American Idol cut MacKenzie Bourg and determined its farewell season's Top 3 finalists during Thursday night's broadcast on Fox.

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After receiving the lowest amount of home viewer votes following the prior week's performance show -- when MacKenzie sang "I Want You To Want Me" for his classic rock pick and "Titanium" by Sia -- America sent MacKenzie, a 23-year-old musician from Lafayette, LA, home.

MacKenzie was ousted from the competition on Thursday following a beautiful tribute to his hometown in which he sang "Hallelujah." He had never landed in the bottom two or three before. His departure named Trent Harmon, La'Porsha Renae and Dalton Rapattoni the Top 3 artists on Idol this season.

On Friday, MacKenzie talked to reporters during a conference call about his American Idol experience. Below is the concluding portion of what he had to say. To read more, click here and here.

What is your personal favorite love song?

MacKenzie Bourg: I like the song that I wrote, "Roses." I think it's a pretty cool love song and I don't know, yeah, that's what mine is.

Who are you thinking of when singing that song or any other love ballads?

MacKenzie Bourg: The easiest way to sing love songs on the show is to kind of stare at JLo in the eyes, and it kind of works sometimes whenever she realizes. (Laughs) She commented on it a few times this year, but yeah, that's definitely who I'm channeling when I'm on the show.

How did it feel to have "Roses" playing in the background of your goodbye package? You must've gotten emotional hearing your own song play.

MacKenzie Bourg: It was great! You know, the only thing I really was bummed about was that my coronation song was going to be "Roses," and that was going to be the first time ever they said an original song would've been that. But it's all going to work out. I think so because I'm going to get to release "Roses" as my single, and that's kind of all being worked out right now.

What was it like for you to enter that ICU room when you visited your hometown? It must've been a pretty powerful moment.

MacKenzie Bourg: Yeah, the whole visit, I mean, the hospital is actually -- where I was at in the ICU is being completely redone, so it added to the, I guess, spookiness of it all because the whole rest of the hall was empty and they kind of just recreated the exact room I was in.

So, I didn't really know what to expect, and then I walked in and realized it. I don't know, it was kind of a lot to handle, but it was definitely something very powerful and moving for me to do.

You mentioned in a previous interview your experience on American Idol was much different from The Voice because Idol allowed you to be your true self. Could you elaborate on that a little bit?

MacKenzie Bourg: Yeah, absolutely. I think American Idol has done me so many favors just by not trying to change me, by letting me be myself. I feel like me with just the guitar and just going up there and singing as if I was in my room has really kind of resonated with so many millions of people in the country.

So, I'm just thankful every day that they've given me the opportunity to do that and even to perform a song that I wrote -- twice -- on national TV. I couldn't have asked for a better time on the show.

Are you sad about there being no American Idol tour? At least there's been no announcement of one yet.

MacKenzie Bourg: No, I think it's going to actually be -- the tour would've been fun, but it also kind of takes away from taking that first step in being a new artist. I think it would kind of take away from putting an album together and setting up, you know, a solo tour. I think a lot of the time, everyone gets so caught up in the Idol tour that there's not a lot of time to put together something meaningful music-wise.

If you had made it through to the finale week, did you have any songs in mind to sing other than "Roses?"

MacKenzie Bourg: The only ones we had, well, I was going to do "Roses" as the coronation and "Billy Jean" as my repeat performance.

Any final remarks?

MacKenzie Bourg: Thank you guys! I appreciate it. There will be some exciting stuff happening in the next few weeks.

To read more from MacKenzie's post-American Idol interview, click here and here.


About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski

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