school to judge a contest, Mr. Jaguar, where David Cook and his band performed Guns N' Roses' "Paradise City". The band had some success when one of their songs, "Hold", was selected to be played in movie theaters across the country, and they were named one of the top 15 independent bands in the country by "Got Milk?" contest as well as the best Kansas City band in 2004. The band produced three studio albums " Matter of Time, Blindsided, and The Story Thus Far, as well as a number of live albums including Alive in Tulsa.

Axium however broke up in 2006 and David Cook moved to Tulsa where he joined Midwest Kings, a band he once opened for. He was the bassist for their EP Incoherent With Desire to Move On. Members of that band Andy Skib and Neal Tiemann later became part of David Cook's post-Idol band The Anthemic. He recorded and self-released a solo album Analog Heart in 2006. He had also recorded his second solo album (unreleased) prior to appearing on Idol, and was working as a bartender to support himself.

American Idol

Overview

Cook originally did not plan to try out for the show. He went to the auditions in Omaha, Nebraska initially to support his younger brother (who did not make it to Hollywood) and then, prompted by mother and brother when a show producer noticed him, David auditioned himself. He performed Bon Jovi's "Livin' On a Prayer" for his audition. For his first Hollywood audition, Cook performed "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" by Bryan Adams, accompanying himself on acoustic guitar. On the second song in Hollywood, he sang "I'll Be" by Edwin McCain. Cook took advantage of the decision to allow contestants to play musical instruments. Besides his Hollywood audition, he also accompanied himself on electric guitar for his performances of "All Right Now", "Hello", "Day Tripper", "I'm Alive", "Baba O'Riley", "Dare You to Move", and "Dream Big", and on acoustic guitar for "Little Sparrow", "All I Really Need Is You", and "The World I Know". His white, left-handed Gibson Les Paul electric guitar has the letters "AC" on it; as Cook told TV Guide, "I have two brothers, Adam and Andrew. So, because of superstition, I put their initials on everything growing up." Starting from the Top 12 week, he also wore (and continues to wear) an orange wristband to support a 7-year-old fan, Lindsey Rose, with leukemia.

Another of Cook's performances, The Beatles' "Day Tripper", was credited to Whitesnake. Seattle-based band Doxology has claimed that Cook's performance of The Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby" was based on a version the band recorded over a year ago. On April 1, before performing his self-arranged rendition of Dolly Parton's "Little Sparrow" on American Idol, Cook told Ryan Seacrest in the interview session that his performance of "Eleanor Rigby" was based on Neil Zaza's and Doxology's versions. He also reiterated the credits of Whitesnake and Chris Cornell. Despite the controversy, critics praised Cook for choosing versions of songs that fit his vocal style. Cook's arrangements of "Happy Together", "Hello", "Little Sparrow", "Always Be My Baby", "All I Really Need Is You", "Baba O'Riley", "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face", "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing", "Dream Big" and "The World I Know" were original arrangements.

Cook won the seventh season of American Idol on May 21, 2008, receiving 56 percent of the votes, with 12 million votes over David Archuleta, the runner-up. Cook then sang "The Time of My Life", the winning song of the 2008 American Idol Songwriter's Competition. In the final tally, Archuleta received 44 percent of the votes. During the final show, identical commercials promoting Guitar Hero featured Cook and fellow finalist Archuleta mimicked the Tom Cruise scene from Risky Business where he dances in his underwear playing an air guitar.

Performances

Week # Theme Song choice Original artist Order # Result
Audition N/A "Livin' On A Prayer" Bon Jovi N/A Advanced
Hollywood N/A "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" Bryan Adams N/A Advanced
Top 50 N/A "I'll Be" Edwin McCain N/A Advanced
Top 24 (12 Men) 1960s "Happy Together" The Turtles 3 Safe
Top 20 (10 Men) 1970s "All Right Now" Free 9 Safe
Top 16 (8 Men) 1980s "Hello" Lionel Richie 6 Safe
Top 12 Lennon"McCartney "Eleanor Rigby" The Beatles 6 Safe
Top 11 The Beatles "Day Tripper" The Beatles 6 Safe
Top 10 Year They Were Born "Billie Jean" Michael Jackson 10 Safe
Top 9 Dolly Parton "Little Sparrow" Dolly Parton 2 Safe
Top 8 Inspirational Songs "Innocent" Our Lady Peace 5 Safe
Top 7 Mariah Carey "Always Be My Baby" Mariah Carey 6 Safe
Top 6 Andrew Lloyd Webber "The Music of the Night" Michael Crawford 6 Safe
Top 5 Neil Diamond "I'm Alive"
"All I Really Need Is You"
Neil Diamond 2
7
Safe
Top 4 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame "Hungry Like the Wolf"
"Baba O'Riley"
Duran Duran
The Who
1
5
Safe
Top 3 Judge's Choice (Simon Cowell)
Contestant's Choice
Producer's Choice
"The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face"
"Dare You to Move"
"I Don't Want to Miss a Thing"
Peggy Seeger
Switchfoot
Aerosmith
3
6
9
Safe
Finale Clive Davis's Choice
New Song
Contestant's Choice
"I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"
"Dream Big"
"The World I Know"
U2
Written by Emily Shackelton
Collective Soul
1
3
5
Winner

Post-Idol career

A week following Cook's American Idol victory, in the Billboard chart week ending May 25, 2008, Cook broke several Billboard chart records. Most notable was his record shattering feat of having eleven songs debut on the Hot 100 that week, beating the previous record set by Miley Cyrus (Hannah Montana) in 2006 when she had six songs debut on the chart. Cook's first single, "The Time of My Life" led the pack, debuting at number three on the Hot 100. Cook's eleven charting songs also gave him the most songs by one artist on the Hot 100 of any week in the Nielsen SoundScan era (which began in 1991), and the most of any era since The Beatles placed 14 songs on the chart the week of April 11, 1964. In addition, that same week Cook also broke the record for the most debuts on Billboard's Hot Digital Songs chart, where he placed 14 debut entries, the record of which was previously six set by Bon Jovi in 2007. Cook's 17 entries had a combined total of 944,000 digital downloads in the first week of selling.

Cook also signed an endorsement deal with Skechers that ran through December 2009.

Cook's photo was also featured on the cover of The World Almanac and Book of Facts 2009, along with President Barack Obama and Senator John McCain.

2008"2009: David Cook

Template:Main Cook worked with Espionage, Ed Roland (Collective Soul), Zac Maloy (The Nixons), Jason Wade (Lifehouse), Neal Tiemann (the Midwest Kings), Kevin Griffin (Better Than Ezra), Chantal Kreviazuk, and Raine Maida (Our Lady Peace) on his self-titled, major label debut album. The album was produced by Rob Cavallo. On Ryan Seacrest's morning show On Air of KIIS-FM on September 5, 2008, the singer revealed that the CD release date would be November 18, 2008.

The first single released from the album, "Light On" was announced on Cook's official site and debuted on September 23, 2008. By the week of October 10, 2008, the song had reached no. 17 on the Billboard Hot 100. The single was certified platinum January 20, 2010. This is followed by a dual release of Come Back to Me and Bar-ba-sol, with "Come Back to Me" being released to HAC radio stations and Bar-ba-sol to rock radio. The music video for "Come Back to Me" was released on April 4, 2009.

His debut album was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association for America (RIAA) for sales exceeding one-million units in January 2009. He was presented with his plaque while recording a performance that was aired during the April 1, 2009 episode of American Idol.

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On January 23, 2009, Cook announced he would be embarking on his first headline national tour, the Declaration tour. Cook had earlier announced via his myspace blog that two former bandmates from Midwest Kings (MWK) would join his band, with Neal Tiemann as the lead guitar player, and Andy Skib on rhythm guitar and keyboard. Other members who joined later were Joey Clement (replaced later by Monty Anderson) on bass guitar, and Kyle Peek on drums and backing vocals. The tour began on February 13, 2009 in Tallahassee Florida, and was originally set to end in Tulsa, Oklahoma on April 25, 2009. The tour however was extended twice " the first time through May 31, 2009, and then again starting from June 18, 2009 in Del Mar, CA and finally ending December 1, 2009 in Charlotte, NC after a total 153 shows. On August 14, 2009, David Cook performed his 100th show at the Tennessee Theatre in Knoxville, TN. On August 23, 2009 in an interview and at his concert in Yakima, WA Cook announced that the band would be known as The Anthemic.

2010"present: This Loud Morning

Template:Main David Cook began to concentrate working on this his second album after his first major tour, the Declaration Tour, concluded in December 2009. While on the tour, he put down some riffs and lyrical ideas, and started song-writing as a band towards the end of the tour. In an interview with Idolatry's Michael Slezak on February 8, 2010 Cook revealed that he is hard at work on his second album. He has been collaborating with Raine Maida and Chantal Kreviazuk, Matt Squire, Gregg Wattenberg, John Rzeznik, Sam Hollander & Dave Katz, Claude Kelly, Brian Howes, David Hodges, Tommy Henriksen, Steven Van Zandt, Kevin Griffin, Zac Maloy, Ryan Tedder, Jim Irvin, Jamie Houston, Ryan Star & Julian Emery, Max Martin and John Rzeznik. Besides that, he also collaborated with members of his band, The Anthemic " Neal Tiemann and Andy Skib. In an April interview with HitQuarters " recorded in March " the producer-songwriter Steve Mac said that Cook had recently visited his Rokstone Studios in London where together with Mac he had also been writing with Savan Kotecha and Andrew Frampton. He had hoped initially that a single would be ready for release in April 2010 and the album that summer. However, a producer for the album was not announced until May, and recording started in June that year with producer Matt Serletic at the helm. On March 31, 2011, Cook tweeted that the title of his new single will be The Last Goodbye and debuted on April 19, 2011. A press release was sent out on April 15, 2011 announcing the name of the album which will be called This Loud Morning and was released on June 28, 2011. He has also stated that at the beginning his goal was to make an album that "really, really pushed the concept of dynamic".

On September 13, 2011 it was announced that Cook would begin touring in support of This Loud Morning with a 2011 Fall Tour, co-headlining with Gavin DeGraw and with Carolina Liar in support, for 22 shows across 15 states beginning October 9, 2011 in State College, Pennsylvania and ending November 10, 2011 in Athens, Georgia. It was also announced that Cook"s second single "Fade into Me" would be released to coincide with the tour. Cook tweeted that there would be "more dates/info to come" In this tour, Devin Bronson replaced Neal Tiemann as the lead guitarist.

Other performances

Cook appeared at the 2008 Glamour magazine Women of the Year Awards as a guest of Mary Steenburgen to surprise honoree Hillary Clinton, a fan of American Idol. He sang one of Clinton's favorite songs, "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face", which he also sang during the Top 3 week on Idol.

Cook appeared in several promotions for the November 1st episode of "Saturday Night Live", hosted by Ben Affleck. Cook performed two songs on the program, the first "Light On" and the second "Declaration".

Cook performed on the American Music Red Carpet Live November 23, 2008, performing "Light On" and "Declaration".

In June, Cook performed The Star-Spangled Banner at Game 3 of the 2008 NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers. Cook also performed with his brother Andrew during the opening weekend of the 2008 NFL season at a game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Oakland Raiders.

Cook started 2009 by performing songs from his debut album for the troops during a USO tour, where he was able to visit seven bases.

On February 12, 2009, Cook appeared on the morning news program, Good Morning America and talked about Walt Disney World Resort's new attraction, The American Idol Experience. He performed "Light On" and took the stage once again to perform "Go Your Own Way" by Fleetwood Mac with fellow American Idol winner Carrie Underwood. He and all the other six winners received a mic-shaped statue from the creator of the franchise, Simon Fuller to honor them for winning the competition.

On May 20, 2009, Cook returned to the Idol stage during the Grand Finale of American Idol (season 8) to perform his song "Permanent" in honor of his late brother Adam. The live version of the song was released to iTunes soon afterwards with 100% of the proceeds from downloads of it going to Accelerate Brain Cancer Cure (ABC2).

Cook performed Heroes and Declaration at the 2009 All-Star Game Home Run Derby on July 13. He wore an American League shirt to honor his favorite team the Kansas City Royals and made some jokes about it. He said that "it was just a huge amount of icing on the cake", to come back to his home state for an All-Star Game and that, "this is a trip, I'm a huge baseball fan, so to get to be here for All-Star Week and be involved it's massive."

On August 7, 2009, Cook performed the Fleetwood Mac hit "Little Lies" with American Idol season 8 winner Kris Allen and runner-up Adam Lambert on ABC's Good Morning America's Summer Concert Series in Central Park.

On August 11, 2009, Cook Performed "Starseed" with Canadian Alt-Rockers, "Our Lady Peace" at the House of Blues Dallas.

Cook performed "Lie" in a Christmas TV variety special hosted by American Idol Season 4 winner, Carrie Underwood. Other guest included Dolly Parton and Brad Paisley.

On February 18, 2010, Cook performed with the original line-up of his band in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They performed songs from Cook's previous band Midwest Kings which included Neal Tiemann and Andy Skib.

During the March 17, 2010, episode of American Idol, which ended with the elimination of Lacey Brown, David Cook sang the Rolling Stones song "Jumpin' Jack Flash".

On September 12, 2010, Cook, along with guitarist Neal Tiemann, performed "America the Beautiful" before the men's final at the U.S. Open in Flushing, New York.

On February 22, 2011, Cook tweeted 'Was just informed by TPTB that that "extra treat" I worked on last week will air on march 3rd!' on his Twitter page, and then revealed on March 3 that he recorded the send-off song for contestants of Season 10. He covered the Simple Minds hit song Don't You (Forget About Me) which would be played whenever a contestant on American Idol 10 is eliminated.

On April 6, 2012, Cook performed the National Anthem at the Los Angeles Angels opening baseball game against the Kansas City Royals.

On May 10, 2012, Cook performed a new song entitled "The Last Song I'll Write for You" on the eleventh season of American Idol. Also on May 10, 2012, Cook confirmed to Shirley Halperin of the Hollywood Reporter that he is without a recording contract.

Personal life

In May 2008, Cook asked Season 2 American Idol alum and TV Guide Network correspondent Kimberly Caldwell for a dinner date while on the red carpet before the show's seventh season finale. During a radio interview with XL 106.7 on October 13, 2008, Cook revealed that he and Caldwell were "still seeing each other." In a November 2008 interview with PEOPLE magazine, Cook said his relationship with Caldwell was a "nice break from the chaos" of post-Idol fame. They ended their relationship in December 2008.

People reported on March 31, 2009 that David was canceling dates on his current tour due to "family matters". Cook's eldest brother, Adam, had been diagnosed with brain cancer since 1998 and died on May 2, 2009. On May 3, 2009 at the "Race for Hope" in Washington, D.C., Cook announced the death of his brother during the awards speech, and saying he "couldn't imagine being anywhere else right now." He finished the 5k with a time of 28 minutes. His team raised $136,376.16 for the cause. Donations were accepted through September 30, 2009. On the finale of the 8th season of American Idol, Cook sang his song "Permanent" in honor of his brother. Audio of the performance was made available on iTunes, and the proceeds from the sale of it were put toward brain cancer research.

His musical influences include Our Lady Peace, Alice in Chains, Big Wreck, Pearl Jam, Bon Jovi, Chris Cornell, The Goo Goo Dolls, Switchfoot, and Collective Soul. Immediately after winning American Idol, Cook was asked backstage by Entertainment Weekly who his top five favorite bands were. Our Lady Peace and Big Wreck were on this short list, as well as the Foo Fighters, Jimmy Eat World and 8stops7.

Discography

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Albums
  • Analog Heart (2006)
  • David Cook (2008)
  • This Loud Morning (2011)

Tours

  • American Idols LIVE! Tour 2008
  • The Declaration Tour - 2009
  • This Loud Tour - 2011

Awards and nominations

Year Presenter Award Result
2008 Teen Choice Awards Choice TV: Male Reality/Variety Star
Best Presenter (Post Show)
The New Music Awards Top 40 Male Artist of the Year
2009 Teen Choice Awards Breakout Artist
Album (Male Artist)
Nashville Music Awards Song of the Year " "Time of My Life"
The New Music Awards Top 40 Male Artist of the Year


This biography article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.It uses material from the Wikipedia article "David Cook (singer)". Reality TV World is not responsible for any errors or omissions this article may contain.



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