Catching up with Gina Glocksen

We chatted with Gina Glocksen, one of the pioneers of "American Idol's" rocker girl category last week as she took a break from rehearsing for her 15-city American Stars in Concert tour.

Q: Congratulations on your wedding. It sounded very fun.

GG: Thank you very much. It was very, very, very fun. It was 
like the dream wedding. I wish that I could've had more people there, 
but it's really hard to ask performers to come and spend time with me 
on my day on New Year's Eve when they could be making tons of money.

Q: How many people did you have there?

GG: I had 300. It was very good-sized wedding.

Q: Has marriage changed everything?

GG: No. All my friends, my married friends kept telling me that 
it doesn't change since we'd been living together for four years 
anyway, but it's actually so much more romantic. I love it.

Q: What is your life like these days?

GG: It's like a roller coaster ride. My highs are really high, 
and my lows are really low. There are times when I'm not doing 
anything and I'm so bored at home. I'm very limited as to how well I 
can play the piano so it's hard for me to write what I want to write. 
But I sit at home and write a lot of lyrics. So I have a lot of 
lyrics, but I'm back and forth from Nashville to L.A. to Chicago 
because I have a producer here who's working on three or four songs on 
album. Her name is Sam Maloney and she was the drummer for Hole and 
she toured with Motley Crue. In Nashville I'm working with Adam Smith, 
who's a producer and is actually the co-writer of "List of Regrets," 
which is going to be my first single, which is on my website.

Q: Is all the travel hard?

GG: No. The only thing hard about it is leaving Joe, my husband. 
Other than that, I know he's going to be there, and so when we got 
married I had less of a problem leaving [laughs].

Q: What's been the biggest challenge then in the last couple of 
years?

GG: I would say that the biggest challenge is trying to get 
people to remember me and to recognize that I'm serious about being an 
artist, that I wasn't just some girl on a TV show who stopped there. I 
want to move on with my music and keep my career going further and 
higher in the industry. I just wish that "American Idol" wasn't a 
double-edged sword, meaning I feel like a lot of labels will see that, 
"OK, Gina Glocksen from 'American Idol.' Here's a girl who just kind 
of wants to be. She's not serious, maybe. Maybe she just wants the fame 
part of it." Yes, I'm doing it for the fame, but I'm also doing it for 
the love of music. I love to perform. I love to sing.

Q: Do you think the rocker girl category coming out of "Idol," 
that there's a strange ...

GG: Like how people think of you?

Q: That it's just kind of a funny fit, "American Idol" and that 
category?

GG: Yeah. There was a show on for two seasons called "Rock Star,"
and I was a huge fan of that. I would've loved to have gone on that 
show, because everybody is there for the same genre of music and they 
all had the same look. So if you had a certain color in your hair or 
your hair looked different, that was the cool thing to do. It wasn't 
like that was the weird thing to do. On "Idol," it's very middle 
America. You have to go along with the fads. "You have bangs? That 
girl is cool. She has bangs. I'm going to vote for her." That's not 
what the show is supposed to be about, but unfortunately I think that 
sometimes it gets to that point.

Q: What are the things about your life that have changed since 
you were on the show?

GG: Well, the people that I've encountered. Before I was on 
"Idol" there were people in my life and I thought that they were going 
to stay there forever and be a big part of my life, when in actuality 
they were just kind of holding me back and hurting me a little bit. 
But meeting the people ...

Q: Professional relationships?

GG: No. Just personal relationships. Meeting people that are 
goal-driven like I am and helping me move forward in my life and not 
kind of holding me back.

Q: You have the tour coming out, and so what's ahead for you? 
Your single is coming out.

GG: Yeah. I'm really, really hoping that after the tour I can 
just get this album together and put it on iTunes and start having 
America listen to who I am and the music that I love to sing because 
I'm not just all about rock. I look the part, yes, but I'm a ballad 
power singer. I love ballads. And you'll see on the tour that most of 
my songs are ballads.

Q: What songs are you doing on the tour?

GG: I'm doing "Alone" by Heart. An original called "Just Me."   
"Gravity" by Sara Bareilles, and "I Want To Hold Your Hand" by the 
Beatles, but it's a different version. It's the version from "Across 
the Universe," the movie. That's what Jordin [Sparks]sang at my wedding.

Q: You had some great moments at your wedding.

GG: First and foremost it was Jordin and Haley [Scarnato] just being 
bridesmaids and having Jordin sing. So many highlights.

Q: You had a rock tour bus?

GG: Yes. We had a tour bus for a limo. Joe's ring, he picked out 
a ring a while ago and I knew that he didn't like it, but was just 
kind of settling for it, and so I got him a very extravagant ring, one 
that I knew he wanted, and it's a very rocker ring. It's got studs on 
it and everything. I surprised him with it at the altar and that was a 
big moment. I put it in Pickle's mouth, the same little guy. So many. 
His band was actually our entertainment and so he was onstage the 
whole time. I got to sing. You never see a bride and groom 
entertaining their wedding and we were the entertainment for the 
wedding. Charlotte Gibson was a background singer for "Idol" on 
seasons, what, 3 to 7. She was there. The stylist from 'Idol' 
came. My hairdresser from "Idol" came. It just made a lot of good 
connections.

Q: When you visit the show now, do you still have the memories of your 
time there?

GG: Of course. When I walked in to the show yesterday because I 
was there for the results show I just looked down the hallways and I 
just envisioned my season walking through those halls and the things 
that we did and people that were in a fight. Like, "I had a fight with 
that person there. Oh, I really miss that." Even driving in I got a 
little melancholy, seeing people line up with different signs. You 
expect to see a sign saying "We Love Gina," but instead it says "We 
Love Adam Lambert." It's hard to not get stuck in the season that you 
were in.

Q: Do you think that a lot of people who come out have a hard 
time putting that behind them and moving forward?

GG: I think they are. I'm very big on memories and it's hard for 
me to let that go, and I know that I should.

— Richard Rushfield