“Dim the lights and here we go,” Ryan Seacrest announces.
One by one, names are called to safety, until there’s only one spot left. The nerves are palpable, but the expectation is there. And just like that, you’re eliminated from American Idol.
For Catie Turner, her time on Idol ended during the Top 7 show last year, only two weeks before the finale. But it wasn’t surprising–she had flubbed the lyrics to Manic Monday about 45 minutes earlier and accepted it was her time to leave (she was even willing to give up her spot to fellow contestant, Jurnee, if Turner ended up advancing over of her).
Turner was just a 17-year-old high school senior when she auditioned for the show. Rarely leaving her bedroom, she spent most of her time obsessing over One Direction on Twitter. But her audition showcased the original song ‘21st Century Machine,’ and though she didn’t know it at the time, the song would go viral when it finally aired in March of 2018.
From there, her reputation of being the first Idol contestant to blow up the internet in years began. Turner would routinely go viral with her original songs attacking toxic masculinity and the pressures that modern media place on young girls. Her quirky wit and awkward realness would amass over 80,000 followers on Twitter and over 300,000 on Instagram. She would gain the attention of major celebrities including Fifth Harmony and Shane Dawson.
But the momentum had to crash. Turner was mortified to screw up so deep into the competition (her flub also earned a tongue lashing from both Wendy Williams and Clay Aiken the next day).
“Mentally, it was the right time to leave,” Turner said. “I just wasn’t able to keep up with the pressures of the competition anymore, so I think that performance was my brain’s way of taking me out of the whole situation.”
Turner went on to sing with Katy Perry two weeks later during the Idol finale, again delivering another viral moment, this time on Perry’s ‘Part of Me.’
Although the attention continued for a while, it faded over the next few months. Turner noticed a steady decline in her followers and began to panic that she was messing up.
“I had just done that for months on Idol. It was time to take fate into my own hands,” Turned said.
“I’m someone that pays too much attention to social media anyway, but I kept noticing my engagement going down no matter what I did, and I was freaking out,” Turner said. “I was getting desperate not only because of that, but because I couldn’t find a management team or label to pick me up.”
Eventually, though, those worries subsided. Despite months of over-thinking, Turner realized it was about making it for herself, not depending on other people deciding she was good enough.
Turner has slowly made the transition to living in Los Angeles. She flies back and forth from Philadelphia once or twice a month, crashing on a fellow Idol contestant’s couch during her time in LA.
Since leaving Idol, Turner has released two singles: 21st Century Machine (her audition song) and Prom Queen. The connecting thread?
“I’m very moody and sad in my songs. It’s just who I am,” Turner said. “I need to express my emotions somehow and it’s just easier to write something good when I’m drawing on sadness instead of good times.”
Despite her struggles and young age (now still only 19), Turner is making moves for herself. She has found two co-managers that support her in everything she does, and she’s spent months writing in both Los Angeles and Nashville with other established co-writers. Turner hopes to release her debut EP by the end of the Summer.
Although Turner has enjoyed impressive streaming numbers (over 1,000,000 on 21st Century Machine), she’s noticed certain writers look over her ideas, often because she’s a woman.
“It was me, one of my male friends, and a songwriter having a conversation,” Turner said. I was talking about a possible line for a song and the other songwriter told me it was too wordy, but then my guy friend said it again, and suddenly the songwriter loved it. It’s those kinds of things where you don’t get the same validation for the same ideas.”
Regardless, Turner wouldn’t trade her job for anything else.
“It’s not easy being a female songwriter or artist, but the fact that I do it for a living is so cool,” Turner said. “No matter if it’s a little more difficult because I’m a woman or not, I wouldn’t trade it for anything else.”
Behind the Beats - Women in Music 