by Moe Zilla

Created on: May 13, 2010

He'd never even seen American Idol, according to Wikipedia. And at the age of 27, Casey James was the oldest person ever to be selected for the show's top 24 after nine years on the air. But as he first plowed his way into the Top Three, good-looking Casey remembered that he'd overcome some real hardship to make his way to the Idol stage. At the age of 21, Casey crashed his motorcycle in an accident - and was initially told by doctors that he would never play the guitar again.  "I remember thinking this truly is the end of my life," Casey said in his first interview on the show.

He'd survived multiple compound fractures to his femur, arms, and wrists, and "There's quite a bit of pain that I go through on a day-to-day basis," Casey revealed. But six years later, he'd traveled nearly 1,000 miles to an infamous audition for American Idol in Denver, performing John Mayer's "Slow Dancing in a Burning Room" as contestant #16678..  (One MTV reviewer described it as the "'questionably talented' portion" of the show, calling him "a good-looking kid who survived a motorcycle accident".)  Casey "was just happy to be there," Ryan said in the introduction to the segment. But Casey said his goal for the audition was simply to make it to Hollywood, because "If I can just get there, I really think I have a shot."

His pivotal audition was painful, with the judges on the panel divided two-and-two against him.

"This is a bad audition," said Simon.
"I totally disagree," said Kara DioGuardi. "I like Casey."
"Really?" asked Randy Jackson in surprise...

Simon:  No charisma. No effort. No attempt.
Kara: But he's got a good voice. He does.  
Simon: Doesn't matter.
Kara:     It does matter....

Casey's luck changed only because of a simple question from the fourth judge on the panel - guest judge Victoria Beckham (the former Spice Girl known as Posh). "What do you look like with your hair down?" Casey dramatically undid his pony tail, and both Kara and Victoria said, nearly simultaneously, that he had a great look. And then, as Casey held his breath, Kara, Randy, and Victoria continued debating over
whether to wave him through to the next level. Randy later described the difficult vote as "the boys against the girls." Kara told Casey he'd need to work on his personality, and that's when the interview took a weird turn that would haunt Casey for the rest of the season - and possibly even define his career.

"I'm willing to do anything that I need to do," Casey

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