ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Let's talk about a few of the new songs, starting with the single ''Light On,'' one of only two songs you didn't co-write.
DAVID COOK: ''Light On'' is an interesting song. It encompasses almost all of my range. It's all over the place. That's Chris Cornell at his finest. It's got some Zeppelin influence in it; it's got some '80s hair-metal influence; it's got some grunge influence. To me it's like a rock history lesson put into about a four-minute lecture. It's fun to play, but it is definitely an intimidating song.
The heaviest song on the album, by far, is ''Bar Ba Sol.'' It's got some almost metal chords.
I'm a big fan of this band Injected, out of Atlanta. We called them up and said, can we have a run at this song and see what happens? What they sent us was a demo version, so we took the idea and ran with it. It's heavy, but still a strong melody.
Was the title of ''Mr. Sensitive'' meant to be ironic in any way?
The song was unintentionally ironic. I had the harmonic riff in my head for five months. In my lyric journal, I had ''Mr. Sincere'' written down, and sincere turned into sensitive. I wanted to write about something outside myself and get a little metaphorical. He lives in a village devoid of feeling. They get so afraid of this child who has feelings that they kill him. It kind of took on this Tim Burton-like, twisted vision of James and the Giant Peach for me. But I know people look at me as that sensitive guy.
And ''A Daily AntheM'' has to do with your brother [Adam, who is fighting cancer], who people learned about from watching Idol, right?
''A Daily AntheM'' is three years old. I didn't originally write it with the intention of it being about Adam. I just wanted to write something that had a John Lennon, ''War Is Over'' quality. Then I was like, oh s---, if you capitalize that letter and that letter and that letter, you've capitalized my brother's name.
You fit in with a style of rock singing that's popular right now. There's the singers from Hinder and Nickelback, guys who have a broad range, but not the real clean, Steve Perry-type of singing that was popular in the mainstream in the '80s. The guys who can sing but have more smoke or rasp in the voice seem to be favored now.
Dumb luck, man. Singing in smoky clubs for 10 years will give you a little bit of a rasp, for sure. When I first started playing in bands, I played it safe and I stayed in my midrange and all that. As I got more into it, I realized I could do more things with my voice. That's the kind of thing that's fun for me. I love having the vocal capacities to do something like that, because I realize that it's a gift and not everybody has it.
Everyone will be making the comparison you're sick of: Is he gonna have a Daughtry-like career?
Opinions and perceptions, man — I didn't let it get to me on the show, and I see no reason to let it get to me afterward. I just think this record is me, and if people want to compare it to Daughtry, awesome. He's sold a ton of records. I just hope someday the coin will flip and somebody will compare somebody else to me.
It must be hard to have perspective on what really happened with the show, even this far out from it now.
It's strange. I don't feel inherently that there's a justification for it. I realize that a lot of people watch the show, and I get the idea of the celebrity aspect of it, I guess. But I still feel like that awkward musician; I think I always will. That's a huge component of me staying kind of humbled and grounded about the whole thing: I get the flimsiness of it. I get that it could all go away. I mean, fame is fleeting....But I'm at peace. I've got guys that I'm playing with that I love to death, and I'm playing music that I think we all really get into, and as long as we've got that and a place to play, I'm good.
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