Idol Chatter & Voice Views

That was 2010. Pre-“Smash.” Pre-“Scorpion.”

So consider it mission accomplished on the acting career.

Friday will mark the next step as Katharine McPhee the singer. She’ll release “Hysteria,” her first album in five years.

“Scorpion” returns for its second season three days later, and the coincidence .. well, it isn’t a coincidence, Katharine told CBS.

“That’s the only time I’ll be able to get out and do some sort of promotion for music stuff,” she said in an interview you can read here.

Katharine, 31, says “Hysteria” is “definitely a pop record, which goes more toward the first album I ever made, which my fans really liked. It’s not a super youthful pop sound, but it’s definitely pop.”

That first album, a self-titled effort in 2007, debuted at number two on the Billboard 200. Her 2010 follow-up, “Unbroken,” debuted at number 27.

Three tracks from “Hysteria” are already available on iTunes — “Lick My Lips,” which she released as a single earlier this summer, plus “Love Strikes” and “Stranger Than Fiction,” my favorite of the three.

And this week, Katharine is teasing fans by posting snippets of the other songs on her Facebook page.

This is a big week for longtime American Idol fans in terms of new releases. Season 7 winner David Cook is releasing his third post-Idol album, Digital Vein, on Friday. And Season 11 standout Joshua Ledet is releasing his first single this week.