"American Idol" alumnus Elliott Yamin [ tickets ] is hitting the media circuit hard over the next couple of months as he prepares to launch the second leg of his North American tour.

The singer/songwriter is set to hit the road once again beginning Oct. 5 in Chicago. He'll make his way from the Midwest to the West Coast, visiting a couple of Canadian provinces along the way, through late November. Fellow pop/R&B singer Josh Hoge and breaking pop-rock band The Last Goodnight will open for Yamin during the club/theater trek, details of which are listed below.

Before the outing gets under way, Yamin will make several television appearances on shows including soap opera "The Bold and the Beautiful," "Rachael Ray" and the "VH1 Top 20 Countdown." He'll also perform a few dates in the UK and the Philippines next month. Yamin's full schedule is available at his MySpace page.

The Richmond, VA-based singer is supporting his self-titled debut, which surfaced in March and snagged the No. 3 spot on The Billboard 200. The set also hit No. 1 on the magazine's Top Independent Albums chart and No. 11 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart.

Yamin was the second runner up behind Taylor Hicks and Katherine McPhee in last year's "American Idol" competition on FOX-TV. Early in the race, the ever-prickly Simon Cowell declared Yamin "potentially the best male vocalist in the history of 'American Idol.'"

That was quite a compliment for the 28 year old, who came to the show with no vocal training and no real performance experience. In fact, he was so shy about his talent as a child that he would lip-sync in choir.

The shyness stemmed from that fact that Yamin is 90 percent deaf in one ear and suffers from Type 1 diabetes. With his newfound fame, he is serving as role model for kids with diabetes and raising money for the cause.

Though Yamin is still riding high on his lead single, "Wait For You," he is already looking forward to his sophomore album.

"I'm real excited to really start getting into recording the next record and doing even bigger and better," the singer told LiveDaily during a recent interview. "I'm always thinking ahead. You gotta stay on top of things in this business and think ahead or you can get left behind really quick."