SFBG: Is touring close to what you imagined it would be?

SM: Absolutely. It’s basically exactly what I imagined it would be.

SFBG: That’s so funny. Anoop said the same thing. So no surprises?

SM: Yeah, isn’t that weird? Because you always think about, you know, you never know. People dream about it and they think about what it might be like, they speculate, and then you actually do it. And you hear a lot of stories about how hard it was and no one expected it to be that hard and that rigorous. But I’ve been dreaming about this since I was a little kid and honestly, to have my first major tour be a stadium tour is fantastic. And I’m very thankful to the fans for putting me here. I wouldn’t be anywhere without them, as far as playing these stadiums night after night. But I imagined it to be a lot worse than it is, actually.

SFBG: During what downtime you do have, have you been able to do anything around the Bay Area?

SM: Yeah, I grew up in Redondo Beach, California. So not while we’re on tour have I been able to get down there, but I saw some relatives while we were rehearsing in LA. And we were in San Francisco the other night, just with a few hours off, and went down to Pier 39, where Boudin [Bakery] and Ghirardelli Square are, and experienced all that. And you know, I’ve done some of those things before, but I love, when we do have time on the road, I love to go out and do something that’s unique to each city. Sometimes — in Tacoma, we literally drove into the venue, did the show, then drove out of the venue to the next city, over to Canada actually. So didn’t get to see any of Tacoma, but some cities we have a little more time — Portland, we were staying in San Francisco for some of these shows, and it’s really nice.

SFBG: How are you handling your newfound exposure? Are you having a lot of fans come up to you?

SM: You know, this whole thing is like an amazing dream. The American Idol experience — it’s really surreal, when you’re going through it, before it, and after the fact. And I haven’t even had enough time to wake up from the dream yet. Not that I want to wake up. But I haven’t had that time to sit back and actually realize, “Wow, did that just happen? Did I actually just do that?” And now all the sudden, people know my name and are coming up to me. It is a very different world, but honestly, American Idol as a show is so busy and such a whirlwind that you don’t realize what impact you’ve had on the world until you get kicked off the show. And then you get to meet all the fans and meet the press for the first time, in a major way, and you’re just kind of thrown into that life. There’s no time to adjust and say, “Wow, I can’t believe this many people support me and are excited about my music.” It’s just there, and you have to embrace it. And honestly, I’m very humbled that so many people would support me in my passion for music and pursuing this as a lifelong career.

SFBG: In terms of that career, have you given any thought to what you want to do after the tour?

SM: Every thought imaginable! I’m a very proactive person. I actually — as soon as I left the show, I was very fortunate to be able to begin work on my album. So that’ll be coming out in the fall after the tour.

SFBG: Congratulations!

SM: Thank you very much. And then on the songwriting end, because, in addition to what I write for myself, I’ve written in genres as diverse as punk-pop, R&B, I’ve written country, but that’s something I would love to continue doing now on a larger level. And I’ve received a lot of interest from some major publishers. While we were rehearsing in LA, I was using every spare minute to meet with people and just, you know, to try to meet with the people who wanted to meet me. There’s a period here where some of that can’t be sorted out till the end of August, but that’s what I’m trying to decide right now, to figure out which route to go. And I’ve been approached about writing a book. A lot of things are on the table, so I’m very excited to see where it goes. But after this tour, we’ll be looking at more tours.

SFBG: And hopefully some rest!

SM: Yeah, but I won’t be going anywhere. So you can look forward to a lot more from me.

SFBG: You probably get asked this a lot, but it’s been on my mind. With your visual impairment, have you had any problems on a tour that requires so much action and moving around on stage?

SM: You know, it’s actually better than the show. Because on the American Idol TV show, it’s not so much about the 500 people who are in the studio audience, but more about connecting to the millions of people at home through little television camera lenses. And that was one of the challenges for me, not only during the group numbers but with any performance, because I cannot see where the cameras are. I didn’t have the advantage of looking directly into a camera and really connecting with people, eye to eye, if that makes any sense. But now, it’s not about a TV show, it’s not about production, it’s about great music. And there’s not that level of finite detail, where you have to be looking at this lens at that time, and looking at that lens on the second verse, etc. Actually, all the camera work that’s done that you’ll see tonight is very free-flowing. There’s no script. It’s not the same each city. It’s different every time — they’re calling the shots as we go in real time. So there’s a lot more room for spontaneity on my part, which is great.

SFBG: Going back to the great music, is there any song you’ve sung that you never want to perform again?

SM: No. I can probably think of some song I’ve sung in my lifetime, but nothing that’s really relevant. Nothing on the show, nothing that I’m singing now. I have heard that some people on the tour are already thinking, “Ugh, am I going to have to do this same song 53 times? I’m getting tired of it.” But I am not tired of my set one single bit. I love the songs I chose. I’m doing “A Thousand Miles” by Vanessa Carlton and the Keane song “Bend and Break,” and I feel like they’re both really good representations of what people can expect from me as a songwriter, as an artist in the coming months. They’re a little bit more contemporary, a little bit more edgy than what I did on the show, and that’s kind of the direction I’ll be moving. So it’s the first time that we’ve really been able to have such a hand in the selection of our music, because there’s no Michael Jackson Week, no Grand Ole Opry Week, or Motown Week. It’s really a chance to show people who I am without all those filters. So it’s exciting.

SFBG: Are there songs you haven’t gotten to perform that you look forward to doing in the future? Aside from your own songs, that is.

SM: Yeah, absolutely. And a lot of what I’ll be doing in the future will be my own music, ‘cause that’s — Kara DioGuardi met me after the show and she heard my original music for the first time, and she said, “This is what you need to be doing.” When you sing your own music, you come alive. You just connect with people. It’s born and bred out of your own soul. It’s a different thing than singing a cover song. And every song I chose on the show, I had to believe in so that I could connect with people and connect with the song, but when it’s your own music and it’s actually well-written and well-crafted, it’s so powerful. Music and words together can say so much that you might not even be able to say in a conversation. It really breaks through all kinds of barriers. And one song, to kind of go back to your original question, the week after I left, I had already — we choose songs like three weeks in advance sometimes on the show, it’s crazy — but I was gonna sing “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” by Elton John. Which probably would have had a similar effect as when I sang “Just the Way You Are,” the Billy Joel song. The judges loved it, America loved it, and I didn’t get to do “Can You Feel the Love Tonight,” but it would have been another great moment. You know, I can always go back and do things like that in the future. But one of my favorite moments on the show was being able to do “Mandolin Rain” by Bruce Hornsby. That’s been a song that has influenced me for many, many years. I hadn’t performed it that much.

SFBG: And you exposed a lot of people to that song. It wasn’t as well known as a lot of the other song choices.

SM: Yeah, exactly. And it was like a number two in the year it was released on Billboard, I believe, but for some reason it’s not like some of his other works, which everyone knows because they’ve been remade into a rap song or something. It was really a chance for me to kind of revive it and contemporize it, but it’s a great song.

SFBG: Do you feel more freedom now that it’s not about people voting for you?

SM: Exactly, right. This is the most amazing place and time to be right now. Because when the world knows who you are, you can walk in any door of any company. It’s just been amazing the response I’ve gotten from the industry. Some people have been very excited about where this could all be heading. So like I said, there is a lot in store — I won’t give it all away — for the fall. But the album is coming out. It’s just an amazing opportunity I have to seize the moment and take a hold of this gift that the show and the people watching have given me, and to really run with it. I’ll be the last person to sit around wondering what I’m going to do next.

SFBG: Back to the touring experience, is there anyone you didn’t get to know well when you were in the show whom you’ve connected with on tour?

SM: I don’t know. I think I’ve gotten to know several people better. We always had a good time on the show, and now it’s a little bit different because there’s not that pressure of the competition. But honestly, I can’t single anyone out, but it’s a great group this year. We’re only beginning but we’re having so much fun on the road.

SFBG: What I really liked about Idol, especially this year, is that it wasn’t the kind of reality show that’s filled with fighting and drama. It really seemed like you all got along.

SM: Well, and this is the first year, I think, that we had no issues, they told us. No issues in the top 10 with anyone fighting or bickering or anything like that. I think they put us in the Idol mansion to see if something might happen. You know, they had cameras around there once in a while, but nothing ever developed. We never had any tension or anything like that. So you never really saw anything in the mansion, because there was nothing to show. The biggest argument that happened was between Matt [Giraud] and I in the basement on the keyboards, and we’d be dueling it out late at night. And of course I’d always win.

SFBG: He’s not here to defend himself!

SM: No, he’s not. He’s not. That’s right. We’ll have a rematch [onstage] tonight, though.

For more on Scott MacIntyre, visit his MySpace page.