And that really is it for the weekend. While we say ‘goodbye’ and ‘good job I didn’t bother to memorise your surnames’ to Blonde Electra and Overload Generation, it’s time for me to say goodbye.
You’ve been wonderful, but then again I never had any doubts to the contrary. I’ll be back here next Saturday, when X Factor will only be two hours long. Imagine! Also, why not follow me on Twitter (I’m @StuHeritage) to see me whining about liveblogging throughout the week in real time? Now get out of here. We’ve already missed 15 minutes of Homeland.
OVERLOAD GENERATION ARE OUT
Thankfully, this is probably the right decision. I was worried for a second there. That said, it would have been funny if they’d stayed, just because Simon hates them so much. What’ll he focus his hatred on next week? His own thumbs, probably, for consistently failing to understand how buttons work.
And deadlock says that Overload Generation are out.
Simon’s judging first. He very vocally hated Overload Generation, so he saves Stephanie. So does Cheryl. It’s down to Mel B, and she saves Overload. This means, CLEARLY, that things are GOING TO DEADLOCK. Oh Louis, never change.
Oh, that said, this is a very charming performance. She’s not yelling or bending double to prove how much she wants this, like everyone else who’s ever been in a sing-off does. It’s effortless and, most importantly, it’s dignified.
She’s done for, isn’t she?
And now it’s time for Stephanie; a woman who once cried because she had to stand alone on a stage. Lord knows what the stress of tonight will do to her. I have a horrible suspicion that she’ll end this performance by rolling in a pool of her own urine.
Now for the sing-off. Overload Generation are first. I don’t know what they’re singing, but they all appear to be doing Irish accents. And singing quite badly out of tune. And Ben Mitchell’s making a noise like a kitten falling down a well. This isn’t very good, all said. Blonde Electra would have killed this.
BLONDE ELECTRA ARE OUT
They got the fewest votes, so they don’t even reach the sing-off. I liked Blonde Electra. And I’d only just figured out that they’re called Blonde Electra and not Blonde Electric. They went too soon.
We’re back! So. The final safe act tonight is... Jake. Who seems to be reacting very ungraciously to the news.
It’s an Overload Generation / Blone Electra / Stephanie three-way. God, that sounds appalling.
GENUINE BROADSHEET ANALYSIS
The only act of that four I have any interest in is Blonde Electra. They’ll probably be in the bottom three though. Ideal world? We’d get rid of Jake and Overload Generation. But that won’t happen. In all the years I’ve been doing this, I’ve realised that I am a terrible predictor of popular tastes. You know that. You’ve seen my haircut.
Blonde Electra, Overload Generation, Stephanie and Jake are left. One of them is safe, but which? There will now be an ad break, because Dermot knows that I much prefer taking the piss out of adverts that gratuitously use the phrase ‘meat juices’ than dryly listing the names of X Factor contestants that I barely remember. Good old Dermot. He might be in a rush tonight, but the man cares.
Andrea’s through (GOOD) and so is Stevi (ERM).
Who’s left? I’m so confused. Jay and Stereo Kicks are through. Stevi’s still there. So’s Stephanie. And Overload Generation.
Also through: Jack and Chloe. My theory was rubbish. Disregard everything I said. I’m an idiot.
Lola and Only The Young are through, which confirms my theory.
The formula of this bit seems to be that Dermot announces a good contestant and then a rubbish one.
Also through to next week: Lauren! Hooray! And Paul.
Righto, sleeves rolled up. The first act safe tonight is ... Fleur! Oh, and Ben.
This is going to take forever, obviously.
ACTUAL ELIMINATION TIME
We’re actually going to kick some of these people out now. It feels weird to use a Key Event for a legitimate reason. It won’t happen again, I promise.
If Weird Al Yankovic is reading this: hey Al, why not do a version of Shake It Off called Shank A Toff? It could be about the problem of violence in aristocratic white-collar low-security prisons and... no you’re right that’s a terrible idea I don’t know what I was thinking. Sorry.
Taylor Swift just tried to say “Thanks for having me”, but Dermot roughly bundled her offstage after about three syllables. He doesn’t want that pork chop to dry out, after all. That lovely pork chop.
I genuinely think that the hypothetical album Now That’s What I Call All Of Taylor Swift’s Decontextualised Spoken-Word Interludes One After The Other would be my least favourite hypothetical album of all time.
I have to say, Taylor Swift’s winning me over here. She’s managed to successfully synthesise enthusiasm, which I haven’t seen on X Factor for about three years.
Oh, she’s doing the spoken-word interlude. I’ve gone off her.
Still, this is quite a good song. And, because of the constraints of the one-hour show, hopefully she won’t be able to do that nightmarish spoken-word interlude that drags the whole thing into the toilet.
Taylor’s singing a new single that I haven’t hea... oh, no, it’s Shake It Off. Hasn’t that been out for months?
Anyway, now it’s time for Taylor Swift, who everyone seems to really like all of a sudden. I can’t think of anything particularly mean or complimentary about her. Taylor Swift exists. There, will that do?
Anyway, Dermot’s talking to the judges. He’s called last night ‘The best opening show we’ve ever had’. The man’s a shell. He’s a shell.
That rant made me talk through an entire ad break. AND one of the adverts contained a slowed-down acoustic version of That’s Entertainment. That’s my bread and butter I’m missing out on, there.
Still, Pharrell praised Lauren’s performance of Happy last night, because ‘She took it down a couple of keys, and that’s what the song’s about’. Which is news to me, because I though the song was about clapping your hands because you feel like a room without a roof. I’ve been clapping my hands for FOUR SOLID MONTHS, and now he tells me that the song was really all about taking it down a couple of keys after all? This is an insult, frankly.
He’d better not tell us that Gust Of Wind isn’t about hugging people that remind you of carbon dioxide later on in the year, because otherwise I’ll have more or less wasted my entire life. Consider yourself warned, Pharrell.
Pharrell just tried to say how much he likes Britain, and Dermot all but told him to shut up. Dermot doesn’t have the legs for this any more. The sooner this show ends, the sooner he can get home and tuck into that nice pork chop that he’s got in the oven.
This song goes “I want to hug you, because you remind me of the air”. I don’t want to transform my commentary of this performance into a critique of Pharrell’s romantic life, but I’m pretty sure that his girlfriend won’t take this particularly well. She’s already putting up with all his waddling and stupid blue hat, so being compared to air might be the last straw.
I believe that Pharrell is singing Gust of Wind from his last album. It’s an ode to that time he crapped himself while recording that BBC advert. He thought it was just a fart, so he strained and accidentally followed through all over the place. We’ve all been there.
Which means it’s time for Pharrell’s performance! I have no idea what song he’ll be singing tonight, but I just hope he’s changed his trousers since filming that rubbish BBC God Only Knows thing. The way he was waddling around in it, I’m pretty certain that he’d crapped himself.
Oh, it’s ended.
IT’S STILL GOING, THOUGH. Why won’t this recap end? Why? I used to be so young. I used to have dreams.
IT’S STILL GOING. Ben Haenow just called the entire television audience ‘mate’. He’s the new Olly Murs, isn’t he? We must stop him, and stop him now.
It’s still going, though. This recap is still going. Soon it’ll recap the group show that we just watched, and then it’ll recap the recap that we’re currently watching, and then we’ll all be trapped in a nightmarish feedback loop of shouting and platitudes. It’ll never end. Our hair will thin, our skin will go sallow. We’ll soil ourselves. And then we’ll die. But the recap? The recap will last forever.
Now it’s time for the interminable recap. That’s good because, even though I sat and wrote about it, I cannot remember a single thing about last night’s show.
Anyway, in the recap, Jay James waggles his fingers around and gives an overwhelming indication that fame will transform him into a monster, Stephanie isn’t allowed to have a backstage reaction, Mel B does that thing that makes her act like Jude Law from AI after being drenched with porridge and, you know, all the other things that usually happen in a recap.
Oh lord, it’s that time of year when I forget that group songs are a thing, and then I realise that they are, and my heart lurches. Tonight’s badly-rehearsed caterwaul is Anything Could Happen. Because anything really could happen. Except for convincing musical performances. And diverse hairdressing. Adverts, though. Adverts could happen. Let’s go with that.
Dermot’s reading phone numbers out. Sixteen phone numbers. I swear to god, he stopped and sighed after 12. I feel for the man. Someone get him some Berocca.
Time to meet the judges, again.
LOUIS: Basically just Louis Walsh forever at this point.
SIMON: All his buttons undone.
MEL B: One chilly leg.
CHERYL: That bellydancer you forgot you ordered.
Dermot’s here, punching cows with slightly less enthusiasm than we’re used to. Maybe last night took it out of him, too. Who could blame him?
Simon Cowell winks now. This is a thing. Goodbye peaceful sleep. I’ll miss you.
LAST NIGHT! Things happened specifically to fuel three different recap packages in tonight’s results show, of which this is one.
IT’S TIME! TO SEPARATE THE CHAFF! FROM THE SLIGHTLY HIGHER-GRADE CHAFF!
Next week on Sunday Night at the Palladium: someone who knew one of Duran Duran’s backing singers goes “Ooh” three times to a backing tape of Girls On Film.
In the meantime, Art Gunfunkel is headlining Sunday Night at the Palladium. At least that’s what we’re being told. It looks more like Larry David being forced to perform karaoke having just woken up, but who am I to argue with Sunday Night at the Palladium?
Oh! We haven’t discussed which two acts are likely to be eliminated, have we? My guess it that a couple of boys will be for the chop – Paul performed first, which is never a good sign. And Ben Haenow, Jake Quickenden and Jack Walton were all completely forgettable. And Stevi, obviously, was deliberately awful. Then again, Only The Young were dreadful, Stephanie was weak and Overload Generation were awful. All of them deserve immediate elimination.
So, in short, Lauren Platt will go home.
SUNDAY RESULTS SHOW
Hello again. It seems like only yesterday that we were last here, watching Saturday’s X Factor together. But that can’t be the case, because Saturday’s X Factor lasted for several thousand years and sitting through it was such an arduous task that we all needed to sleep for a full week to recover from it. Oh well, we’re here now. That’s the most important thing.
Anyway, to recap: 16 contestants got to sing songs, and they all started to blur into each other after about 20 minutes, but Lauren Platt was quite good and Blonde Electra were OK and then an Italian man started shouting about elephants so we all decided to go home. Also, Mel B’s my new favourite judge. That, in a nutshell, is pretty much everything that happened.
Tonight, though, should be much better. That’s because Pharrell and Taylor Swift – two artists with a history of not being consistently awful – are both performing songs. It’s also because two acts are being eliminated, which gives Louis Walsh two separate chances to take things to Deadlock. But mainly it’s because X Factor is only an hour long. Just an hour! Take away the adverts and recaps and I’ll probably only have to do about 45 seconds of work. Hooray for everything! See you at 8:15, when stuff kicks off.
Anyway that’s it for tonight. Remember when this episode of X Factor began, all those years ago? We were all so young back then. But we made it! We did it, and all your comments have made me proud. (NOTE: if you’re reading this tomorrow, and you’ve just left a comment reading ‘Why are you being so mean? I hate X Factor, and I don’t even own a TV’ then your comment did not make me proud).
Anyway, we’re in this now. 19 episodes left. The next one is tomorrow at 8:15pm. Pharrell will be performing and two acts will leave, so that’ll be nice. If you’d like to follow me on Twitter, I’m @StuHeritage. If not, I’ll see you tomorrow. We did it! Merry Christmas everyone!
It’s not a true interminable recap of tonight’s show, obviously, because it isn’t 80% adverts, but hey ho.
And now, because this is X Factor and we haven’t had one since last Christmas, here’s an interminable recap!
Other things that this performance has taught me: Louis Walsh says ‘Eye-talian’ instead of ‘Italian’, and Andrea is brilliant. I really would be very happy if he won, you know. Very happy indeed.
There’s a chance that Andrea’s just singing this because he’s not very good at remembering lyrics and wanted to just get away with going “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH” and “OOOOOOOOOOOOOOH” for a couple of minutes. And “CATFOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD”, obviously. But you can’t fault his ambition, and he’s got easily the biggest cheer of the evening. Hooray for Andrea!
I don’t know what’s happening, but it seems like Andrea is singing Earth Song. This is either the best or worst moment of my entire life. Especially because I’m 80% certain that he just changed the words to ‘What about catfood?’
And now, finally, for Andrea Faustini. I like Andrea. He’s probably going to win X Factor this year. He’s endearing, and he has a rich and powerful voice. That’s not why I think he’s going to win, though. I think he’s going to win because he wore a jumper with a picture of a dog on it once and people are morons. But, hey, he’s still going to win.
“There’s a lot of underappreciated songs from the past” says Hat Girl, having just performed the famously underappreciated song Jailhouse Rock.
The judges are laying into Only The Young, and Only The Young are rolling their eyes SO HARD that they’re probably on the cusp of a brain haemorrhage. The brunette in the hat, especially, looks especially murderous. We never got this attitude with Same Difference.
That sense of self? They’re singing Jailhouse Rock. Is it as nightmarish as it sounds? No. Is it several billion times more nightmarish than it sounds? Yes. Yes it is.
I just caught a cutaway reaction shot of Mel B looking like Frozen Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining, neatly summing up the entire mood of the nation. This isn’t X Factor. This is... this is Jive Bunny. They’re doing Twist and Shout now, and I’m genuinely scared that it’ll never end. What if they do another song after this? I’ll drink myself to death, I swear.
Oh, it’s finished. Thank God. Thank God.
Anyway, now for Only The Young, the group that Louis Walsh transparently picked just to act as a firewall for that awful eight-piece boyband of his. It’s not worth remembering any of their names, really. Your life is too short. But, then again, you’re the ones willingly watching X Factor. You’re not exactly fond of all-encompassing productivity, are you?
The good news is that Only The Young have a well-formed sense of self. So this should be great, right?
‘Wagner’ is apparently trending on Twitter. I’ve never felt like such a part of something.
I CAN'T FEEL MY LEGS ANY MORE.
And one of my shoulders has stiffened up. This episode is far too long.
This might be too much information, but this episode has been going on for so long that I think my laptop has boiled my genitals.
The judges are all being very nice about Fleur. Out by the middle of November, then.
Fleur’s singing All About That Bass, which I think is a song about embracing your moderate to high body mass index. Which Fleur obviously knows a lot about, because she looks like she might have eaten some of a salad at some point in the last week or so.
To be fair, Fleur looks like she’s been doing this all her life. This is almost like a guest performance from an actual popstar. That said, this is such a weird song choice. It’d be like Jake Quickenden singing a song about being really charismatic.
Now: Fleur East. Despite having a name that makes her sound like a crap hotel (I know,like I can talk), Fleur is perhaps the most fully-rounded contestant this year. I think she might be great tonight, so long as she can resist rapping in the middle of every song. We all remember what happened to Mischa B, don’t we? Anyone?
Simon says that Jake needs grit in his voice. In next week’s VT: Jake puts a shirt on, Jake looks at a toothbrush, Jake gets basted in the face by several tons of gravel, Jake slightly moves one of his eyebrows once.
Jake’s singing She’s The One, which I’m taking as a sign that Simon Cowell has either a) run out of ideas for him or b) banged his head and thinks it’s 15 years ago.
Interesting that the best method X Factor could find to prove that Jake has a personality is to make him go from lying down to sitting down to standing up. Perhaps having him move across the stage in a stairlift to a walk-in bath used up too much of the budget.
TL;DR - that was exceptionally dull.
Hey, it’s Jake Quickenden. You know, Jake Quickenden from X Factor two years ago. Jake Quickenden from the telly. Remember him? Jake Quickenden? Bit forgettable. That’s him.
In the VT: Jake gets his makeup done, Jake takes his top off, Jake wears a hat, Jake is told that he doesn’t have a personality, Jake sits quite near a cushion.
By my calculations, we have four contestants and 35 minutes left of X Factor tonight. So that’s, what, six ad breaks? Seven? We should have a sweepstake.
If he leaves X Factor this week, this guy will be legally obliged to change his name to ‘Ben Saenow’. This is a reference to a passing joke made in series three, episode one of The Larry Sanders Show. I’ve probably been watching too much of The Larry Sanders Show lately.
Cheryl has called Hank Kingsley’s dull fart ‘one of the top three performances tonight’. That’s the worst advertisement for X Factor I’ve ever heard.
Hank Kingsley is singing Bridge Over Troubled Water, because X Factor obviously really wants to nail down the teenage market this year.
Seriously, after watching Blonde Electric’s neon circus, this doesn’t look good. It’s just a bloke in a shirt shouting the word ‘BREEEE-EEEYYY-EEEEEEJ’ like he’s just banged his foot on something. It’s boring, it’s one-note and I do not care for it in the slightest.
A VIDEO OF A MAN SAYING ‘HEY NOW’ A LOT
Updated
Now it’s time for Ben Haenow who, since I spent the majority of my last holiday rewatching episodes of The Larry Sanders Show, I will be exclusively be referring to as Hank Kingsley.
Mel B has just told Blonde Electric to ‘take it to the next level’. I kind of hope they don’t. These are the only retinas I’ve got, and I’m worried that they’re already on their last legs.
Blonde Electric and their glittery eyebrows are performing Kids In America, which leads me to believe that they require comprehensive retraining in both basic geography and knowing how old they are.
It’s hard to accurately describe what I’m seeing onscreen. There are hula hoops, and an elephant, and lots more colours than I’m used to at my age. I think, worryingly, that I might actually quite like this. I wish the one with short hair wouldn’t keep making a noise like she’s straining for a poo when she sings, but other than that I might be slightly onboard with this. Look, it’s been a long evening.
Next up are Blonde Electric; the She-Ras to Jedward’s He-Men. That’s all there is to them, basically. I miss Jedward, too. I wonder what they’re doing right now. I hope they’re hanging out with Wagner. I hope they’re having a party. I hope Storm Lee is serving drinks there.
Why does Ella Henderson go to the river to pray, anyway? Go to the church to pray, you weirdo.
An advert for Lidl now, containing the hashtag #LidlSurprise. My favourite Lidl surprise is probably that time I bought something called a Meat Salad there, and it turned out to be a tub of mayonnaise with about three bits of spam in it. SURPRISE!
In happier news, there is only one hour of X Factor left tonight. Just an hour. As long as a flight to Germany. Three episodes of 30 Rock. That’s not bad is it?
That said, I quite liked that. If it weren’t for the fact that all the judges are obliged to remind Lauren how old she is every three seconds that she’s onscreen, I’d quite like her to be on the show for a while.
Lauren Platt is singing Happy. She wanted to sing a song that reflected her state of mind, but nobody’s written a song called Profoundly Ill At Ease yet, so this had to do.
It is – surprise surprise – a slowed down version of Happy. Imagine if they’d all got to sing these songs at the normal tempo. We’d all be tucked up in bed with a nice mug of cocoa by now. Curse you, X Factor. Curse you to hell.
Lauren Platt now: the girl who looks exactly like a cross between Lauren off EastEnders and Gail Platt off Coronation Street. If this is X Factor dabbling in nominative determinism, I would have much preferred it if they’d found someone called Likeable Goodsinger. But, hey, never mind.
Cheryl’s saying that Lauren is much more grounded than she was when she was young. Reading between the lines, it looks like Cheryl is congratulating a teenager for not belting a toilet attendant yet.
Simon’s predicting that Stevi will remain in the competition for longer than most of the other acts. But Stevi’s already threatening to sing a ballad because he wants to show that he’s a serious singer. Goodbye Stevi.
I MISS WAGNER.
That deserves a key event, right?
He’s no Wagner, though, is he?
That aside, Stevi started the song with an energetic dance routine, and this has now resulted in him being fully out of breath. He’s not singing in time. He’s gone purple. I think he might actually be about to die. The boy’s giving it everything. I think it might be... quite good?
Low blow, X Factor. They’re making Stevi singing She Bangs. You know who else sang She Bangs? WAGNER. They’d better not make Stevi do a bongo solo, or force him into a Love Shack medley, because that would break my heart. I love Wagner.
Oh thank god, Stevi Richie is the wildcard for the overs. You remember Stevi, obviously – he’s the novelty contestant who looks like a plastic Manga toy of David Brent that’s been left too close to a malfunctioning radiator, wildly overuses the first names of people he’s talking to and cannot really sing at all. But, by god, I’m pleased he’s on the show. He’s made my job about 50% easier.
An advert for Vodafone now. Specifically an advert for Vodafone customers who like to tell their closest families life-changing news over Facetime because they’re cold misers who hate actual human contact in all its forms.
Also, I bet they’re called Stereo Kicks because they make you want to kick the stereo whenever you hear them. Right? Right? Right? Anyone? Right? Hello? Anyone?
Updated
Simon has called Stereo Kicks ‘exciting’. This may or may not be because they’re like One Direction, but there are eight of them so they’ll each earn half the amount of One Direction, so they’ll have to work themselves to the point of exhaustion to make ends meet.
They’re singing Roar. Or at least four of them are. The other four are nowhere to be seen. Perhaps the first four ate them... ah, wait, no, they’ve invaded the stage for the chorus. I bet that was a fun meeting. “You, you, you and you, the four ugly ones. Wear these balaclavas. No? How about keeping your backs to the audience? No? Fine then, just come on halfway through. Whatever”.
And now for Stereo Kicks – also known as The Hateful Eight, Louis Walsh’s insane eight-piece boyband. They’re less a boyband, though, and more a terrifying communist public service advertisement for government haircuts. They’ll go far, this lot. Far away from me, hopefully.
Simon’s advice to Boris is basically ‘Everyone’s going to be mean to you while you’re on X Factor, because you’re on X Factor and X Factor is a terrible programme that only arseholes are on’. To be fair, the man has a point.
Boris is singing Toxic by Britney Spears or, to be more precise, Toxic by that posh jetpack inventor who didn’t make it past the first auditions about seven years ago. Is that reference too niche? Probably.
There’s actually a lot to like about this performance. Like the way that Boris is standing on a tassled plinth. And the fact that Boris is consistently pronouncing ‘Toxic’ as ‘Toxy’. On the other hand, this is a slowed-down jazz version of Toxic, so it’s lasting at least four times longer than it needs to.
Forget that, we’re back. Now it’s time for Boris Johnson. Good old Boris, he’s always up for a laugh, isn’t he? Look at him, dressing up as a woman and pretending to be even posher than he actually is. You’re fooling nobody, Boris. Not with that hair.
I haven’t updated for a few minutes because there’s another ad break, and typing ‘there’s another ad break’ every three minutes has given me RSI.
Simon’s suggesting that one of One Direction pestered him into making Jack return to the show. This is at least the third time that Simon has mentioned One Direction so far this episode. After the break: Simon Cowell tells Dermot O’Leary off for not being Harry Styles, licks a poster of Harry Styles, mumbles the words to Best Song Ever and cries a little.
Elsewhere: Leona Lewis punches a vase off a table because she used to be the one who Simon talked about every week.
He’s changed the lyrics a bit. He’s singing “I’m going to make you feel like you’re the only girl in the world”. Bit presumptuous, given that he looks like an eight-year-old.
UH-OH. Jack’s got an acoustic guitar, and he’s performing a slowed-down version of The Only Girl In The World. This means that Jack is the boy who ruins all house parties you’ve ever been to, and therefore must be stopped as brutally as possible.
The wildcard for the boys is Jack Walton, who you’ll remember for being exactly the bloody same as every other boy who’s ever taken part in any series of X Factor ever.
Ah, I take that back. Jack is a bit of a clown. I know this because Jack has accidentally made a Take Me Out VT instead of an X Factor VT.
Simon doesn’t like Stephanie because she’s like a member of a girl band. Simon is sitting next to two members of girl bands. Simon will not leave this studio alive.
Ugh. Cheryl just defended Stephanie’s song choice by calling it ‘One of the most Shazammed songs right now’. I hope Stephanie makes it to next week, because I think Cheryl might make her sing the Flappy Birds theme tune.
Stephanie’s singing Everything I Own, because it’s a bit reggae and so is she. Next week: Stephanie sings the entire Peter Andre back catalogue.
She’s walking the line between ‘being good at singing’ and ‘being good at singing every single note at once’. Which, admittedly, is a little bit irritating. Worse still, I’ve just realised that this sounds like Stars Are Blind by Paris Hilton, which is obviously massively unforgivable.
Time for the girls again. It’s Stephanie Nala, who fans of Britain’s Got Talent might recognise from a few years ago, if only fans of Britain’s Got Talent weren’t so eternally dimwitted that they can barely even remember their own names. Fleur might be my favourite contestant this year. As we all know, this means that she probably won’t make it to November.
For the newcomers, Stephanie is a girl who cries a lot. That’s about all there is to her, apparently.
More adverts now, including:
One where Kevin Bacon phonetically just says words that he makes no real attempt to understand!
One where a woman loudly promises you a free carpet if you buy a manky settee from her!
One where a series of dead-eyed dolls spring to life and attempt to make you shop at Sainsbury’s, presumably because they’ll eat your brains if you don’t!
One for that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film that everyone thought came out about three months ago!
Simon Cowell is patting himself on the back for this radical overhaul of Jay James. Remember, this is X Factor, so ‘putting a man in a leather jacket and politely asking him to walk around in a medium-sized circle’ counts as a radical overhaul.
Jay James is singing that song where Paloma Faith just bellows a load of vowel noises for three minutes. Oh, wait, no, that’s all Paloma Faith songs. And on the basis of this, I suspect, all Jay James songs.
Now for the over-25s. First up is Jay James, a man who can best be described as the Kathy Bates from Misery version of James Blunt. Jay James doesn’t so much sing as mimic the noise that a newborn baby makes when it falls down the stairs. I do not care for Jay James.
The judges do not like Overload Generation. This wouldn’t have happened if they’d called themselves Ow4lowwwd Gen’er’AT’un.
You know that feeling when you look back over your old Facebook photos and feel embarrassed about all your terrible old haircuts? Overload Generation are in for a lifetime of that.
They’re singing I Kissed A Girl, because there’s a good chance that at least one of them has actually kissed a girl. If only there was a song called I Spent My Entire Life Trying To Mimic One Direction, then it’d be far more apt.
Also, Ben Mitchell from EastEnders seems to be a member of Overload Generation. Watch out, other members of Overload Generation! He’s a murderer!
The group wildcard now. It’s Overload Generation (formerly just Overload), who I think caused the entire bootcamp audience to scream with barely-contained lust once. I don’t trust them, though, because their name is spelled correctly. This is X Factor, after all. Surely they should be called OhvaLOAH’D JenneraSHUN or something.
We’re back, again, and Mel B is setting herself up as a WORLD-CLASS PHOTOBOMBER. I’m going to like her.
Oh thank god, another ad break. I take it all back. Liveblogging X Factor is piece of cake. I might try and simultaneously construct an Airfix aeroplane while the show’s on next week. I’ll have plenty of time to do it, at least.
I’m also really worried about Mel B’s white dress. She’s one overripe raspberry away from an enormous dry cleaning bill, that one.
Lola’s singing a song that I don’t recognise, partly because I’m old but mainly because she’s singing the lyrics like a woman who’s rammed her mouth with cotton wool for a bet. Let’s say it’s called Stay With Me, because that make up about 90% of the song. It isn’t bad, but then again I am just saying that because I’m worried that her eyebrows will gain sentience, crawl out of the screen and bludgeon me to death.
Now it’s time for the first wildcard of the night. It’s Lola Saunders, who I can genuinely remember nothing about. That bodes well, doesn’t it?
“I’ve gone from being a fishmonger to being on the live shows” says Lola in the VT, failing to realise that she’s doomed to be known as Fishmonger Lola for the rest of her life.
A YOGHURT ADVERT!
It isn’t a very good yoghurt advert, admittedly, but I have to take what I can get these days.
But that’s enough of that. We’ve had 14 minutes of X Factor to sit through. You know what this means? It’s time for an ad break! Hooray for ad breaks!
The judges are all being very positive about Paul. Except Simon just accidentally said that Paul should come out onstage ‘every year’. This is all of our lives now. We will age, but Paul will always be here, year after year, chewing on the inside of his mouth like a dog that’s just swallowed a wasp.
Paul’s singing Ghost by Ella Henderson. Ella is, of course, one of the greatest ever X Factor contestants. Paul, meanwhile, is easily the most recent.
Paul’s apparently been taking lots of performance lessons this week. Judging by this, it basically involved staring at a poster that said ‘LOOK LIKE POPEYE WHEN YOU SING’ for eight solid hours a day, because that’s exactly what he’s doing. Also, we should take a moment to commemorate the first plinth of the year. He’s standing on a plinth. That’s about it.
And now for the first act of the evening, AKA the act that’ll definitely go home tomorrow. It’s Paul Akister, who I only remember because he looks a bit like wilderness-era Robbie Williams guest-starring in Peaky Blinders. That’s enough, surely.
In the VT, Paul introduces the X Factor house. If you want to see more of it, just search Zoopla for the terms ‘horribly decorated’ and ‘previously full of idiots’.
The finalists are onstage. In other news, don’t bother buying anything from ASOS tonight because their warehouse is empty.
Now for a bit where we pick the wildcard. This is weird, though - the judges are picking acts who aren’t from their categories. I’m so confused that I haven’t actually bothered to see who they are. The fish woman, Stevi, some anonymous bloke and a boyband. I’ll write more about them later, unless I end up hating myself too much, which I will.
In time-honoured tradition, even though I’m bound to regret introducing this feature about three weeks from now, let’s meet the judges:
LOUIS! Two thumbs up
MEL! Enormous duckface
SIMON: Four buttons undone
CHERYL! Tonight starring as Caroline Flack
Weird seeing Dermot O’Leary doing something other than standing by a stage and going “ooh”, isn’t it?
Here’s a shot of central London, because a shot of Wembley would obviously be quite weird and boring.
SO FAR: Lots of men with identical haircuts made a series of horrible noises for several weeks at a time. Good, we’re all up to speed.
IT’S TIME! TO FACE! MY ONGOING CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS!
OK, we’re ready? We’ve been to the toilet? We have booze? There’s no backing out now, you know.
Some things you should probably know before tonight’s episode starts:
1) I can’t really remember who any of the contestants are, despite doing my best to memorise their names and faces all week.
2) Unlike previous years, this is a new NEXT-GEN liveblog, which means that I can add important bold-text KEY EVENT entries whenever there’s a particularly good advert about yoghurt or whatever.
3) I forgot to have anything sensible to eat this evening, so I’m doing this shift on biscuits alone. There’s an enormous chance that I’ll have a devastating sugar crash at about quarter past eight, and I apologise in advance.
Hello everyone, and welcome to the X Factor liveblog 2014! We’re back! It’s basically Christmas now!
As you probably already know, the show has been through some momentous changes since last year’s final. Gary Barlow has been replaced by Simon Cowell. Nicole Scherzinger has been replaced by Mel B. Cheryl Cole has been replaced by Cheryl Versini-Fernandez, who is basically just Cheryl Cole with an even more ridiculous set of granny teeth. The X Factor finals are back! Hooray!
And, compared to the endless damp sqibbery of the Barlow years, I’m actually quite excited about this series. Already, based solely on their auditions, I know that I legitimately hate about a third of the finalists this year, which is obviously wonderful news. And there are so many unanswered questions, too. Like:
- Will this be the year that Simon Cowell finally figures out how buttons work?
- How many times will Louis Walsh take things to deadlock?
- Will Cheryl even come close to displaying a realistic approximation of sincerity this year?
- Will Mel B just stand up mid-song and punch someone in the face?
- How many weeks will it be before I genuinely and irreparably lose the will to live?
But we can worry about that later. The important thing is that we’re all here again, and I couldn’t be happier.
As always, I’ll commentate up here, you commentate down there and at the end we can all kid ourselves that we’ve actually accomplished something. Deal? Great. These next two and a half hours are going to fly by. Wait, X Factor’s on for two and a half hours tonight? Christ. Is it too late to back out of this?
