Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Two years ago, much was made of the fact that David Cook’s pre-Idol independent album, “Analog Heart” became available on Amazon.com midway through his American Idol run.

In fact, it was pretty quickly yanked down.

And, typically, it’s pretty difficult to find pre-Idol music from contestants who make the semifinals. MySpace pages are scrubbed of music. Pre-Idol independent EPs and CDs are suddenly unavailable on CD Baby.

This year, I have no idea what’s going on.

For instance, nearly all the Idols have taken music off their old MySpace pages. Which I find distressing since I loved listening to Crystal Bowersox’s “Farmer’s Daughter” (plus several of her other songs) and Janell Wheeler’s “Red Dress.”

Yet Jermaine Sellers and Michelle Delamor still have songs posted on MySpace. And since they were fortunate enough to be members of bands pre-Idol, you can still listen to Lilly Scott sing lead vocals for Varlet and Tyler Grady sing with the band Wailing Waters.

And then there’s this: Varlet released a four-song EP in 2007. It’s unavailable on CD Baby. The result of her success on Idol? I have no idea.

But four of this year’s semifinalists have music out that you can buy right now on iTunes. They’re listed below.

Personally, I’d like to see Idol allow each contestant to keep a handful of their best songs on MySpace during the competition.

I mean, what’s the worst that can happen?

We get to know them a little better? We get to hear them sing a full song instead of a 90-second clip of a song?

Oh, well, maybe next year.

Meanwhile, if you’re a fan of Jermaine, Tyler, John Park or Lee DeWyze, you’re in luck.

Here’s what’s available.

* Jermaine Sellers: He has a 5-track EP available on iTunes. It’s labeled as Christian/Gospel music, is called “The Prequel” and includes a version of “The First Noel.” And while music has been scraped from most of the semifinalists’ MySpace music pages, two of the songs from that EP are still on Jermaine’s. Just go here.

* John Park: Before Idol, this semifinalist was part of an a cappella group at Northwestern University called Purple Haze. And, in 2009, the group released an album called “Mosaic.” Two songs from the album can be heard here. We’ve heard so little of John on Idol, I can’t begin to pick out his voice.

* Lee DeWyze: This semifinalist has two full albums available on iTunes, “So I’m Told,” released in 2007, and “Slumberland,” released last year. You can check out snippets of several of the songs, on the band’s Web site here. “Princess” and “Stay” sound particularly good.

* Tyler Grady: Before making the Idol semifinals, Tyler was lead vocalist for a rock band named Wailing Waters. They have a three-song EP on iTunes. And you can hear all three songs on their MySpace. “Runaround Rodeo” is particularly good.