  We generalize the soft-wall and hard-wall models to a light-front holographic
QCD model with a generic dilaton profile. The effective potential induced by a
higher power dilaton profile is interpreted as a stronger color confinement at
long distance, and it gradually evolves to the hard-wall model when the power
increases to infinity. As an application, we investigate the exotic meson
states recently discovered in experiments in the generic soft-wall model with a
higher power dilaton profile, and the results are in agreement with the spectra
of the exotic mesons. Our calculation indicates a weaker interaction at short
distance and a stronger interaction at large distance for the components in the
exotic mesons. The generic dilaton profile deserves further scrutiny for
understanding the strong interaction and for applications.
