That goofy guy with the funny hair who suddenly seemed as if he couldn’t care less about winning “American Idol”?
Yeah, that’s pretty much who Jason Castro is – except that, it turns out, he really did want to win.
Castro chatted with reporters this afternoon and one thing he quickly refuted – punctuating it with that halting giggle familiar to “Idol” viewers – was that he didn’t intentionally flub his lyrics to “Mr. Tambourine Man” Tuesday night simply as a way to guarantee a goodbye trip from the show.
“I definitely did not do that on purpose,” he said. “I couldn’t believe I forgot such a popular line that’s, like, written on your soul. Somehow it slipped my mind, but I definitely didn’t do that on purpose … As of yesterday, I wanted to win. I think what it came down to is my inexperience. Once we doubled up on songs, I just wasn’t really being able to focus on both my songs. My mind was just split and I just couldn’t deliver either/or, and I think that’s what it came down to.”
Unlike many of the top 10, the 21-year-old Castro had little performing experience heading into the show. He started playing guitar his freshman year of college and singing shortly thereafter.
“I would learn songs, but I wouldn’t learn them all the way through,” he said with a drawn-out laugh, adding that prior to his callback audition on “Idol,” he performed about 10 or 12 times around his native Texas, and the longest set he ever played was 30 minutes.
Castro said, somewhat regretfully, that he didn’t think he’d be heading home yet because the “Idol” crew was going to New York next week and then he would return to Los Angeles for the show’s finale.
“I just miss home,” he said. “I love being home in the summer. I kinda miss working the summers with my dad.”
Castro’s father runs a custom-design swimming pool company; the “Idol” castoff said he liked helping out by surveying lots and cleaning pools.
But most amusingly, Castro didn’t deny the perception that many had of him as a spacey dude and believes the show portrayed him accurately.
“I am a goofy person. I am kind of an awkward conversationalist—I’m doing my best right now—but all my friends, they love it because what you see is what you get,” he said. “I didn’t change at all coming out here. That’s me.”
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