Technically, there are still two weeks left in the season. However, whatever the outcome two Wednesdays from now turns out to be, some conclusions are pretty clear. This season is ready to stand beside the likes of Seasons Three and Six in the roster of infamous Idol seasons.
The list of crimes this season committed are long, and I can’t hope to list all of them. So, for now, let’s just focus on one thing: the music. Or, rather, the lack of it.
Up to this point, Season Eight has featured 120 performances on voting nights. We can expect six songs each week, bringing the total to 132. Sounds like a lot, right? Well, let’s put that in context. Last year had 156 songs – just like Seasons Four and Five, and only four more than Season Six. That’s a 15.4% decrease in the number of songs – and less, in fact, than any other season except Season One. (Marginally, to be fair – Seasons Two and Three had 136 each.)
It gets worse if you look at the numbers for the contestants who get to the end. The two Davids each left the season with a total of 20 performances. So did the finalists of two other seasons – Seasons Four and Five. Thanks to losing one week of double-song nights due to Idol Gives Back, Jordin Sparks and Blake Lewis only put under 19 performances. Ruben Studdard, Fantasia Barrino, and Diana DeGarmo had one less performance – 18 for each. (Due to passing through the wildcard, Clay Aiken had 19.)
And this year? The finalists will leave with, in all likelihood, at most 16 performances. That’s less than any other season except… Season One. That’s a 20% decrease for, supposedly, the very best of the season to get a chance to show off their music.
Why is this relevant? Why, you may ask, have I fixated on this seemingly obscure statistic? It’s illustrative of perhaps the biggest problem this season has had.
Two things help American Idol do so well, both as a TV show and as a cultural phenomenon: music and public participation. It may have needed the added drama that reality TV loves to get it started, but it doesn’t. Not anymore. (Yes, I said drama was the other part. I was wrong then, in hindsight.)
Take away either leg, and like the Tower of Babel the Idol giant starts to fall. It’s that simple. However, this year, the Idol powers that be have done their best to undermine both. This is not a formula for success.
How has the music been undermined? After all, aren’t these supposedly The Most Talented Contestants Ever? (Never mind that they say that every year?)
First of all, as I detailed above, we’re seeing less performances than before. The reason is clear to anyone who’s watching the shows: the level of “filler” and talking has gone up, and the actual singing has gone down. Adding a fourth judge has turned out to be a remarkably dumb idea so far. Kara hasn’t been a disaster by herself, but has she really added anything new to the show? In our book, no. The downside, though, is clear: the three other judges never adjusted to her presence – the necessary adjustment being talking less. One might as well ask Randy and Paula to stop talking less at about the same time as you’d ask a politician to waste less money.
However, I can imagine the reaction to that already: it’s not quantity, it’s quality, you ignorant fool! And, to some degree, I agree with that. However, have the performances really been that good? Let’s see.
If one looks at the What Not to Sing numbers, you’d think this would be a good season. After all, the season average stands at 51.2 – highest of any season to date. However, as I said at the turn of the year when I looked at song age, averages isn’t everything.
What may well be more important than the average is how many performances are well-regarded by the Idolsphere. And in that, this season has done poorly. There have only been 14 performances that earned a five-star rating; four-star performances total only 32. In both categories, that’s a significant drop not just from last year, but from earlier seasons as well. The only area of improvement in in one-star ratings: there are less of those than any other season to date, and unless Danny Gokey decides to reprise The Scream from on, it’ll stay that way.
Just as problematic is the distribution of performances. There were some very good singers who went pretty far – Adam Lambert, Kris Allen, and Allison Iraheta have all been pretty strong singers. Beyond those three, however, the picture is much less rosy. Alexis Grace went home far earlier than she should have, and the rest ranges from the maddeningly inconsistent (Anoop Desai and Matt Giraud) to the downright terrible (Megan Joy, Scott Macintyre, Lil Rounds towards the end).
In short, what we had this year was a relatively small number of very good people holding up a mediocre top 12 overall. That’s not a recipe for a good season. Sitting through two or more miserable performances for each gem week after week gets old after some time, and that’s clearly where we’ve gotten to right now. It tends to be true to some degree every season, but it’s especially true this year.
It’s especially clear, then, that the music has suffered this year. What about the public participation? Well, that has gone downhill too.
Let’s begin with the top 12 that America voted into the finals… or, more correctly, the top 8. Four contestants were chosen by the judges themselves, in what can only be called a complete and utter sham.
It’s hard to underestimate the damage the “improved” semifinals did. Going back to the group format, by itself, was bad enough – but the matter how it was done was even worse. As I predicted, the groups were cleverly manipulated to get favored contestants through – or, conversely, the unpimped out. By far, it largely succeeded. The only two contestants who were largely unpimped but managed to squeak through to the finals were Kris Allen and Allison Iraheta.
However, if the group rounds by themselves were bad, the wildcard was even worse. Only one word can be used to describe it: a sham. Group 3, who had collectively refused to lay down for the Idol bus by singing well, sent only one representative – a representative who wasn’t anywhere near one of the better singers in the group. (Felicia Barton, anyone?) In addition, the “picks” to be sent ahead despite being turned down by America weren’t all that impressive either. Megan Joy and Jasmine Murray deserved to be sent through ahead of Ricky Braddy? Really?
If that wasn’t enough, the Judge’s Save also furthered this feeling of public disengagement. The votes of millions of Americans could be suddenly overruled by the fiat of a judging panel that included the likes of Paula Abdul and Simon Cowell. That was a far from comforting thought.
Manipulation by 19E has always been a part of Idol, but in the recent past there were limits. After picking the semi-finalists, direct meddling in contestant survival wasn’t there – it just wasn’t possible. This year, not only did they restore a tool for doing just that that had been consigned to Idol‘s past, they expanded the coverage of that tool from three contestants to four and reserved the right to ignore America when they found it convenient. This was a power grab of the worst possible magnitude, as applied to Idol.
If there was one deep, underlying flaw in this season, it was this. Idol‘s Powers That Be forgot what made the show successful. They forgot that good music and an engaged viewing audience is what makes for a good season. Instead, they thought they could “manufacture” what they thought would be a good season.
What else can explain the list of bizarre decisions that have been made this season – except that it has made the producers more powerful? The “save” (that no one was really calling for), the return to maligned group rounds, the ever-more-blatant manipulations – the only thing in common was the increased power it gave the producers.
Idol has been a smashing success for seven years – almost an eternity in the land of television. Sadly, however, success has a way of going to the heads of people. Idol‘s producers thought that they could do better than America; they thought that they were responsible.
Nothing could be further from the truth. The very best seasons – and winners – have not been creations from Idol producers. They were the direct result of brilliant singers being embraced by a public.
Yet that isn’t how this season has gone so far. The music has not been as good as it was in previous years; and while Adam and Danny both have their share of passionate fans, this year’s competition has just not captured viewers – and fans – the way previous seasons have.
Who can blame them, though? Too many of the contestants this season were not of their choosing. Instead of America being allowed to witness a contestant grow their craft, wow the audience with good songs, and be gradually embraced as a champion – the sort of stuff that happened to great winners like Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, David Cook – the producers gave that status to their favorites, like Adam and Danny. Adam has earned the title of frontrunner, Danny hasn’t. His best performance was his group performance back in the semis. That’s shocking, to put it bluntly.
Remember, too, that the entire top 12 was made up of heavily pimped contestants… with the exception of Kris and Allison. The entire season to date has been so heavily manipulated, the votes of America barely matter. Pre-show promotion, not necessarily musical merit, has determined far too much of this season.
It’s not just the competition itself which has been battered by this newfound notion of the producers that they matter. The shows themselves are now as much about the judges as the talent – which it shouldn’t be. Yet that’s exactly what’s happened. Both this past week, and this coming Tuesday, we will be denied singing – the whole point of a singing competition – because the judges could not shut up. We, the Idol viewing audience, will be denied good music so that we can listen to the hormonally-driven ramblings of Paula and Kara, the dawg-iness of Randy, and Simon’s snark. That isn’t a fair trade in our book.
There is only one word in the English dictionary to describe this sort of nonsense. Hubris. The producers now think that they are indispensable to the success of Idol. Not the singers that leave their heart out on the stage. Not the voters who dedicate time, money, and effort to vote. They, and they alone, are what makes Idol successful – in their minds.
They are wrong. Horribly, terribly, wrong. This season is proving that. While the ratings have somewhat stabilized from the early season declines, rarely have I seen a fanbase angrier than the Idol fanbase is now. Can any show really piss off its fans and live? I doubt it.
There’s a saying that says pride goes before the fall. One has to wonder how close Idol – and its producers – are to that. It’s probably closer – far closer – than it should be. And, as a fan of the show, I will say: that is not, and cannot, be a good thing.
In past years, the phrase “jump the shark” has been thrown out willy-nilly to describe the PTB stupidity. Upon hindsight, we were able to put everything in perspective and see that the silly machinations of the producers were attempts to mix it up, to increase ratings. But the motorcycle jump over the shark tank was lurking; until last week. Last week, the “Fonz” put on his leather jacket and kick started his bike into life, roared down the ramp, skidded sideways, fell into the pool, and Fonzi became chum. One of the best singers Idol has ever seen, who has decades of music ahead of her, was sacrificed by idiots that thought the show’s success has anything to do with them. Now we know why Nigel left; even he had ehical doubts about the direction they were going.
You make some very valid points. The top 24 sing off was and still is the best way to the top 12.While it gives some a chance to falter (Ace Young) it gives others (Davic Cook) a chance to gain an audience and shine.Granted we might have has to listen to Nick Mitchell and Tatiana some more but I am sure we would have had Felicia and Ricky in our top 12 this season. I guarentee you though, things will be different next year. There is no way Fox can afford to kill this goose because without it Fox is in the red. They couldn’t even keep the finest show ever on TV (Firefly), on TV long enough to gather a substantial audience because of mishandling. They lose Idol were back down to 3 networks.
Great article by the way!
You forgot a few things –
1) Lip synced group songs.
2) tedious filler shows on result nights with all sorts of guest stars taking bows.
Note: when talking about fewer songs in Season 2, remember they tended to sing 2 songs ( I think they only sang one song 2 times) on results day and once three songs before the finale and they had the halfway home nad top two Monday specials singing solos and group songs again. On Finale night – There were solos, duets, trio and group songs resulting in Clay sings 5 times and Ruben 6 (he won).
Also, in Season 2, there were guest judges up to the top 4 show so there were intros shown and a 4th judge at every show and they still managed to get the show done on time and increase the number of songs over previous years.
Great article. I’m used to the pimping – we’ve seen it every year – but it’s never been as bad as this year has been and has never been so blatant. If I wanted to hear sob stories, I’d watch Lifetime; I watch Idol to HEAR THESE KIDS SING! I’m sorry for Danny, and I’m sure that Lil and Scott are wonderful people, but there were a lot of better voices at the begnning of the season – Felicia, Ricky, Mishanova…I could go on and on. What I have always enjoyed, in the past, has been watching contestants grow and develop, hearing them learn to project not only their voices but their personalities through their music, even when the song they were told to sing was unsuitable or ridiculous. Bo doing “In a Dream;” Elliot singing “Moody’s Mood..;” Carrie’s “Alone” or Katherine’s “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” Almost anything Cook touched!
I’m furious at the lack of respect Allison got, and that Gokey is still there. 19E can sign him, if it wants, but if that’s what they’re looking for in a recording “artist,” at least stop inflicting that nonsense on the rest of us, and let’s go back to letting the best voices, rather than the cute stories, sign a lot of songs!
Well written. You put everything I’ve been bitching about this whole season into a well-thought out article. I know we’re not saving the world here, but could America have some say? I won’t watch anymore because they’ll kick Kris off Wed night and then who cares? I care that Allison never got the credit she deserved. And I loved the guest judges way better than the 4. It’s not just Kara. They have the audacity to call the singers “self-indulgent,” I guess they should know better than anyone what self-indulgence looks like. The pimping is out of control and I could care less. I do disagree with Fox going away if Idol fails again because I am thoroughly looking forward to So You Think You Can Dance. The judges are much better; the talent is out of control and the overall show is just better.
Thanks, Idol Guy!
Great article. You just post everything that went wrong with this season. As some have comment, I’m used to the pimping as well, but this season has make it unbelievable. We were lucky to have two contestants, at least (Kris and Allison) that were able to overcame their plans, and in the way they have been treated with the least respect possible and even being humiliated. Now, one has been sacrificed because maybe her fanbase couldn’t handle it anymore. Allison should be in the top 3, that’s a fact, I don’t know which one, Kris or Danny should be in her place, but I’ll say the latter, mostly for personal preferences, I like Kris’s style better. I can’t deny the talent Adam has, and I won’t say Danny isn’t talented because it would be lying, but what’s true is that he hasn’t done anything since the semifinals to prove he deserves his actual spot. But at least Kris has earned his fans with no help at all. He has earned them in such a way that he defied every initial plan from the producers and judges. His fanbase responded better than Allison’s and that’s the reason he’s here, but if it would be the producer’s choice, he would have been gone already.
I can’t believe such a successful show need to get to this point, sacrificing talent over what they think people want. The best final they could have ever had (Adam and Allison) just slipped over their hands and it’s a shame. They will realize this sometime, and I hope they regret it.
I did not watch season 6 and season7. But I decided to watch again this year. I am really enjoying watching Adam, Kris, and Allison. And I was just telling my husband last week that I really wish they had sung more songs this year. I REALLY wish we had Adam in the old round of 24 format so we could have seen him a few more times. And I REALLY wish they had sang 2 songs in the round of 4 and 2 songs in the round of 5. I can not believe it is an hour show and we only hear 10 minutes of singing! I want more singing!
To Blueprintbaby: I agree about the SYTYCD bit, and I’m stoked waiting for it. I’m really beginning to see how much input Nigel had on Idol and why he wanted to leave – SYTYCD totally sticks to showcasing the real talent – and it’s awesome talent, too – without the judges feeling like they have to select a pet during the auditions, or force that pet down everyone’s throats while slamming the truly good ones.
I agree with you about everything, except that Danny Gokey hasn’t earned his way into the final. In fact, if anything he is the one that has been kept in the competition by the viewers. The judges haven’t put him there, the public has, and he deserves it. He’s never been eliminated and saved. He’s never been in the bottom three.
The judges are ALL clearly behind Adam Lambert to win and have been since Top 10. The bloggers and recappers, like yourself, are all behind mainly Allison, Adam and to some extent, Kris. Despite all that pressure, the voting public STILL likes Danny Gokey because he’s been delivering consistently good, emotional performances, not just some vocal scale exercise showing off his range. If you all were honest, you’d admit it. At least we see it and we do what we want, not what we’re told. yay America.
The public only put Danny into the Top 3 because of Simon…people that are not long time fans of this show tink that Simon knows what he is talking about. This season, I wonder if Simon is trying to tank the show on his way out.
Now, the funng thing about me saying that is I started the season as a Danny fan. But then I realized he just wasn’t that great – there were so many others that were better. I’m now a Kris fan but I know that unless there is some sort of miracle this week he’s out. That happens, I’m all about Adam. And I know there are definitely a lot of Kris fans who feel the same way I do and would never consider putting their support behind Gokey but will support Adam. There are likely many Allison fans who feel the same way (my husband loved her but now he’s joined me in the Kris fan land).
Besides the public, the contestants are the ones who get the raw end of thsi deal. A contestant like Allison never had a chance because she was not one of the chosen ones. Ditto, why Kris will be the one out this week. They went against the plans of TPTB. All season they’ve been hyping a Dany/Adam finale and the judges have publicly come out and said that numerous times to numerous media. The never gave an Allison a chance. And this week they will once again thrwo Kris under the bus he pulled himself out from under last week.
I’m done with this show and it’s manipulations (and the last time I really watched was Season 2 when Clay should have won, but well…)
Congratulations Idol – keepp moving in this direction and I won’t be the only fan you lose.
Well, as I’ve said, I do think Danny is talented, and I admit that anytime. I just think he hasn’t done anything to earn his spot, compared to the other contestants in the top 4, at least. This last statement is my complete opinion. I prefer any of the other three. Allison is my favorite and now she’s gone. I like Kris’ style a lot and think he has an amazingly huge fan base, and I even think he could be a surprise for the final 2, and I actually hope so.
So, I’m really not saying that Danny has no talent, I liked him at the start, very early, but he stopped giving me a reason to like him better than others. And I do admit that he has a big fan base and his fans are loyal, and he’s made it “deservedly” if we consider that it has been with votes, not saves or anything. But he has always had a fair treat with the judges. Even when he was as bad as last Tuesday, they gave him an A for “effort”, as if the other contestants don’t try as hard, as if Kris didn’t try as hard on a night that wasn’t his genre as well, and worse, as if Adam or Allison didn’t try as hard just because it was their genre. And this has been all the way through, since they first meet Danny. So, of course he has gotten a better treatment than Kris and Allison.
I also admit Adam has gotten this special treatmen as well, and I’m also not ok with it. The only difference, for me, is that I think that if they were all treated the same, Adam will still be where he is right now, and I’m not so sure for Danny.
The most blatant example of control by the producers is the Rock theme episode: the pairing of the two strongest rock singer (they were only seeing $$$ in music downloads for this pairing), Kris singing after his duet with the “other guy” (never gave him a chance to recover), the unbelievably soft criticism of the “worst note” ever to be sung in idol history (they praised him for trying something new..huh?). Each one was a blatant display of trying to kick off the one person (Kris) that they never thought was going to get this far.
I’m a fan of both Allison and Kris (also of Adam after “mad money”), and I strongly believe they decided that Allison had a better story line (because of her age) than Kris hence the pimping at the end. But they underestimated Kris’ popularity and talent. Now they are scrambling around the news media, and pushing for a showdown between their two “pimped” idols hoping that Kris doesn’t pull through as the “little engine that could”. We can never have enough of talented singer/song writers in this country, and I hope Idol fans agree with me in the end: show these producers that we can still think for ourselves, and let the two that showed the most “artistry” throughout the show make it to the finals! Go Kris and Adam!
I agree with a lot of it. I am not a regular Idol viewer. I have seen bits and pieces from a couple seasons, mostly when the top group is left, and most of this seasons top 10. This season has been by far the worst in terms of talent. Adam Lambert is a performer, not a singer. He won’t sell well if he wins because his voice leaves a lot to be desired. He will do good in concerts because of his theater background, but not when listening to him on a record. Kris is more marketable but is still a mediocre singer that reminds me of a shallow boy band lead singer.
The good news is that America was able to see through this ruse and they gave the finger to the Idol powers that be by voting Kris for the win. The sad part is that Allison, a girl with great talent, had to be sacrificed in order to see that. Sure, I am a fan of Allison, and a very invested one at that. However, since the powers that be dictated an Adam/Danny Finale, they had to intervene and underrate both Allie and Kris. Sadly, one fanbase just got tired of this and simply gave up. Adam’s fans couldn’t afford to split votes with Allison, Danny’s fans were on fire to save him and Kris’ fans followed suit since his reviews were harsher IMO. And that spelled the end of Allison’s run.
Oh, and note to Idol producers, while you tried to push for what you call a “great” Finale, an Adam/Allie/Kris in the Top 3 would’ve been a whole lot better. Three great friends battling it out all in the good name of competition, erstwhile having fun: that makes for great TV IMO. And there would’ve been no real losers. But with your intervention, you guys lost credibility and many fans.