Josiah Leming Calls "Idol" "Glorified Karaoke," Preps Debut Album

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Former American Idol hopeful and newly signed Warner Bros. artist Josiah Leming has lobbed some shots at the show that rejected him but certainly contributed to his record deal. "The fact is, it's glorified karaoke — they pick people with pretty faces and the pretty voices, and they don't let them write their own songs," Leming, who will forever be known by Idol fans as the emo kid who was living in his car, told MTV. "And therefore, it lacks passion, it lacks emotion and it lacks the things that set an artist off from being good to being great. So that's my feeling on it." Leming's own album is written and waiting to be recorded, with producers Nick Launey (who's worked with Gang of Four and Talking Heads) and David Kosten (the man behind Faultline) taking the reigns.

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Song Stories

“Everyday People”

Sly and the Family Stone | 1968

"Everyday People" managed to trailblaze in two different ways -- it was one of the first pop hits to deal with the subject of racial harmony, and it utilized Larry Graham's "slap" technique on the bass guitar, which would soon be copied by countless other bassists. Graham once said about his pulsating style, "I'd never done that before … that's where the freedom of creativity came in for the band, that we'd be allowed to do that." In 1978, the song's line "Different strokes for different folks" would be borrowed for the title of the hit television show Diff'rent Strokes.

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