Cook And Archuleta Compete For 1st Place On Top Charts
David Cook and David Archuleta faced off during ‘American Idol’ and now they are taking the competition to the pop charts to vie for fans and consumers. David Cook has done an amazing 17 songs that have hit the top of the 200 Hot Digital Songs chart. The #1 hit includes “Time Of My Life” – which opened up with 236,000 downloads.
Cook’s 17 entries have a combined total of 944,000 paid downloads. I don’t think he’ll need to go back to bartending anytime soon. Topped by his cover of John Lennon’s “Imagine,” which opens at #16 with 71,000 downloads. Archie’s songs have a combined total of 301,000 paid downloads. Thus, Cook was downloaded more than three times as often as his rival, whom he beat in last week’s voting by a much less lopsided margin of 56% to 44%.
Cook’s new entries also include “Dream Big” (#7, 111,000 downloads), his cover of U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” (#9, 98,000), his cover of Collective Soul’s “The World I Know” (#14, 80,000), his cover of Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” (#21, 60,000), and his cover of Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean” (#24, 56,000).
Third place finisher Syesha Mercado isn’t represented in the top 200, but fourth-place finisher Jason Castro has two entries–his cover of Jeff Buckley’s “Hallelujah” (#81, 19,000 downloads) and his cover of Israel Kamakawiwo’ole’s “Somewhere Over The Rainbow” (#102, 16,000).
Fifth place finisher Brooke White opens at #136 with her cover of the Beatles’ “Let It Be” (12,000 downloads). Eighth-place finisher Michael Johns bows at #187 with his cover of Aerosmith’s “Dream On” (9,000).
Five of the original versions of these songs also receive a spike. Collective Soul’s “The World I Know” ranks #67 (23,000), Kamakawiwo’ole’s “Somewhere Over The Rainbow” is #133 (12,000), Buckley’s “Hallelujah” ranks #139 (12,000), U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” is #148 (11,000) and Lennon’s “Imagine” is #175 (10,000).
Several of the guests on the Idol finale, including OneRepublic, George Michael, Bryan Adams and ZZ Top, also surge this week. This bodes well for the debut albums by Cook and Archuleta. Cook may just find himself getting his attention and fame quicker than most ‘American Idol’ finalists.