Former judge Randy Jackson, who had served as a mentor on the previous season, left the show and was succeeded by Big Machine Records founder Scott Borchetta.

[3][4] Long-time sponsor Coca-Cola ended its relationship with the series, and the Ford Motor Company maintained a reduced role.

[5][6] To evaluate their ability to perform in front of a live audience, the final 48 contestants participated in a private concert at the House of Blues in West Hollywood before being cut to 24.

[6] A new feature was also introduced, where viewers could vote via Twitter to decide which of the bottom two singers from the previous week would advance.

[9] The American Idol "Audition Bus Tour" visited the following cities: Portland, Oregon; Portland, Maine; Reno, Nevada; Columbus, Ohio; Richmond, Virginia; Albuquerque, New Mexico; Amarillo, Texas; Myrtle Beach, South Carolina; Branson, Missouri; Tallahassee, Florida; and Kansas City, Missouri.

After Hollywood Week, contestants performed in the Showcase round in front of a live audience at the House of Blues in Los Angeles.

[19] After the top 10 finalists were determined by the public vote, the judges chose two additional contestants to advance to the finals as Wild Card picks.

Quentin Alexander performed "Light My Fire" and "Shake It Out," but he lost the Twitter vote and was eliminated.

Rayvon Owen performed "Want to Want Me", "As", and "You Are So Beautiful"; however, he was revealed to have had the lowest vote count from the previous week and was eliminated.

After Alexander had left the stage, Connick Jr. said, "Quentin, if it's that whack, then you can always go home, because Idol is paying a lot of money to give you this experience and for you to say that to this hand that is feeding you right now, I think is highly disrespectful."

Alexander was then prompted by the producers to return to the stage, where he approached the judges and clarified that he meant the two being potentially eliminated was whack, not the show nor the experience.

[33] Judge Jennifer Lopez empathized with Alexander's emotions running high, but said that as an artist, he would have to learn to work through that even when putting on a performance.

[34] Joey Cook commented after being eliminated on Alexander's statements: I pretty much just told him what he did was beautiful, in my opinion, and it was the perfect representation of him.

[36][37] An Idol source also stated that for fairness purposes, the judges and contestants had a strict wall of silence between them and only interact onstage so Connick Jr. and Alexander have not had contact since last week.

"[38] Yahoo's managing editor Lyndsey Parker detailed many points that she argued was American Idol "throwing Quentin Alexander under the tour bus" referring to the idiom of "throwing [someone] under the bus" by sacrificing a friend as the show heavily promoted the summer tour, which only guaranteed that the top five finalists would be included.

[39] Included in her critique was that the show had aired the promotional video featuring the confrontation, which she characterized as "misleadingly edited" to boost ratings.

Quentin’s perfectly solid “Light My Fire” received one of only two negative critiques among the night’s dozen performances, and undeservedly so.

Parker also referenced a "backhanded and unflattering" exchange from Connick Jr. insinuating that Alexander needed Auto-Tune.

However, it was up 6.3% from the thirteenth season's finale (which had an audience of 10.53 million viewers), the second time in the show's history[citation needed].