Soon after Katelyn Epperly, Lilly Scott, Todrick Hall, and Alex Lambert were eliminated from American Idol, they opened up about their experiences on a press call.

Iowa’s Katelyn Epperly came on to the Idol scene after dealing with some family hardships. While on the show, Katelyn had many looks and sounds. She said her most memorable moment on American Idol was “playing ‘The Scientist’ with that white piano. I’m definitely in my element when I’m just sitting behind the keys without a band, just super raw and intimate. So I definitely had my own personal moment while I sang that song…It’s definitely a song that comes to mind when I think about anything hard that I’ve had to do, of any sort of loss. It’s a very touching, riveting song. I remember I covered it a lot this summer and it helped me cope with a lot of things that I was going through and it definitely is a song that is sad, but also hopeful.”

With such a connection to Coldplay’s “The Scientist,” how did she feel after the judges told her the song was too slow? Katelyn said, “That was okay with me. I was waiting for that comment. I wanted to do it slow. I wanted to focus on the lyrics and the song, it just cries. And I wanted that to be portrayed and I think I portrayed it despite what the judges might have thought.”

Katelyn has never had too many girl friends, and she said she didn’t expect to get along with everyone so well. “Lilly and I were best friends throughout,” Katelyn shared. “We were roommates throughout the show and we hung out all the time. So, I mean, it was kind of ironic that we both got eliminated on the same day, but maybe it happened for a reason.”

What’s next for Katelyn? She said she plans on going back “to Des Moines and start working and continue to pursue recording and writing music with all sorts of different artists…I’m going to get together with a band called Lovedrug and hopefully start writing some music with them as well as other artists. Just getting back in the studio and getting back to what I truly love to do.”

Colorado indie rocker Lilly Scott had her reasons for auditioning this season. “Originally trying out this year I really just kind of wanted to break the mold and just kind of be that offbeat contestant that did exactly what I wanted to do and really just kind of explained myself as an artist with my song choice and I definitely have no regrets in that department.” Lilly stayed true to herself, even if that meant performing songs by older artists such as Patsy Cline.

If Lilly could work with anyone, she said, “I would love to meet Thom Yorke from Radiohead and people like Björk, just really kind of like the King and Queen of the Indie world. They’re really kind of who I strive to be like as an artist and their fan base is so huge and they are so respected as an artist, every album they put out. I would love to collaborate with someone like them.”

What’s next for the songbird? “I definitely feel like I would fit in the big summer festival circuit, doing things like Coachella and Bonnaroo and really doing some mass touring. I know that I can have a whole entire different kind of audience coming out to shows if I did tour. And recording is definitely on my list of things to do.”

The 20 year old wanted to let everyone know “that American Idol has been a great experience and that I really appreciated meeting everyone and it has been a wonderful stepping stone to everything awesome that I’m going to do with my career.”

Todrick Hall, the 24 year old dancer from Texas talked about the type of music he sang, versus the type of music people wanted him to sing. People suggested that he sing R&B songs, but that’s just not Todrick. “I’m happy that I stayed true to myself, but I kind of sadly feel that if I had just sung the cookie cutter songs that people would have expected me to do, and not gone so far out there with the clothes and the performing and just been a normal guy that got up there and sang semi-decent, I feel like I would have maybe done better, but I’m happy that I stayed true to myself because I think that’s most important and I would have not been happy doing that.”

While on the show, Todrick made a lot of close friends. “My best friend was Jose Munoz,” Todrick shared. “He was the first guy that I met when I was there and I took him to see The Color Purple with me. He hadn’t really seen hardly any Broadway musicals. So I was probably the closest to him and to Alex Lambert because Alex was my roommate. And those are probably the two people that I’m going to miss the most from the show.”

Todrick talked about being a dancer on the show. “It did come in handy for the performing aspect, but actually that kind of like hindered me. I was always so frustrated during the rehearsals because I’d be like, ‘Come on, guys! Left, right, left, right.’  And then I had to be like, Todrick, they’re not dancers. So that was kind of one of the things that I had to kind of let my dance background go and realize that this is not that; we’re in a singing competition.”

What’s the musical playwright/actor/dancer’s next gig? “I’m making it my personal job now to be my own campaign manager to get myself a role on Glee,” Todrick stated. “I think I would be perfect for that show and so every time somebody asks me what I’m doing now I’m just telling everyone that I would love, love, love to be the next cast member on Glee. And I didn’t even think about campaigning for that until they said the other night, Simon said, “Well, you look like you are doing ‘American Idol the Musical.’ And then Randy chimed in and said Glee. And I was like, ‘Actually, I think I would love to be on Glee.’ It’s the perfect show for me and that’s the reason I came on American Idol, to hopefully take this platform and do something else with it.”

Alex Lambert, Ellen DeGeneres’s unripe-turned-ripe-turned-mushy banana was also eliminated the week before the finals. The 19 year old explained how nerves got the best of him. “Every time I got up there I couldn’t even sing my best because I was so nervous. I have a whole other series of songs that I can sing that sound so much better than what I sing on the show. I don’t regret anything because this is like the beginning of my career. I have never really been on stage before so I think I did great for like how good I did for not having any experience.” Alex said that with a few more weeks under his belt, he thinks he would have overcome his nervousness.

When the Texas native sang John Legend’s “Everybody Knows,” he received great reviews. “I chose that song because it’s usually a song that I do on ukulele and it’s just a song that I was completely comfortable with. I knew I could play it on the guitar pretty easy and I had a good picking pattern for it and I knew that I could do it without being nervous and that’s pretty much the reason I picked it. And it means a lot to me. That song was like my favorite song for a long time because stuff was happening in my life that really related to it, so I felt like I could really connect with that song.”

Alex says he knows exactly what kind of artist he wants to be. “I really would like to do a bunch of acoustic stuff, but I would also like to be on some R&B tracks and like a whole bunch of different stuff. I know my voice and I know what I can and can’t do and I know what would sound good on what.”

There’s no question that Alex has come a very long way. “Before American Idol I had performed at a few coffee shops. The most people that ever showed up was probably like 40 people, and most of the people there were my friends and my family. So, I don’t have any experience singing in front of people that I don’t know, so that was like the main problem for me. But I feel like if I had more experience like the sky’s the limit for me.”