The National Enquirer‘s decision to publish a photo of the late Whitney Houston in an open casket has sparked a firestorm of outrage across the pop landscape — even Perez Hilton blasted the Enquirer‘s move as a “tasteless, insensitive, morbid thing to do”. Condemnations have poured in from numerous artists (and competing media outlets), but does it all add up to a bigger payday for the tabloid?

Onetime American Idol contestant turned We Are The Fallen singer Carly Smithson tweeted the thoughts of many, saying: “The National Enquirer is disgusting !!!!!!! Shame on them !!!!!”

The appearance of the photo has also touched off a series of heated questions about how and why it was shot in the first place. Though the Enquirer claims the photo was taken at the Whigham Funeral Home in New Jersey (in other words, prior to Houston’s funeral at the New Hope Baptist Church), the funeral home director insists that is not the case.

“I’m going to answer you as the publicist told me to answer you: We have no comment. But it was not the funeral home,” the funeral home owner, Carolyn Whigham, has told reporters. “You guys are getting me in the middle,” she said, noting that the publicity around the photo is threatening her reputation.

When asked to explain, she added: “I am very angry, very upset, just like the family, just like the fans,” she said of the Enquirer photo. “We don’t like it because it implicates us. Whitney was a personal friend to me and my family. We would not do that.”

But hey, not everyone was upset: The National Enquirer‘s publisher Mary Beth Wright defended the use of the photo to FoxNews.com, calling the image “beautiful.”

Houston, who died at age 48 the day before this year’s Grammy Awards, was buried in a private ceremony on Sunday.

Will the Enquirer suffer any real consequences for publishing the photo? Let us know on Facebook, Twitter or in the comments.

 A one-time aspiring pop star, Carly Smithson has recast herself—and maybe found herself—as a bona fide rock goddess. The American Idol Season 7 alum, who vowed voters with her enthusiastic stage presence and gale-force vocal power, last year joined hard-rock band We Are The Fallen, a new outfit formed by several former members of Evanescence. But Carly warns against comparisons: “This band is completely different,” the Irish lass tells us. “Evanescence is still together and currently making a new record. This band is a completely new thing.” After pursuing many different routes in the music scene, Carly seems most at home with the crunchy riffs and dark imagery of We Are The Fallen. 

So spare us the Amy Lee references — Carly is her own phenomenal woman and performer, and one that was generous enough to chat with us about the Idol finale, who should really be taking Simon’s place for Season 10, and which pop acts impress her the most, despite the fact that she is “not one for pop music at all.” Jump below for our exclusive Carly Smithson interview.

Idolator: What did you think of Lee and Crystal and how the Idol finale turned out?
Carly: They were great! Great voices. I was really into Alanis Morissette when she walked out. And Christina Augilera is just stunning. Even though I don’t listen to pop, I can appreciate a ballad like that.

Why weren’t you there on stage with all the other former Idols?
I was supposed to do it, but we had a show in Arkansas the night before. My flight got in late, and I didn’t get to do it because rehearsal was at 9 a.m. We weren’t sure what it was going to be, there might have been choreography, so I just opted not to be a part of it. They’re like, “It’ll be fine!” And I’m like no, I’m that girl that goes the wrong way! I made it to the red carpet and the event just right on time.

What’s it like being the lone female on the road with all these men in your band and your crew?
They’re cool, they’re fun! They make fun of me all the time and get up to mischief and watch as many horror movies as they possible can. It’s like having 11 brothers, they’re always making sure they know where I’m going and that I’m safe. They’re good guys. My husband and I have a tattoo shop so I’m used to being surrounded by dorky metal guys.

Where’s the tattoo shop?
It’s 319 market street in San Diego. It’s called Nothing Sacred Tattoo. It’s a nice place when you come off a tour, all our friends stop by and say hello all day. It’s a chill environment like a living room.

Tell me how you got hooked up with Ben Moody [co-founder, guitarist and songwriter of We Are The Fallen, formerly of Evanscence]. We know you sang “Bring Me To Life” on the Idols Live tour, but how familiar were you with Evanscence?
I was obviously familiar with their radio songs, because you’d have to be living under a rock if you hadn’t been. But I wasn’t a huge follower. My friend was Ben’s roommate and I met him multiple times. His girlfriend found out I was friends with his roommate, and her mom started telling Ben, this girl is great and you gotta have her in your band! And he was like, I’m not about to have my girlfriend’s mom pick my band’s lead singer! So he let it go for weeks, and finally he let her show him my stuff on You Tube.

What song were you singing in the clip he saw?
Heart’s “Crazy On You.” It was a really great thing for me. He watched that song and called me straight away, we talked on the phone for hours. It was cool when I met [the band's other members, John LeCompt, and Rocky Gray and Marty O'Brien]—it was like we had known each other forever. We sat down just to write two songs in the beginning, and we ended up writing a whole record. The chemistry is unbelievable between all five of us.

Was it difficult at first coming into a band where everyone had worked together before?
No, because it is not a group that had been playing together for awhile. Evanescence is still together and currently making a new record. This band is a completely new thing. This band is completely different. It’s a little misunderstanding in the media that we’re Evanscence, but we’re not. It’s a completely separate new band. Ben left Evanescence seven or eight years ago. Ben and Marty had been working together for years, and Marty wasn’t in Evanescence. It’s not like they just started to create a new band.

What are you listening to now that you like?
I’m kind of stuck in the 80s with music. I listen to the old school Heart and Iron Maiden. The modern stuff I listen to is Sia. “You Have Been Loved” is one of my favorite songs. When Christina Aguilera sang ["You Lost Me" during the Idol finale], I thought, it hasto do something with Sia. It’s so obvious! That sound – I said to Marty, that has the flavor of Sia in it.

Good ears! “You Lost Me” was in fact written by Sia.
That makes sense!

Do you listen to pop music?
I am not one for pop music at all. I don’t listen to it that much, but I am very impressed with Lady Gaga. I think she is really creative and very new. It’s a very cool thing—you don’t know what she’s gonna wear, what she’s gonna do… even to listen to her in interviews, she’s amazingly well spoken and just very, very interesting.

What’s lacking in pop music that stops you from being a fan?
I don’t think there’s anything lacking, but I just love heavier music and more dramatic music. I grew up in theatre, I was in Les Miz when I was a kid. I love that, and I love rock music… combined is where I find myself in our record.

What was it like doing so much pop on American Idol since you’re not such a big fan of the genre?
On Idol, the one thing that I found difficult for me… a lot of the heavier bands, they don’t clear their songs for Idol. I would have personally liked to do a lot more rock music, but that’s the formula Idolhas. We had Dolly Parton, Mariah Carey, Neil Diamond… there wasn’t really a rock week during my time on the show. It was very important for me to come off the show and start writing, because I think many people misunderstood who I was as a performer, that I didn’t really have an outlet to do rock on the show.

You mentioned you did a lot of theatre growing up. Would you ever follow other Idol alumni journeys to Broadway?
I don’t know. I’d have to wait until I get to that point. Right now I wouldn’t think so. But maybe I will change my mind! Not so much Broadway, but I love operas. I love when there’s a massive, massive orchestra. I love soundtracks. I love the scores to Tim Burton’s movies.

Ah, Danny Elfman, the man is a genius. How much do you think those film soundtracks have influenced the music you’ve written for We Are The Fallen, including the main single “Bury Me Alive”?
Probably! There’s noting better for me personally than hearing those strings an the guitar and the drums pounding in my chest to perform to! That’s the amazing thing, when you can pull a vocal off a song and just feel everything.

Alright, the question everyone has been trying to answer for months now: Who could possibly replace Simon? Who’s your pick?
Simon Fuller. He’s the creator of the show, and very intelligent, wonderfully genius man. I think if anyone was going to take the title, I feel he would be a great choice. He develops all the careers of all the Idols after the show. I think that would be the smartest choice.

Could he be as nasty as Simon when critiquing singers?
I don’t think the next person should be the mean role, that’s Simon [Cowell]’s thing. They should be unique and do their own thing.

Now that you’ve spent some time on and off the show, what do you think of American Idol‘s role? Should we just watch it for entertainment, or does it really have the ability to find true musical artists?
As a person who ame off the show, I would hope so! It was a musical environment that I always wanted to be in. There was nothing greater than hanging out with somebody like [Season 7 contestant] Brooke White, whose whole life is music. I’ve seen wonderful artists come off the show. I think people have an idea of the show, that the people on it aren’t real artists. For me, I was a singer-songwriter for years before I came on the show, and the one thing I needed more in life was finances. I needed to be able to leave my job, I needed a foot in the door, and I needed to lock myself away from the world and make music my career. And as a bartender, that wasn’t possible for me at all. The one thing that is so important for a musician is to not have any distractions. And for me, that’s what Idol gave me.

Head to We Are The Fallen’s official website and follow Carly on Twitter.

After months of online buzz that has drawn both hard-rock fans and American Idol fanatics, new band We Are The Fallen is ready to rise. Led by Irish belter (and onetime Idol contestant) Carly Smithson and featuring former Evanesence rockers Ben Moody, John LeCompt and Rocky Gray, along with bassist Marty O’Brien, the band has been kept much of its music under wraps. But we have a special first look at the video for the band’s first single, “Bury Me Alive”. The video, co-directed by Kyle Newman (of 2008′s Fanboy) and wife Jaime King (yes, the model), will lead viewers through the grim ritual of burial, but with a vintage Victorian twist. Dig through the pics from the set of “Bury Me Alive”, take a listen to the single on the band’s site, and you’ll see why people are falling for them.

Fox today outlined its plans for replacing Paula Abdul at the American Idol judges’ table, and somewhat unfortunately, they involve retaining the four-judge panel that was instituted on the show last year. The show is going to bring in guest judges! “Our intention is to have guest judges be female pop stars, female performers,” Fox Entertainment chair Peter Rice said. Signed for next season so far: A & R expert Katy Perry and tabloid fixture Victoria Beckham. Even though Beckham is more known for her stick-thin figure and the clothes she hangs on it these days, she was a Spice Girl, right? Uh, sure. Any Idol watcher knows that Fox will likely make some sort of misstep in selecting other people to round out the panel; as a sort of pre-emptive strike against that, we offer up five female pop stars whose presence would make the new-look Idol judges’ table even more farcical than it already is.


1. Gwen Stefani. Because when all is said and done, “The Sweet Escape” is no “Forever Your Girl.”


2. Mariah Carey. Sorry, Mimi, but your appearance on NBC last night has temporarily disqualified you from being able to critique others. Please go back and think about what you’ve done. (And no, you aren’t allowed to think about the Batles instead. Come on.)


3. Kellie Pickler, Katharine McPhee, Carly Smithson, or any other non-winner. Because then what is the point, really? “Here are some tips to make you go far… who knows, maybe you’ll be more successful with them than me”? I never believed in the whole maxim about those who couldn’t turning to teaching, and I still don’t.


4. Nicole Scherzinger. Say what you will about her plummeting star, but know this: She’s already snagged a slot on the panel for Diddy’s forthcoming Idol ripoff, and you really don’t want to be thought of as biting your Xeroxers. Ahem.


5. Susan Boyle. Sure, the Britain’s Got Talent-fueled singer makes Simon Cowell go all weak in the knees, but her mere presence on the show will come off as more of a cautionary tale about The Price Of Instant Fame than anything else.


Fox plans to replace Abdul, have guest judges [THR Feed]

Hooray, I qualified to get a free MP3 of “Bury Me Alive,” the first single from the Carly Smithson/Evanescence dudes project The Fallen! And it sounds… like a big, vaguely gothy, mooky rock song, complete with chorus that’s a bit of a Xerox of that from that band’s 2003 track “Going Under.” This is not a complaint–”Going Under” was actually one of my favorite tracks the year it came out, and it was way superior to their big hit with that vestigial tail of a “rap” verse”–but I figured it was worthy of mention. Smithson’s voice sounds in fine form, if a bit studio-massaged, and the band sounds, you know, like a band trying to get on modern-rock radio. I hope it works, because as has been mentioned before, that format is way bereft of ladies.





This seems like an appropriate place to note that Smithson’s American Idol BFF, the fetching Aussie Michael Johns, also has an album coming out today. Here is him doing the first single off Hold Back My Heart, called “Heart On My Sleeve”:





Apparently his album is on the cooler-than-you haven Downtown Records, although he hasn’t been added to the label’s official site yet. Hope this slight means he at least gets an extra beer ad out of the deal.


The Fallen – Bury Me Alive [YouTube]
Evanescence – Going Under [YouTube]

The gates have been opened at the official site for The Fallen, the band featuring former American Idol Carly Smithson and a smattering of dudes who were booted from Evanescence. And the site’s even giving away a free MP3–although you have to sign up with an e-mail address and a mobile number, and then wait to see if you were one of the first 100,000 people to sign up and qualify for one of the free downloads. Dum de dum.


The site launched 20 minutes ago, so I figure I’m in pretty good shape. (No offense, Carly/Ben/everyone else–it’s just that I see music-related traffic numbers a lot, and 300,000 pageviews in an hour is a pretty high bar to leap over when you’re just cobbling together an opt-in list.) I will admit, I’m kind of intrigued by what will come out of this! Sure, it’ll probably be somewhat sludgy neo-grunge, but it’ll definitely beat the Linkin Parky search results for the term “The Fallen” that YouTube is bringing up at present.


Fallen [Official site]

Yesterday’s news that former American Idol contestant Carly Smithson would be joining up with a bunch of ex-members of nu-goth outfit Evanescence to form a band called The Fallen apparently got Amy Lee, Evanescence’s figurehead / Billy Corgan character, in a snit. So she released a statement on her band’s Web site letting everyone know that hey, she is still around and making music under the Evanescence name, and she would like some of that press attention that all of the people she once collaborated with to go in her direction!

There’s some pretty weird stuff flying around right now and I’d like to clear up some confusion in the press. As our fans already know, Ben Moody left Evanescence in 2003. Evanescence came out with a follow-up to Fallen in 2006. It was called The Open Door and it debuted at #1 on the Billboard charts and reached platinum status in just over a month. The Open Door has sold more than 5 million copies worldwide. We’re currently working on new material that I’m extremely excited about. I believe that to make great music you have to give yourself the freedom to evolve. I don’t see the point in making the same record twice, so I always want to challenge myself to make something better, stronger, and more interesting than before. That takes time, but it’s worth the wait for me. Hopefully, it will be for the fans too. Look out for new music next year…

If you read all the bits defending The Open Door–which was actually not bad!–in the Comic Book Guy voice, it’s a little bit funnier.


Will The Real Slim Shady Please Stand Up? [Evanescence]

Carly Smithson–the 2008 American Idol contestant who was also the poster child for the record industry’s problems in a 2002 Wall Street Journal piece–is joining forces with all the dudes fired from Evanescence to form a new band called The Fallen, according to USA Today. (Any resemblance between the band’s name and the title of Evanescence’s 2003 breakthrough album is probably coincidental.)


It’s probably a good fit, all around–the tattooed, world-weary Smithson sang the band’s big hit “Bring Me To Life” on last year’s Idols Live tour, and she can certainly belt out a tune or two. Her journey along the Idol path last year ended too soon in my opinion; while I was certainly skeptical about her major-label past when she first was announced as a finalist, her puppy-like demeanor and undeniable pipes gradually won me over, and I was kind of sad when she got the boot instead of the irritating Syesha Mercado two Aprils ago. Plus, check out this quote she gave to USA Today Idol reporter Brian Mansfield: “The first time we rehearsed, everybody started in on this jam of Iron Maiden. I was like, ‘I’m in a band! I love this!’ ” How can you not like that enthusiasm?


The Fallen [Official site]
“Idol” belter Carly Smithson’s band falls into place [USA Today]

I should probably preface my writeup of American Idol‘s results episode by saying that I watched it while on a cross-country flight, which meant that a) I didn’t have a peanut gallery to bounce my observations off until much later and b) I had to keep any bon mots to myself, since the woman sitting next to me got visibly weirded out when I gasped at the banishment of Syesha Mercado, and not Brooke White, to the Bottom Two Stools. (She was watching Animal Planet with the sound off, so maybe I caused her to think that a tiger was actually sitting in 8E.) And after Carly joined her in the losers’ club–even after that cutaway where Jason Castro was caught yawning backstage!–I was expecting Syesha to get dispatched quickly, what with her suffering the curse of being not all that bad and first on a trainwrecky night.

But it wasn’t to be, and Carly got sent off in an anticlimactic, awkward way that didn’t even close out with her doing one last, rousing version of “Superstar” from Jesus Christ Superstar. Maybe she doomed herself by saying that she’d go all-out and have fun over the coming weeks of the competition; American Idol never rewards such “I’ll Stick Around”-dervied hubris in kind. But even after all the crap surrounding her time on the show–the major-label record deal that I read about when writing about music was still just a vague dream of mine, the “NO U R FAT” sign she posted on her fridge back then, the tattoos, the husband with the face tattoo, the increasingly visible desperation every time she talked about how she just wanted to make it–I grew to actually root for Carly somewhat.

In a way she seemed like a great big Cautionary Tale for David Archuleta and his dad; she was the groomed-from-birth girl whose teenage quest for stardom fizzled after a series of ill-fated moves by the people who should have been looking out for her (and maybe/probably by herself, too). (For some reason I feel like her career and Jordin Sparks’ recent travails should both send Archuleta running for a set of hills located somewhere bereft of cameras, and given that dude looked like a deer in the headlights for most of the evening, perhaps he’s starting to feel the same way.) Will tonight be her last chance at making it? Even with the definition of that two-word phrase becoming more and more nebulous, and dare I say damning, by the day, it’s doubtful; between the fragmentation of the musical landscape, the fact that I still have her version of “Superstar” in my head (and not in the annoying Flo Rida way), and her seemingly Broadway-ready voice I suspect that she’ll have some sort of a career over the coming years, one that won’t involve her living in a house equipped with cameras that run 24/7.

Also, how did Brooke White not go home? Keeping her around at this point = making the inevitable meltdown all the more of an utterly uncomfortable live-TV moment.

[Photo: AmericanIdol.com, since taking a picture of that little, DVR-free TV was a completely fruitless exercise]

An update on David Cook’s album sales: “It sold 885 copies this week (all digital), or about half of what would be required to make the digital albums chart.” Which means, I guess, that Cook doesn’t count as a “new artist” by SoundScan standards, since he didn’t appear on that 150-album chart either (No. 150, Tierra Cali’s Enamorado De Ti, sold about 600 copies). And as a side note, David Cook hater Roger Friedman has moved on to mumbling about the greatness of the Carly Hennessy album, saying that she’s taken an “odd route” to the Idol stage. [Earlier]

Whoever’s running the American Idol Web sites must have gotten wind that Sanjaya’s fans were not happy with Carly Smithson telling the show’s online staff that her favorite Idol moment of the past six seasons was watching Sanjaya and his hairstyles get the boot; the answer to that question in her AmericanIdol.com q-and-a session is now a succinct “n/a”. Something tells me this won’t make the Fanjayas any less unhappy (or exclamation-point-happy)… [AmericanIdol.com / Earlier]

My increasing–yet still grudging!–affection for Carly Smithson increased a little just now, when I found out that while other contestants said in their latest Idol questionnaires that their favorite moments of the show were their admission to the top 24 (Asia’h, who should enjoy it while she can) and Idol Gives Back (Luke, who… ugh), she selected as her favorite the night that Sanjaya Malakar got voted off last season. Say what you will about her past; Carly certainly knows how to rile up the bloggers and message-board posters who decried her eligibility because of the major-label flop she put out a few years back. And it’s kind of awesome. An example: There are 94 comments about Carly’s flippant answer on Idolwatcher haven/Fanjaya gathering-place rickey.org already, spurred on by the very-displeased site proprietor Rickey:

What??? How could Carly Smithson say such a thing? How evil! What has Sanjaya Malakar done to you Carly Smithson? Sanjaya Malakar only brought joy and inspiration to the world! He’s the most talked about American Idol contestant EVER. He had the most dedicated fans on the American Idol tour last summer. Girls cried in his presence! Sanjaya Malakar was the talk of the town during the White House Correspondents Dinner — the governor of New York wanted his autograph. He totally upstaged everybody that night.

Oh my God you guys! He also mentions that her first single was about blow jobs! He also orders the Fanjayas to the war room, and here they come:

Motherly instincts!! BEYOTCH PUH-LEASE!!

I’m sorry Carly, but you’re officially DEAD to me. For someone who endured an EPIC FLOP so BIG that the WALL STREET JOURNAL did a profile on you as a living example of WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE MUSIC INDUSTRY, you would THINK the SKANK would have some COMPASSION!!

But NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

This woman wants America’s SYMPATHY and to give her a 2nd chance. But she thinks it’s cool to kick a fellow contestant in the gut with a comment like THAT!

Carly, you don’t deserve SH**IT!!!!!!!!!!!!

snuffles on March 6, 2008 at 10:09 am

His name is snuffles! So you know he’s like totally serious! Let’s let someone who only reads rickey.org’s Sanjaya RSS feed take a swipe next!

Carly WHO? I never heard of her before reading this. I suspect she will fade into obscurity very soon.

Disrespecting another artist is beyond uncool and says a lot more about HER that it does about Sanjaya. Sanjaya has never had a bad word to say about anyone, including Simon.

kapua on March 6, 2008 at 12:20 pm

And finally–because if I read another exclamation point I’m going to scream–let’s all relive the night in question and ask ourselves: Was it really that good?

I think to truly appreciate the tastelessness and tackiness of her remark, let’s go back TO the night in question. Here is a then-17-year-old kid, who has already endured so much humiliation and garbage from the media for months, but has hung in there week after week, fighting the good fight. People tend to forget that Sanjaya wasn’t voting to keep himself in. It was the fans who kept him advancing, because we loved him and wanted to keep him in as long as possible. There was nothing the kid could do except come out smiling, week after week, and trying to do his best to compete and hang in there. This had been his dream. His may not have been the best voice in the competition. But let’s not forget, it was a GOOD voice and one that I’m sure he had been praised for all his life. So he enters the competition, as all of them do, with high hopes and dreams. He wants to make a better life for himself and his family by winning. If we go back in time to that night, we see a very brave and courageous kid finally giving in to all the strain and pressure. He collapses in tears on Lakish’s shoulder while people in the audience cheer like their favorite team has just scored a touchdown victory. That was heartwrenching to watch. I remember sitting at home and crying right along with him because his pain felt like my own. And now, for another AI contestant to come along and tout that as her “favorite” AI moment is just wrong, tacky and tasteless on so many levels. I don’t think it’s so much his getting eliminated (because that’s just the nature of the show) but it’s seeing what all he endured and knowing he was in such pain and heartbreak at that moment, and for this smirking ugly be-yoth to take pleasure in that and call it her “favorite AI moment” just really makes me hate her. Sorry, but she’s made this personal now. Heck, scroll to the top and look at Sanjaya’s pic, then look at hers. Kinda easy to see who’s the ugly one, right? Well, thing is, it’s not the ugly on the outside that counts, it’s the ugly on the inside. And Carly has proven she’s eat up with it. Yes, the war is on!
blackraven on March 6, 2008 at 12:56 pm

I have no idea how to answer the question I posed above, except to say that if there’s a war on… how did you have time to type all that?

Carly Smithson [americanidol.com]
Carly Smithson Declares War on Sanjaya Malakar [rickey.org]

During last night’s episode of American Idol, Carly Smithson (née Hennessy) came sorta-clean about her major-label past, talking about how her label “imploded” after her album came out–although said label, MCA, didn’t so much “implode” as “get absorbed by Geffen a few months after that Wall Street Journal piece about the piles and piles of money they spent on her came out.” And Carly’s mention of her current job highlighted another interesting detail about that story that has nothing to do with major-label excess: It reports, in its closing, Carly getting her first tattoo (“an intricate cross on the small of her back that she hopes will impress her fans”)–and now she owns a whole parlor! Crazy, right?

The first episode in the competitive portion of American Idol just started on the East Coast, and tonight the top 12 guys are giving their spin to the songs of the 1960s. The above shot is of the young ladies remaining in the competition–in a nice bit of reverse chivalry, they get to kick back and relax a bit while the men go first–but note that there are only 11 of them, thanks to one notable absence: Carly “Hennessy” Smithson, the former MCA signee who’s caused quite the firestorm before even stepping on Idol‘s big stage. The obvious question: Where is she? Was she on a bathroom break? Did her visa expire again? Is she going to come back from the commercial with a huge record contract? Or is there going to be some sort of big, embarrassing announcement at show’s end? I’m going to unpause my DVR and find out right now!