James Masterton

I told you we hadn’t heard the last of it.

The bizarre end to last week’s result show inevitably prompted a flurry of column inches and wild conspiracy theories as to Simon Cowell’s motives in not binning the twins at the first opportunity he was given and as a result sending home someone who appears to be universally regarded as one of the more talented contenders in the competition.

I should point out from the outset that much of this is patent nonsense. Any argument that somehow the fix is on and that a scheme is afoot to make sure that the terrible two make it to the end so they can either win outright or, as some would have you believe, so that they will present an easy black and white choice between themselves and the true winner. Such speculation inevitably ignores the fact that the one variable the producers cannot control is the public vote. However much we might complain about the machinations of the judges or the producers behind the scenes, we still get to choose who the 2 acts are who are in line for the chop.

The one unanswered question really is just how much did the judges know about which way the vote had gone last week, and so was Simon making his final choice with the full knowledge about what the consequences would be? Even if he did know, the actions of the panel before him in voting 2-1 for the twins to go home meant he had little room for manoeuvre in his choice, as whichever act he chose would have gone. Suggestions that it was all a grand conspiracy simply don’t hold up. For all the talk of how Lucie was clearly one of the most talented and a “threat” somehow to the other acts, the fact remains that she didn’t actually have anyone voting for her last week. Just like when Laura White got an early bullet last year, it may well have been a shock to see someone who could sing better than many of the rest eliminated, but the numbers did not lie. She wasn’t popular, few people voted for her, so it stands to reason that she has to go.

Simon Cowell’s one problem now is that his ability to wear two different hats is badly compromised. During the week the newspapers are full of backstage reports of Simon changing something that he doesn’t like, Simon insisting that something else should happen or Simon changing the theme on a whim. The fact is that X Factor is his show, he calls the shots throughout and everyone else dances to his tune yet when it comes to judging the acts we are expected to believe he suddenly becomes the impartial evaluator of talent, assessing each performance on its musical merits with little regard to any plans he might have had about the direction the competition could take. His ability to keep up this pretence was surely hit last week when despite many public pronouncements about what a disaster the twins were for the show and how he could emigrate if they won, he still did not remove them from the show the first time an opportunity to do so presented itself. On balance, you can understand why so many people are asking questions and coming up with strange conspiracy theories.

So sit down to watch the show this week suspecting that we will see a new, contrite and analytical Simon Cowell. He has to upsell himself as a judge and downplay his role as producer. Or maybe something unexpected will happen to create a brand new set of headlines…

The first thing we learn this week: there is no part of “It’s the X Factor Queen night – with Dermot O’Leary” that doesn’t sound funny. On any level. The show begins by offering Simon a few minutes of airtime to explain himself and his actions six days ago, although he spends most of it throwing down the gauntlet to Sting and suggesting he should help the contestants out rather than condemning them. I’m happy with this, just as long as it doesn’t mean “lute week” for the semi final or something.

Disco Stu gets to worship at the font of Messrs May and Taylor first, the game of “who’s got the silliest haircut” he played with Brian May presumably taking place before the cameras are switched on. His song of choice is ‘Radio Gaga’ and we are told time and time again that he wants to avoid coming across as some kind of bad Freddie tribute act. Or “Queen with Paul Rodgers” as I believe they are commonly known. Refreshingly this wasn’t a tribute act, nor was it particularly terrible. He took his time warming up to it but by the end the crowd were on their feet. A good start.

“Pyro excites me” says Dannii during the judging. Odd, I thought it used to be Canadian racing drivers. Tastes change I guess.

NotGazza steps up to the plate next. Cheryl promises us a “cheeky” performance, as the crushing weight of dramatic irony threatens to swamp the universe. All will become clear. The man with the white hair trots out ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love’. Cheeky? Yes. Tuneful? No. Notice that you struggled to sing along with this whilst watching at home? This is because he was a semitone sharp almost the whole way through in a manner which was at times quite excruciating. Whilst waiting for someone other than me to point this out I finally spotted that the X Factor format almost requires the judges to critique the performance as a whole rather than the actual singing. You will notice that there is no equivalent of say a Randy Jackson who will pull a face and so “I dunno dawg, for me that was a bit pitchy for me that was”. Hence the poor singers are never really pulled up on their technical inadequacies. Yes it is nicer, but it does mean that people who can’t really hold a tune ride through sometimes at the expense of people who can sing. Fine in theory, except on those occasions (hello Leon Jackson) when a non-singer wins and this bites them on the bottom.

I mentioned arses again. Almost as if it is foreshadowing something. Also, have you noticed how Cheryl constantly glances down at her notes when delivering her reviews? Even when she is saying nice things about her own acts.

Moving on, and to sing next is new competition favourite NiceBloke. His big news of the week is the hand injury he has suffered whilst in the X Factor gym. It means he spends every rehearsal wearing a sling, making slick choreography rather tricky this week. If you don’t mind, I’m going to pretend he has actually suffered some kind of bizarre wanking injury as it makes the whole thing even funnier.

Tonight he is singing ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ but this ends up being just a little bit of a letdown. It is a huge song to sing and he is by no means the first person ever to be totally swamped by the song and almost lost on the stage. Pleasingly Dannii makes the same point mere moments after I’ve written the above in my notes which does at least mean that one of us knows what we are talking about. Meanwhile the wanking knuckle injury is elevated to “nearly broke your arm” by the time we get round to Simon’s comments and he is required to make excuses for the poor performance of one of his acts.

The regrettable but sadly inevitable parade of boys continues with Ken who has chosen ‘Somebody To Love’. In the deserted theatre of celebrity worship, May and Taylor purse their lips and tell him what a hard song it is which sets this up to be a car crash. Except it isn’t. His rendition is everything the last chap wasn’t. Showing a side of him he never has before he delivers this in a powerful, confident manner and even hits the long sustain into the bridge without so much as a wobble. If it does fall to me to start critiquing the singing then I’m pleased to report this was almost inch perfect. Best of the night honours are surely going to go his way.

Louis grumpily complains about the choir that joined him onstage, for reasons that are not quite clear. Simon says he was better last week. I shout at the TV that last week is irrelevant before realising they are in Zone 4 on the tube map and can’t hear me.

So it comes to this. Fresh from Stacey-gate are the Malfoy Twins. I’m going to skip over the “we met Queen. The Band not The Queen” gap in their intro VT as this was clearly scripted as part of a new campaign to endear them to the public. Some of us aren’t so easily fooled you know.

Their carefully chosen (to mask their inadequacies) song is ‘Ice Ice Baby’, er.. I mean ‘Under Pressure’, although the joke is spoiled when they wind up doing a cute hybrid of both songs. As seen on the last Westlife tour I’m told. Wonder who came up with that idea. First of all we should note that as a performance, this was knockout wonderful. I’m not sure what it was. Whether it was the revelation that they make better rappers than dancers or whether it was the fact that the staging meant they toned down that annoying little jig dance that they always wind up doing, I’m not sure. All I do know is that for a brief four minutes it was worth forgetting everything that had gone before and appreciating the pair in a whole new light. Now that took some doing.

Sadly for them, this won’t be the reason the performance was remembered. The headlines will belong to a stage invader (quickly revealed to be planned studio guest Calvin Harris) who makes his bid for Jarvis Cocker-esque infamy by dancing around with a pineapple on his head before pointing his rear end towards the camera and then exiting stage left. Some swift camera work ensures it was a blink and you’ll miss it moment, but the wonder of the internet means that screen captures of the whole thing were being swapped left right and centre within moments of the performance.

If he had tried to disrupt them being awful it might have been funnier. As it was, as a timely intervention this was right up there with the time during my university years when the rag society hijacked a Union meeting, just as they were discussing a recent campus suicide.

We’ll move on to the lady who is quite blatantly the only womb-packing contestant left – Dagenham Doris. She performs ‘Who Wants To Live Forever’ which turns out to be an inspired choice. For the first time since, well pretty much the first audition show, she gets to break out the “new Leona” persona that made her an instant favourite after the very first show on the series. Can I change my mind about best of the night? This was rich, classy and actually not a little bit moving. The panel shower her with praise, meaning we get to see her looking really happy over and over again. The downside being that it hits home how much her “I am really pleased” face is exactly the same as everybody else’s “I am doing a large poo” face.

To bring up the rear if you’ll pardon the ever more appropriate pun, here comes Arsehyl who is apparently still on the horns of the “too cocky or not to cocky” dilemma. OneHalfOfQueen reassure him that most people believed that Freddie Mercury was cocky and arrogant and it didn’t let him bother him. Although Freddie also had lost of unprotected promiscuous sex and didn’t let that bother him either, and look where that got him. Not that Arsehyl will fall into that trap, unless he takes Cheryl’s cooing over his close cropped haircut at face value.

What’s that? Oh yes, his song. ‘We Are The Champions’. It was only OK, and Dermot has just reminded me that we have to endure this year’s charity ensemble record tomorrow night and so we’ve finished on a downer.

We’re left at the end of this performance night with three big questions unanswered:

1. Who is for the bullet? I’d go for NotGazza in all honesty.
2. What is the “big Queen surprise” that they teased.
3. What is the technical TV term for the “emergency wide shot of extreme panic” that the director cut to when Calvin Harris started waving pineapples around?

On that last question, I’ll consult a TV director friend and report back tomorrow. In the meantime I’ll leave you with a clip of the Twitscoop cloud from moments after the show ended. The bigger the word, the more popular it is. Can you guess what the real talking point of tonight was?

Before we start this week, we interrupt your normal X Factor Blog schedule to bring you a gratuitous moment of reality TV celeb schmoozing on the part of the author.

There, that feels better. Sorry for the interruption.

This week the obsession with discovering just who has topped the telephone voting seems to have hit new heights, with huge numbers of people landing on this site all searching for variations on “X Factor Voting figures”. The Sun suggested this week that the source of its bold claims to know who won were based on figures released by the Free2call website which was offering free voting to a limited number of people who listened to an advert. It is an interesting theory, but I would counsel against assuming that it is necessarily a representative sample – especially as there was little to stop the limited number of people being aware of it from voting multiple times. It is all a moot point this week as the site lost their sponsor and so did not run the service.

I should point out that trying to find out who “won” kind of defeats the object of the show. Such figures are kept secret for a good reason, as finding out who is theoretically ahead risks rendering the heats pointless. The only numbers that matter are who came bottom, and in truth they are the only ones that I personally care about.

Preaching over. This week it is “movie songs week”, which as per this show’s usual habit of recycling themes was last seen in week 2 back in 2007, although any fears that this would mean a similar recycling of song choices ultimately proved unfounded.

First out of the hat is Dagenham Doris. In keeping with tonight’s theme, they all got to attend a movie premiere this week, something which actually gets old very quickly as every single damn interview starts with the contestant saying “we went to a movie premiere this week”. We are told that tonight she is concentrating on being “sexy”, an effect ruined by the lady herself as she gives that odd little snort of hers right after she’s told us. Her song is ‘Son Of A Preacher Man’ which is apparently so obviously from Pulp Fiction that nobody sees fit to mention it. Once again the stress of walking and talking takes its toll on her voice as she warbles in a way that makes the ghost of Dusty Springfield distinctly uncomfortable. Am I nitpicking about the bum notes? I don’t think I am really. She was the one people were talking of as a winner after very first show of the auditions, so it isn’t too much to expect her to be better.

“Lovely to see you looking so sexy and young” says Cheryl. Maybe I wasn’t paying attention but I missed the week where she was dressed up as a granny. Simon complains it was “a talent show performance” which I’m taking to be the final proof that he is running a completely different show in his head. Call me daft but I was under the impression this was what this is. Never mind, you do have to conclude she did look sexy. I almost want to make a baby with her and then leave her to raise it on her own.

Second to perform tonight is NiceBloke, who now is apparently “The Incredible NiceBloke”. Well he did rip his shirt off last week I guess. Simon says it is a song from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and I can’t have been the only person in the country who entertained the thought just for a moment that he might be doing ‘Oh Yeah’. Instead we learn he Is doing ‘Twist and Shout’ and you will note that Simon’s act is the only one whose introductory video includes the actual footage of the song being used in the film. Sniping aside this is another assured performance which goes a long way to seeing him anointed the winner although the choreography eschews actual twisting as per the lyrics and instead bizarrely at one point turns into the ‘Thriller’ routine. The three judges who don’t “own” him all do their best to pick holes causing Simon to fly into a bit of a rage. This could get ugly.

Now for NotGazza, who has to do the compulsory “phew I escaped the chop last week” moment in his video. It seems at one point he is going to be this year’s sicknote as his voice sounds shot to bits, although we are assured he is OK to perform. He is doing ‘Stand By Me’ and it surely did not take a clairvoyant to predict that it would turn into ‘Beautiful Girls’ halfway through. Sure enough it does, which is an interesting move as technically it means he has performed two songs so they had to pay for two lots of clearance. I only bring this up as the year before last on American Idol David Archuleta famously turned ‘Stand By Me’ into the Sean Kingston song at the behest of his father and completely without permission from the producers. This apparently landed the show a huge bill for the uncleared song and a backstage ban for the meddling father. This aside, the performance was good although the lack of contemporary songs is starting to get a little annoying.

Here is hoping for something from DIsco Stu who once again was embroiled in a row over his song choice with Simon making a last minute intervention to change it to something more sensible. His original choice was apparently ‘Unchained Melody’, which as Cheryl sagely notes would have been a little bit rubbish. His eventual song is ‘Crying’ which prompts the first stand up row of the series. The song is credited as being from little known cult film Gummo which prompts Louis to complain of cheating, given that it is from a song that only five people have seen. On closer examination this simply doesn’t hold up. Regardless of what Simon thinks it is from, the song was also in Hiding Out (which prompted the kd lang and Roy Orbison duet) and famously in the nightclub scene in Mulholland Drive. Charge not sustained I’m afraid.

All of this serves as a good distraction from his performance itself which was a little off the money and a poor reflection of his talents. Never mind the songs though, the feistiness of the panel is providing most of the entertainment tonight. Nonetheless you will note it was yet another very elderly song.

Things change as we get to IAmWelsh although this a classic example of being careful what you wish for. Tonight she is singing what I initially have to note as “obscure song from Camp Rock” which eventually turns out to be the Demi Lovato song ‘This Is Me’. The flaw here is the sheer obscurity of it. Let’s face facts, nobody over the age of 14 has ever sat through Camp Rock. Even if you are tangentially aware of Disney Channel movies, it is still no High School Musical. That can’t help but harm her appeal. Incidentally the amount of Disney related product placement tonight is starting to get a little suspicious. Not only to the contestants all make the point of how wonderful their Disney Film Premiere experience was, we now have a song from a film that was made by them. They even get a post-song plug as IAmWelsh takes time to note how wonderful it was to sing a Disney song. Hmmm.

As for the singing this was actually bloody poor again. More than anyone else she seems to be trading on her looks rather than her talent. The best Simon can do is tell her she was “relevant”, which to my mind does not equate to “being able to sing”. Do I really have too elevated a bunch of expectations, or are many of these people this year just painfully average?

Now to the newly shorn and nicely humble Arsehyl. Fascinatingly his song is ‘Purple Rain’ which is inevitably going to provoke comparisons with Los Pechos and her show-stopping performance from this time last year. Meanwhile I’m more interested to learn whether this is the one performance of the week which won’t be up on the official X Factor channel on YouTube given Prince’s idiotic and slightly contemptible insistence that no representation of him or his music appears on internet sites he doesn’t control. Prince, if you or your lawyers are watching, I think you are an utter cock. Dialling down my hatred of Arsehyl himself, this was actually the kind of good performance the show has been lacking this evening. It wasn’t the best performance of ‘Purple Rain’ this show has ever seen (nothing ever could be quite frankly) but it was enough to ensure he won’t be bottom again. Cheryl once again manages to be the most relevant judge of the week by noting that he is no longer the broken man we saw last week. He has his mojo back, but let’s hope the ego doesn’t return as well.

Dermot cues the break by announcing that the twins are next and for a moment you could be forgiven that we are watching a pantomime as the already animated audience almost drown him out with boos and catcalls. This I think illustrates the main problem the show has with this act. It isn’t like John Simpson on SCD last year where the judges were the only ones who hated him and the public kept him in just to annoy them. This time the judges are trying to play fair by the contenders in the face of what is a totally split public view. It is very hard for them to call it one way or the other.

The Malfoy Twins tonight are doing Ghostbusters which you will note yet again is a song that doesn’t have much of a tune that needs carrying. The elaborate staging (far and away above that offered to anyone else) again demonstrates that the two cannot dance in time any more than they can sing in tune and once more this is going to come down more to entertainment value than any talent they may possess. Dannii confesses she has nothing constructive to say. Does that mean she has to give her fee for the night back? Simon ends up echoing my own thoughts and notes that for sheer entertainment value you cannot escape the fact that they were the best of the night so far.

Incidentally I do love the way the Twitter hot topics list is swamped by X Factor related tags any time the show is on. People in the USA and indeed around the world must wonder what the hell is going on.

Ken gets to finish tonight. I note with interest that his rendition of ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ last week meant that he has for the first time been responsible for the creation of a spontaneous Top 20 hit. If you take that as any kind of yardstick you can’t escape the fact that he is turning into one of the more popular contenders. More Disney plugs here as he goes for ‘Circle Of Life’ and I do have to point out here that I’ve so far managed to go through my entire adult life without ever watching The Lion King. I did watch The Loin King once but that was a totally different film and probably not compatible with the Disney ethos. The song performance is a bit choirboy (or as Dannii points out, a stage musical rendition rather than that of a potential pop star) but at the very least is in tune. My new philosophy is to ignore whether I hate the people singing or note. Awarding top marks to people who actually sing in tune is the way forward.

So this was a weird one tonight. You’ll note that we’ve hit the half way point of these hearts so theoretically all the real deadwood has now gone. Choosing a loser of the night is going to be tricky.

See you tomorrow night for the results, and I’ll leave you with one thought. Why do the voting recaps make a point of highlighting the pictures of the respective judges? I can’t help but think that the public don’t actually care which act “belongs” to which judge. After six years of this show you would think the producers would have spotted that as well.

There is a well known American website called votefortheworst.com which by its own admission devotes its time to attempting to ruin Stateside talent shows such as American and Canadian Idol. Exploiting the fact that telephone voting over there is free and subsidised by the corporate sponsors of the show, as their name suggests they encourage their readers to vote for what they view as the worst, most pointless contestants on the programmes in order to subvert the outcome as long as they possibly can. Their most high profile success came in 2007 when AI contestant Sanjaya Malakar made it to the Top 7 despite his glaringly obvious lack of singing skills next to the other contestants and the continuing disgust of Simon Cowell.

Whilst there is no such campaign on these shores, sagas such that of John Sergeant on Strictly Come Dancing last year demonstrate that at times the British public can take on a similarly evil streak, voting incessantly for the contestant that actually entertains them the most, regardless of the actual level of talent they possess. This “we like him” over “he is talented” factor may actually account for the careers of many people on television and radio at the moment, but that is by the by.

This year it is the turn of X Factor to be faced with such a headache as the continuing presence of the duo whom the press have dubbed “Jedward” threatens to cast a shadow over the rest of the competition. All week there have been competing and contradictory tabloid stories about the pair, first claiming that the producers are panicking because they actually topped the secret vote last week, then with claims that this is not actually true and that the “leak” of the figures was a deliberate attempt to scare us into not voting for them this week, and then finally the claim that Simon and Louis are in on the whole scam and actually want the pair to win as they know they can make millions out of them.

Clearly at some point something has to give, and so we enter Week 4 not only wondering who out of the people who can actually sing is going to go home, but just how long the jokers in the pack are going to be inflicted upon us.

As the show opens we are excitedly informed by the ever more geeky Dermot that for the first time ever the theme is ROCK. The fact that this itself needs pointing out is quite telling, as the endless recycling of themes such as “divas” and “big band” has itself resulted in an endless recycling of the songs the contestants are told to sing. For all his experience as a music guru, Simon Cowell subscribes to the view that the public are to be given what they know and love and very little else, the same attitude that means stations like Heart FM would quite cheerfully play the same five records over and over again if they thought they could get away with it. It means that musically X Factor tends to get quite repetitive (two acts in three years have propelled ‘Hurt’ back into the Top 40 for example). Switching to a theme that has never been used before means we might, just might, get treated to a brand new playlist. We live in hope.

“Expect Aerosmith to the Beatles and even Katy Perry” says Dermot although the last time I looked only one of these acts was actually rock. Although Bon Jovi were hailed last week as the superstar guests on this show, it should be noted that there is no celebrity mentor for the contestants this week, this despite Jon Bon Jovi cheerfully mentoring on American Idol two years ago and prompting LaKisha Jones to confess to his face that she’d never heard his music but knew who he was as she’d seen him on Oprah.

First out of the hat tonight is Ken who slowly but surely has been creeping up the popularity tables. We are told he has the “voice of an angel” and so can’t pull a heavy rock song off. I know Hell’s Angels that would quietly disagree with that to be frank. To my utter joy they bring the eclectic song catalogue from the word go as he is handed ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ which I’m sorely tempted to describe as inspired choice. Contrary to the build-up, the tone of the song fits his rather girly voice perfectly and you realise that in tone he isn’t so far removed from Journey singer Steve Perry. This is officially the first time I’ve actually bought into him as a performer and indeed it is so good that for want of something to be grumpy about Simon critiques the dancers who were performing their own private ballet and were leaping into each others arms at the back of the stage. This is around the time of year that Mr Cowell starts jetting back and forth across the Atlantic during the week to whittle down the last few American Idol contenders. He may well have forgotten just which show he was on.

IAmWelsh takes second spot of the night and is pleasingly handed ‘Sweet Child O’Mine’, a choice which only serves to highlight just how much Axl Rose sings like a girl given that she does the track in the same register as the original. I must be watching this in a very good mood because am impressed by this as well. Ignoring the occasional bum note she does the whole rock chick thing very well indeed. Cheryl compares her to Avril Lavigne and I am momentarily distracted by imagining a toilet fight between the two. Meanwhile after having his “you sung it like an actress” complaint from last week thrown back in his face, Simon gets to do his magnanimous climb down and plays the benevolent hero as he tells her in no uncertain terms what a star this night has made her.

Now we get to have some fun as the hopefully newly humble Arsehyl takes to the stage. Given the loud and numerous shouts of joy that were heard when he escaped the bullet by the skin of his teeth last week it is clear that the love felt for him in the studio each week has not been universally shared. In a sense I kind of feel sorry for him as he has been badly served by the new audition format this year. Whereas before the contestants had to go through several rounds of closed room performances before getting to appear in front of a crowd, this year they have been applauded by the public from the word go. If you have become accustomed to having people kiss your arse telling you how wonderful you are every time you take to the stage, you are naturally going to start believing it, thus making the revelation that not everyone shares this view even harder to take.

Nonetheless the nation’s favourite (sort of) teacher clearly has some work to do and all four judges line up to make the point on his introductory tape. Playing it safe he goes for ‘I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing’ and oh my word his confidence has sunk to rock bottom. Attempting to play down the cockiness he appears to have lost everything that made him so entertaining in the first place. The song doesn’t suit him at all and he warbles it off key like a five pints gone karaoke singer rather than the superstar in waiting that he has hitherto been billed. I can’t help but think this was a mistake and that his voice would have suited the Guns N’ Roses song far better. All sympathy aside, I must confess to a guilty pleasure of enjoying just how bad this was. He may well be in trouble yet again.

Now to NotGazza and the theme of his introductory VT is that everyone is worried that he has been given a girls song. How bloody true that is. The promised Katy Perry track makes its grand appearance here as he belts out a unique take on ‘I Kissed A Girl’. My head almost explodes trying to deal with the million things that are wrong with this. Indeed it prompts a debate in our house about the context of the song and how it works with a man singing it. For the avoidance of doubt, the crucial line in the chorus has now become “hope her boyfriend don’t mind it” which means instead of being a gay anthem the song has now been recast as one guy cheekily trying to steal the woman of another. I could be wrong but that surely kind of diminishes it somehow. This only serves as an unwanted distraction from the performance itself which I have to rewind and watch again to discover it was faltering and a little unsure. Simon and Louis bicker after Simon congratulates him on taking such a risk with Louis asking just how much of a risk the songs of Robson and Jerome were. Ouch. Most entertainingly Dannii steals Cheryl’s planned gag about all his fans wishing it was about them he was kissing and unable to improvise or deviate from her planned script Mrs Cole is left having to repeat the gag and look a bit foolish in the process.

OK so as promised at the top of the show we’ve now had Aerosmith and Katy Perry. I find myself just a little scared about who amongst those left to perform is going to massacre The Beatles.

It isn’t Dagenham Doris thank goodness. Simon has been complaining in recent weeks that she never gets to dance and instead spends her time glued to the stage, so Dannii breaks out this week’s contractually obliged use of the “comfort zone” expression to suggest that this week we will actually be seeing a performance. Her song is ‘Somewhere Only We Know’ which is the most tenuous use of the “rock” concept so far. During her three minutes we start to understand just why it is she has never moved before as the poor girl quite manifestly can’t manage the walking and singing at the same time thing very well. I’m starting to like this theme, as you may note that the previously coasting favourites have suddenly looked very average indeed whilst those who have previously not shined at all are having their best week of the competition so far. That said, it does mean that the show has rapidly gone downhill  as the last three performances have been utter garbage. Simon tells her she walked better than she sang. Maybe he is wishing she’d had a private ballet onstage with her or something. Her post song chat with Dermot is more incomprehensible than ever although if she does get eliminated early there is surely an attempt at the “saying 500 words in the shortest time possible” world record lined up for her on daytime television.

Now to Disco Stu who says what we are all thinking by confessing that as the one out and out rock singer in the competition there are inevitably some high expectations this evening. His is an eclectic but rather puzzling choice of song as he goes for ‘Rocks’ and I find myself wondering if ‘Country Girl’ wouldn’t have been a better choice of Primal Scream track for him to take on. Or maybe Simon Cowell couldn’t find it on YouTube (rumours are that this is how he chooses the songs for his acts to sing). The main problem here is that it was no better or worse than I or anyone else expected it to be, so we have little choice but to be largely indifferent to it. I never thought I’d say this but the phrase comfort zone is only too appropriate here. As the only one safely inside his, he blew a golden chance to shine.

Before we get to Rihachel another word about song choices. Let’s rewind and look at some song choices over the last couple of weeks:

Week 2 – ‘With Or Without You’
Week 3 – ‘Angel Of Harlem’

Do you spot a pattern there? Indeed for the third week running a U2 song gets an X Factor outing. Is there some kind of agenda here in persuading Bono to appear on the final or something? This week’s U2 song is ‘One’ which notably has been covered by both Mica Paris and Mary J Blige in the past so it is well established as a song for a female singer. Much has been made of Rihachel’s cheeky wink to the onstage camera during the first verse although I do feel compelled to point out that such showmanship does rather detract from the overall impact of a song that is supposed to be about reaching into the darkest depths of your soul for the inspiration to continue. That said this was kind of OK and at the very least has the distinction of not being the worst of the week, so I think we can conclude she will be safe once again.

Eight acts in and the moment we have all (not) been waiting for has arrived as the terrible Malfoy Twins take to the stage. They could hardly avoid the elephant in the room of the week’s newspaper headlines and so the week long fuss is neatly covered complete with footage of the chaos outside the shared house. 14 year old breasts notably not pictured however for obvious reasons. What we need to do now then is move on from the hype and try as best we can to concentrate on the performance. Instantly I come to regret this approach. Their take on ‘We Will Rock You’ manages a unique first by being simultaneously insulting to both the Queen original and the 5ive cover version on which this arrangement is based. To reuse a Cowell quote from two years ago on Idol, “I don’t think it really matters what I say any more”. What this was actually like is irrelevant. All that matters is whether people vote for them out of sheer bloody mindedness or not. There surely can be no other reason to do so.

Our hopes for the end are now pinned on NiceBloke to close the broadcast with a memorable performance as you can’t help but escape the feeling that things have gone downhill in the last hour or so. Thank goodness he gets to be the one to do The Beatles as he belts out a neat performance of ‘Come Together’. For reasons of taste I’ve chosen to leave out the joke I want to make about this being the very reaction of all the the girls who appear to be swooning over him in my office and my social circle. Whilst this wasn’t exactly “rock” it was certainly entertaining and it increasingly appears to be all that matters now. His shirt popping at the end of the track was surely the most show stealing moment of the series so far. Louis claims that he is the dark horse but I’m inclined to point out that he is actually a front runner by a long way now. When asked by Dermot to show his appreciation for the crowd in the studio he does the honourable thing and thanks them on behalf of all the performers. He’s just that nice you see.

In summary then this has been the ultimate topsy-turvy show. Those who have hitherto been poor were very good and those who behaved like stars to start off with have been badly found out. Just for a change these are one set of results that I really would love to see leaked.