Kelly Clarkson is looking back on her “American Idol” days.
A year after winning the first season of the singing competition show in 2002, Clarkson passed the torch to Ruben Studdard. Clay Aiken was the runner-up during that second season, but the talk show host didn’t remember it that way.
“We spent a lot of time,” Clarkson, 42, recalled on Monday’s episode of “The Kelly Clarkson Show” while talking to Aiken. “We toured after you won. The Independent tour I think what it was called.”
Aiken, 46, opened his eyes in shock before he quipped, “After I came in second.”
“You what?” Clarkson asked before her guest reiterated, “After I came in second!”
“So sorry, Ruben. I totally remember that,” Clarkson said to the camera. “Look, I’m 42, bro. I forgot, yes.”
But Aiken, who is back on the Music scene with his new holiday album “Christmas Bells Are Ringing” after a 12-year hiatus, understood the mix-up.
“It’s been 20 years,” he reminisced. “We are both getting older.”
“For some reason in my brain, ya’ll are on different shows,” Clarkson explained, “because I know that, speaking of Christmas, ya’ll did ‘The Christmas Show.’”
That wasn’t the only project Aiken and Studdard, 46, did together.
“We did a show on Broadway together, too,” the singer continued. “We went on tour last year for the 20th anniversary and I’m sure we’ll do stuff again. I mean we’re sort of inseparable.
“I think we’re better together than apart,” he added.
The duo has stayed close over the years, with Clarkson adding, “It’s such an odd couple of seeing you two, but it so works.”
Along with making music, Aiken also dipped his foot into politics, running for Congress in North Carolina as a Democrat in 2022.
The artist did not win and previously lost a run for the 2nd Congressional District in North Carolina, in what was considered to be a safe Republican seat, in 2014.
Aiken, who is a dad to Parker, 16, whom he co-parents with Jaymes Foster, revealed why he wanted to try something new.
“My son got to the age where I didn’t want to be away,” he said. “I wanted to be home more often, so I wanted to do what would allow me to be in one place all the time. And I thought I could make a difference with that. Nobody makes a difference in politics.”
Instead, Aiken is ready to return to the music industry.
“I did that for 10 years and sort of decided I hate all of them and at the same time I realized that Parker is now 16 and he wants me to leave as much as possible now,” he elaborated. “So the whole idea of coming back to music was because he wants me out of the house some now.”
All kidding aside, Aiken added, “Music can make people happier.
“And I thought the politics thing could improve people’s lives but it doesn’t and music does,” he concluded. “It makes people escape from their problems, so I realized I could probably do better with music.”
