I've never been a fan of the reality-talent-finder type show. In fact I'm not too keen on any reality show preferring to watch some dark Scandinavian drama series such as the fabulous Borgen, The Killing or Wallander or the French-made Spiral all of which with the English subtitles facilitate my increasingly cloth-eared state. That will tell you something about me which may or may not be too healthy!
Whilst friends stayed with us over Easter they expressed an interest in watching The Voice as they had been following it for the last few weeks .... of course we went with it and this Saturday found, whilst on our own, a being drawn into The Voice .... this is what these shows do .... they insidiously get their tendrils around you and lo and behold you're caught up in the whole shebang and the next thing you know you're rooting like mad for Jaz Ellington!
Admittedly The Voice does have a preferable format to the X Factor/Pop Idol/Britains Got Talent routine whereby there was, to my mind, the indescribably awful build ups, deafening drum-rolling scene-setting, yawning moments of suspense and endless emotional sob-stories; the contestants in this show are not known by name or seen by the judges and are assessed only by their voices alone.
But here's the thing ... the judges. We have Danny O'Donague who I thought must be Feargal (The Undertones) Sharkey's much younger brother. We have Will.i.am - a seemingly thoughtful and likeable black guy. But now I must turn my attention to .... da-da drum roll ... the remaining two judges.... Firstly there is Tom Jones. Well I think I'm in love. Tom it seems has morphed into an utterly adorable, charming, sexy, mature man with an irresistible smile and laconic manner. What happened to him? Perhaps he is still the raunchy, thrusting performer at which middle-aged women feel compelled to launch their panties when he is singing but here there is no sign of the orange tan, the shoe-black hair or the overt sexuality. ... No, here we have a REAL man and I'm truly smitten.
Then there is Jessie-J. Now at this point I'm probably going to upset a lot of you ... but really isn't this woman whose speaking voice is pitched somewhere between Romford, Essex and the middle of the Atlantic ocean, just one of the most affected, camera-hogging, gobby women to be on TV short of Davina McCall? "Oh no the camera's on me" as she waves her nail extensions underneath her false eyelashes in a mock-cry. Let those who can sing - as I'm sure she does very well having sold 12-million records - sing. BUT please don't let them loose to feed their egos on the unsuspecting public each saturday night.
Oh well - it's the brilliant US Homeland on Sundays acted out by our very own Damian Lewis
and as for Saturday evenings .... well there'll always be a good book to turn to.
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