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The X - Factor: Rocks out, or attempts too

By Ian Cullen Nov 28, 2010, 22:41 GMT

11/05/2010 - Cheryl Cole - Cheryl Cole Arrives at Heathrow Airport in London on November 5, 2010 - Heathrow Airport - London, UK © Solarpix / PR Photos

Ah, what is it about pop stars or wannabe pop stars trying to rock out that gets on my tits... 

Maybe its being a fan of Rock music perhaps, and not really being one to see Rock songs being given the commercial pop make over that it inevitably gets on this show.

I mean can you imagine Take That or some other middle of the road pop act singing Dead Babies by Alice Cooper?

I guess not.  Thankfully it wasn’t a total washout with X - Factor last night, but I have to say that when you have singers who are vying to be mainstream acts attempting to sing Rock songs.

It goes either one of two ways, good in such a way that they make the given song their own or bad in such a way that they can neuter the next door neighbors dogs with a single breath. 

This week’s X - Factor as always managed to do both. I can still hear the neighbor's dog yelping after a particularly cruel onslaught by Wagner. 

This week saw the various acts sing two songs, which is always good because it gives the viewer a better idea of the acts weak and strong points!

Though in the first act of the night the weak point is blatantly obvious. He can’t sing.   The account opened with Wagner, so right away the pressure was off all the other acts given the fact that even when Wagner is close to singing, well he’s bad but damn entertaining if only for all the wrong reasons.   

This was followed by Simon Cowell’s boy band ‘One Direction’ who sang and completely butchered the Bryan Adams song ‘Summer Of 69.’ I never thought we’d stoop lower than the Girls Aloud cover of Walk This Way by Aerosmith, but somehow One Direction managed it with ‘Summer Of 69.’ 

One Direction was followed by Mary Byrne who sang well and again earned much applause and praise from both audience and judges alike. 

Next up with her first song of the night was Cher, who remains her ever cocky self, but does admit that the near loss of her place on the show last week was terrible.  Technically the song Cher did was not really what the purist would class as rock.

She sang the song ‘Girlfriend’, which had a few Rap elements to it. So it appealed to her strengths, and will no doubt have impressed the younger teeny bopper end of the market. 

Fifth to sing was Rebecca Fergusan who never ceases to impress and by all rights should win this whole competition.

Rebecca sang a jazzy version of the popular U2 song ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’ and totally made the song her own. Despite it being cut back dramatically for the show. 

Matt Cardle, who is officially the last boy in the competition, sang the popular rock/pop song ‘I Love Rock N’ Roll’ and sang it well, but I don’t feel that it was all that special given the many times that this song has been covered.

However it was fun to see Cardle move around the stage with more confidence than we would have saw him with a number of weeks back when the show started. 

Katie was next, and she chose to sing ‘Your Sex Is On Fire’, which is kind of controversial given that her Grandmother was outed by the press as a Working Girl, but hey, live and let live right?

She’d probably be an ideal match for Premiership Footballer Wayne Rooney.  Anyway, despite the fact that Katie’s song choice seemed a bit contrived given all the media gossip in regards to her Grandmother.

She sang the song fairly well and actually put on a performance and owned the stage. Not that am changing my mind about her. She’d still be the girlfriend from hell. Needy, clingy drama Queen. We still shoot horses here in the UK, you know. 

Joking aside, this was a fairly good song for Katie, and a fairly strong performance, but not the strongest of the night, but for my money it was her strongest showing in the competition. 

As mentioned earlier this being the quarter finals of X - Factor meant that each act had two songs to sing, and returning for their second song first was Wagner, who opted to sing ‘Addicted To Love’ and very, very badly.

Fans of the late Robert Palmer have absolutely nothing to worry about here.   This was greeted with a mixture of boos and cheers from the audience.  

Also singing for a second time was One Direction who sang ‘You Are So Beautiful’, which is about as much Rock Song as flipping ‘Jingle Bells.’ However, it did provide a stronger showing for the boy band than their god awful rendition of ‘Summer Of 69’ and spotlighted them a little more individually.  

Next up singing her second song was Mary Byrne, who did a bit of a jig and shimmy across the stage while singing ‘Brass In Pocket’ by The Pretenders, I found this to be rather shouty in parts, but seeing a 50-year-old move around the stage I felt was a lot of fun, and showed some of the older viewers of the show that you’re never to old to shimmy and jig.  

Then we had Rebecca Fergusan, who showed us a different side of her character by singing the classic Rolling Stones song ‘Satisfaction,’ and the sexy glint in her eyes and Aretha Franklin style rendering of the song really worked.  

Next up with her final song was Katie who sang the REM song ‘Everybody Hurts,’ but for my money was hindered by the lyrics being so chopped up that no matter how good or bad the singer. It would always have been a hard sell. Which really made Katie’s first performance of the night her strongest. 

Matt Cardle was next and for his second song chose ‘Knights In White Satin,’ which many referred to on the show as a forgotten song. Which I felt was a bit much given that its a song that I always listen to on some of my Compilation CD’s... 

Either way Matt put in a fantastic performance of the song, which for me really suited the singers vocal range, and he really brought a more updated feel to the song without ruining the premise or intent of it.  

Last up was Cher Lloyd who did another pop/rock song with some rap elements to it in ‘Walk This Way,’ which was originally written and record by Aerosmith, before Run DMC did a version with Aerosmith.

Both of which are somewhat iconic in both rock and rap circles.  While this song appealed to Cher Lloyd’s strengths, it was kind of ordinary and not really to the standard of the first two versions of the song that I’ve mentioned above.  Though it was marginally better than the bloody awful mess that Cheryl Cole and Girls Aloud made of it a number of years ago for Children In Need.  Which isn’t really saying that much! 

In the final elimination show it was three acts that were under threat of leaving, and the one with the least votes, which left right away was Katie, which left Mary Byrne and Wagner in a final sing off. 

Though I find it somewhat unbelievable that Wagner who can’t sing a note would get more votes than Katie. For me Katie deserved the opportunity to at least be in the sing off, but joe public chose to try and keep Wagner in the mix. 

First up to sing for Survival was Wagner, who as one would expect put in a very should we say different rendition of ‘Unforgettable’, which was near as damn in tune. Though I don’t think the late Nat King Cole, a hero of mine has much to worry about. 

Last up in the sing off was Mary Byrne, who out of the two facing elimination has been the most consistent. She sang a moving rendition of the song ‘This Is My Life’, which is a Shirley Bassey standard, and a bloody great diva song that Byrne nailed. 

When it came to the crunch the judges saw sense and unanimously decided to keep Mary Byrne in the competition and sent Wagner home.

Though I do believe that Wagner is going to open an animal hospital specialising in birth control via badly sang songs.  Which means that the X - Factor Semi Finalist are: Cher Lloyd, Matt Cardle, Rebecca Fergusan, One Direction and Mary Byrne, which will make for a fascinating semi-final on next weeks show - and it's nice to see a veteran singer in Mary get this far. In previous years the older singers haven’t got this far in the competition.