Sunday, October 24, 2004
When Irish Eyes Aren't Smiling
So, X Factor finally got off to a proper start last night after what seems like years of heats and auditions. Has it succeeded in convincing the public that it's not just a quick knock-off of Pop Idol? Well, not really. On a purely superficial level, the set is a hell of a lot better, and Kate Thornton undoubtedly makes a prettier host than Ant and Dec, but ultimately it's quite clearly exactly the same show, except, and this is a big except, so we should probably put it in bold, except there's a twist, what could it be? Perhaps the act who gets thrown to sharks at the end, providing a bloody, though memorable finale to each episode? Maybe the highest rated act gets to slap the judge they like least? Umm, no, something far less uninspiring than that, but we'll get to that later, first the performances.
Voices With Soul were up first, and the seem to have shaken off a lot of their problems - the bellowing, the nerves, the fact they looked like a group of drunk girls on a hen night - and played the Diva card well with their rendition of Ain't No Mountain High Enough. Verity was up next, looking like an even more haggard version of Fern Britton. She did I Will Always Love You, during the chorus of which she hit various notes, occasionally stumbling on the right ones, seemingly more by luck than judgment. Roberta wore a dress that had apparently been customised from a shower curtain and did a performance that was the very definition of the word 'adequate'.
2 to Go did an excellent version of Don't Know Much, but were clearly styled by someone who was blind, ironically enough. Twinkly eyed Steve had a tinkly voice, as he'd been struck down with laryngitis that morning. Despite this, he didn't do too badly with his version of When a Man Loves a Woman. Cassie on the other hand might well have done a good version of her song, but we couldn't tell as we were too much in shock at the idea that someone thought that the best look for a 17 year old girl was that of a middle aged home-counties librarian.
The final three kicked off with G4 who's version of Everybody Hurts would have brought a tear to the eye of even the coldest hearted individual, then Rowetta did You Don't Have to Say You Love Me reasonably well but for us it lacked a certain "oomph" in the chorus. The last act up was Tabby who wore eyeliner, performed a guitar solo and had a dancing style that was heavily influenced by the Flappers of the 1920's.
Now, this is where it should, essentially, have ended. Public vote, Verity voted off for being entirely pointless and everyone would have been happy. Unfortunately, however, that was not the case. For this is where the twist comes in. For the public are only voting to decide the bottom two placings. These two then have a final sing-off, before the judges have to decide which of the two have to leave. When this was announced we had planned on having a bit of a moan about this and how it essentially means that the public can't be trusted to make the right decision. However, it transpires that they were quite right to do this as the public can't be trusted to make the right decision, voting, as they did, Roberta and Voices With Soul into the bottom two places. While Roberta being there is fair enough - she could be any other reasonably pretty girl singer for all the spark she has - there was no way on earth that VWS should have even been near the danger zone. The judges were quite aware of this and, while Sharon was duty bound to stick with the matt finish of Roberta, Louis and Simon both went with the gloss of VWS, leaving Roberta as the first to return to her normal life, except she can't, as she quit her job, so convinced was she that she was going to win the hearts and minds of the nation. Ah well, one thing that can be said for this genre of television is that it does often live up to it's name and provides the more McDonald's-worthy contestants with a severe reality check.
