Early on in the fourth season of American Idol the powers that be dubbed the season the battle of the rockers, because for the first time ever, AmIdol had not one but two rock vocalists as prime contenders. First, there was Constantine Maroulis, a music-theater veteran singing overheated, outdated grunge who dominated the audition rounds, becoming an early favorite. His rival didn't appear until the tail end of the auditions. His name was
Bo Bice, a bearded longhair who seemed as if he stepped out of central casting for a Southern rocker.
Bo catapulted to front-runner status as soon as he belted out a gritty, soulful version of "Whipping Post" in one of the first shows of the season. It was easily the hardest-rocking thing ever heard on American Idol and as the weeks went by,
Bo proved that he was versatile, singing ballads as effectively as the rockers -- a feat that proved to be a bit of a stumbling block for Constantine, who truly shined only when he acknowledged his bent for theatricality, as on a startlingly good version of "Bohemian Rhapsody." Soon, that lack of versatility becameMaroulis' Achilles' heel and the battle of the rockers petered out into a competition between
Bo and
Carrie Underwood, a sweet girl-next-door country singer who eventually won the tightest AmIdol contest since
Ruben Studdard squeaked out a victory over
Clay Aiken on the second season. On
Bo's album debut,
The Real Thing, 19 Entertainment, exec producer Clive Davis, and the whole American Idol album crew place the singer into an alt-rock setting somewhere between
Nickelback and
Bon Jovi.
Bo sounds like other mainstream male rock singers in 2005 -- his songs have verses that surge into anthemic choruses where heavy guitars kick in, inching the volume up to a point where it becomes a glossy wall of digital sound. The music is tightly wound and meticulously clean. While this doesn't necessarily play to
Bo's strengths, there are some good, professional tunes co-written by either
Jon Bon Jovi or his longtime partner
Richie Sambora. Elsewhere, 19 paired him with Ben Moody from
Evanescence,
Ashlee Simpson's collaborator Kara DioGuardi, and
Chad Kroeger from
Nickelback, for a set of mildly active rock. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine