American Idol ratings are vanishing. It has been widely reported that this was the first season ever that they did not have higher ratings than in the season before. Maybe it was because they were noticeably nicer. Last year producers were criticized for being mean to the contestants during the early audition rounds. Or maybe America is over American Idol. Ruben Studdard, Katherine Mc Phee and Taylor Hicks all got dropped from their record labels. Last years winner, Jordin Sparks, who’s song Tatoo is all over the airwaves released an album a few weeks ago that debuted at #10. That’s the worst debut of an American Idol winner EVER.
I was listening to a local radio show this morning and heard that somebody leaked all the finalists’ names for this year. Many of them had something in common: they have had recording contracts in the past; some of them even had multimillion dollar contracts with big labels like Arista records. And just when you were beginning to think that the judging process was unfair listen to this: one of them was even nominated for a Grammy Award.
That got me to thinking: thousands of people turned out for the American Idol auditions in San Antonio and were turned away because they weren’t “talented” enough but is it a fair competition if people off the streets with no experience are competing against people with record contracts and Grammy nominations? (I would never challenge an Olympic swimmer to a race.)
Does this change the way you think about Idol? Will you be less likely to watch knowing that it’s no longer about a young person from a small town making their dream of becoming a star come true? I was never a big fan of the show but it seems to take the fun out of it when you realize that you aren’t cheering for the underdog; you are hoping the person with the smallest (past) record contract wins.
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