X Factor 2007, painful showoffs, blah blah blah

Given that Steve Brookstein's been making some pretty good records under the pseudonym of "Burial," I guess anything's possible.

See, here's the thing:

When Will Young beat GGates, the judges had already placed their troth w/ Gareth. So, after having basically treated as Second by his new boss, it didn't take too long for him to not want Simon's control.

Since then, there's been paranoia on Simon's part about setting his stall against the winner.

Witness: When the lads group and the girls group were 1-2 in favour of the girls, Simon had a vote to go. If he had voted the lads, he could have potentially lost them when it came to the tiebreaker i.e. the phone-in votes. That's why he *had* to vote for "Hope".

Also, why all through the final show, he was the same vaguely supportive commentator all the way. And the lack of "OK judges, who do you think is tonights winner" type question *after* all the performances.

After all, why piss on your own meal ticket?

(thread enz)

I can't quite see what long term profits he's going to establish from a succession of well scrubbed, docile lads who'll sell for a month or two and then vanish, apart from the fact that he'll save lots of money from not having to hire songwriters since they'll all be forced to do cover versions. But then I don't think he really gets the point of music.

Save money? With cover versions he has to pay the publishers. With "new songs" he can *be* the publisher and take his cut.

But these acts aren't going to make long term profits full stop, so Cowell may as well just focus on being a "media celebrity" and not waste any time/money trying to be a recording mogul. Or just live off those Il Divo coinages.

Or, more likely, his Westlife residuals.

I'd guess record sales aren't the most important moneyspinner in Cowell's portfolio. And you only need 12 months of sales out of some guy if you're going to replace him next year.

Sorry, yeah, what Dom said. The illusion of being a recording mogul props up all the other bullshit tho.

I read his autobiography, (it was a cheap paperback), it was shockingly wrong in some places, to the extent where I thought "he's either winning by dumb lick, or he's giving nothing away"

e.g. one point where he says he'd have signed any songwriter that came to him and offered "Sorry seems to be the hardest word" and/or "Yesterday", without noticing that neither of those songs were exactly early in the respective songwriter's careers.

Having just heard the single, all I can think is that Leon IS Pat Kane. They've also given him Shayne Ward's set from 'That's My Goal'. And his moves. It's weird just how uncertain his voice sounds - it's a bit more characterful than Shayne, certainly, but by hell the kid sounds nervous.

Yeah, Pat Kane, good call!

Will he withdraw his LAYYBOURGH!!!

Probably not allowed under Cowell's 19th century workhouse contract.

Next year I want to see Malcolm McLaren on the judging panel.

Should I be embarrassed to say that I want to take Cheryl Cole and wrap her up in a soft tortilla and just eat her up?

I suppose I'm embarrassed enough to not start a new thread.

I NEED A PICTURE.

of me eating Cheryl Cole in a tortilla?

(me too)

ANYWAY, I'm hooked already, which is way earlier than usual for me. Do the judges seem nicer this year? I'm really liking the addition of CC who seems, against all odds, to be sweeter and more person-like than the other three, easily.

I really enjoyed tonight's episode. They obviously re-edited the entire thing after all the bad publicity this week, not just getting rid of all the sob stories but screwing up the usual order everything happens in every week.

Oh whoa! I didn't hear about the lying dude!

Cheryl's gotta be the favorite now that she made the unprecedented decision to pick the three best contenders out of her six (it helps that her three are probably the best three of the bunch--save perhaps that punchable dude with the triangle face and the biceps--Austin, is it?).

I'm going to jump in and say that I think either Ruth will win, or one of the two girl groups. Everyone else is either boring (all the girls, most of the boys), has the stench of failure (Steve Brookstein II), or is, as you say, punchable (Austin - pull it together man, it's all over the street)

all the girls

RONG

That said, I have zero track record in predicting these things. I think all three of the (younger) girls are actually awesome, which may not translate into will actually win.

I don't think any of them really really stand out. There's not a Leona Lewis there, or even a Chico. This year it's really about which mentor is going to beat their contenders into shape, and I think it's going to be Louis. But it's not going to be that boy band, 4LS or FLR or whatever they're called. Walsh has already got they crossing their legs in sync (it was right at the end of tonight's show). He can't think far beyond Boyzone/Westlife, but with the girls he doesn't have his usual tricks to fall back on.

The girl/woman that sang "Take another piece of my heart" is the only one I'd actually want to hear more from.

The others range from Good to mediocre.

I haven't seen who went through. So, tell me plz.

I've not seen any of this current series nor do I wish to but enough of these dull proper songs. Dale played "Superman" by Black Lace yesterday; less of the sob stories and more shave, go for a walk, macho man and whatever the rest of the routine was.

Cheryl chose:

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081005_p_alexandra.jpg
Alexandra
http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081005_p_diana.jpg
Diana
http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081005_p_laura.jpg
Laura

Simon chose:

Scott

Austin

Eoghan

Dani chose:

Daniel

Rachel

Ruth

Louis chose:

Bad Lashes

Girlband

JLS

For a minute I thought that was Bat For Lashes!

I knew the album didn't sell that well, but what a comedown!

Dunno why those links didn't work..

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081003_scottjhportraits.jpg

Scott

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081003_austinjhportraits.jpg

Austin

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081003_eoghanjhportraits.jpg

Eoghan

Daniel

Rachel

Ruth

Bad Lashes

Girlband

JLS

3 images max per post, dude.

Keep goin...

Fair enough.

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081003_dannyjhbootcamps.jpg
Daniel

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081003_racheljhportrait2s.jpg
Rachel

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081003_ruthjhportraits.jpg
Ruth

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081005_p_BadLashes.jpg
Bad Lashes

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081005_p_girlband.jpg
Girlband

http://xfactor.itv.com/_uploads/images/imagelibrary/Judges%27%20Houses/081005_p_JLS.jpg
JLS

Alexandra ftw

apart from Alexandra (who will win, hopefully) Cheryl made some really terrible decisions. basically she chose Winehouse wannabes who are too celeb obsessed to realise you have to have it before you can fall apart. Diana is 17 but looks like a 35 year old who has just had a drunken shag in the bushes. Laura (19) looks like an 45 year old alky who still looks fairly well preserved for her age.

i reckon Louis' group is even worse, though. I'm guessing that Girl Band will be first out. and his next two groups will follow fairly rapidly behind. he might have had a chance had he picked, 4 instinct, the family group.

Mark G, Hannah, the one who sung "Take another piece of my heart" did not get through. probably the worst decision of all.

Yep, Hannah was far, far better than Diana or Laura.

Does anyone else think that Daniel looks a bit like Ricky Gervais? Maybe the choreographers could work that in and get him to do that dance.

Yeah, she was so good on that Dreamgirls song that I sort of wished that I was watching it with Surmounter.

xxxpost fair enough with the Winehouse comparisons, but both of those girls can flat-out SING. I was totally rooting for 4 instinct, but I can see the logic that their disastrous boot-camp performance shows a lack of readiness for the 'big time'.

p.s. that Hannah girl was awful.

I wish I remembered who were the scarce few from the auditions who made me go "ok they've actually got something"... I'm not sure that any of 'em are in this final lot. Sad dad certainly wasn't one of them.

Have we had sad Elvis impersonator yet?

More questions:

The group who sang "umbrella" like their nan just died.

The lad who sang "She's out of my life" that Simon described as a 'life changing performance"

Both out, right?

I take it the old Saw Doctor guy was shown the door before boot camp....

i don't think either of them can sing.

xxxxpost

It was Austin who sang "She's out of my life" (still in).

"Umbrella" I think was Desire, who are out.

Oh fuck he didn't cry at the end of it did he?

He's cried at the end of every one of his performances, iirc.

I really fucking hate Austin.

Hannah out?

Right, officially not interested.

Props to Hannah for striding straight past Dermot O'Leary with a muttered "Yeah, I'm fine", rather than collapsing into his arms for the statutory weepathon.