A lot of today’s artists have no idea what’s happening in the real world
AS THE 14TH SERIES OF THE X FACTOR GETS UNDER WAY, JUDGE SIMON COWELL TALKS ABOUT SHAKING THINGS UP AND WHETHER THE SHOW WILL MAKE IT TO 20 YEARS
You’re shaking things up again this year in terms of the format of the show, what’s going on?
WHEN you’ve done it for 14 years you can’t keep making the same show every year. I think you have to realise what the contestants are in it for, why do so many people enter?
I think if you just make the same show each year it becomes boring and predictable. So you try and make changes for the better, not everything works but some ideas we’ve got for the live shows are going to be good.
There are fewer live shows. Some have said that it’s a reaction to ratings.
IT’S the way things are in all these shows at the moment. The early and middle rounds rate well. So, the idea is to do more of the middle shows and less of the live shows. We’ll see if it works or not. I think there might be a middle ground.
How do you rate the talent this year?
IT FEELS different and I tell you why. Sometimes you have to check yourself and go, ‘Why did we make the show in the first place?’. We made the show to be fun to watch but also to do something where people who couldn’t get a record deal could get what they needed to give themselves a head start.
It worked. I think this year we’ve put the emphasis back on them, it’s all about them, their personalities, their originality, let them be the stars of the show.
There also seem to be a lot of contestants who have never auditioned for The X Factor before.
WE DIDN’T want the same people coming back again. Now, there are a few people who have been on the show before. But when you’ve just got the same people coming back year after year, it’s boring for us; it’s boring for the audience.
You’ve really been pushing for original songs from the contestants, why?
WHEN they are good song writers you have to encourage that, 100%, otherwise it’s just karaoke. I have to be careful what I say because I have learnt through the years that whatever you do, other people copy you. You hope that whatever we do other people don’t copy; we try not to copy what other people are doing.
If we’re doing original material then you’re going to see it turn up on other shows. It’s one of those things.
You have seen someone already that you’ve said you would have signed on the spot.
I SAW a couple of people in Edinburgh who, outside of the show, I would have signed.
I have to be careful because I jinx it! Whenever I say someone’s amazing, I set myself up for a fall or them up for a fall.
I don’t think at this stage there’s any such thing as a perfect audition, I think you see potential.
Is there a gap in the market right now?
THERE’S always a gap in the market when you’re good. It’s why this show’s called The X Factor, you can’t define what it is, it’s not just a great voice and personality.
I think Olly Murs is probably a good example. He came in and knew he wasn’t the best singer or dancer, but he had that ability to connect with the audience when he was on the show.
You look at his career afterwards, that’s what the show is about.
Does weight, appearance and age matter when launching a new artist?
LESS so now. If anything, I think it can be a virtue. I pride myself on the show, that we don’t have any rules, no age limits. I don’t believe in that.
More and more now in the charts you’re seeing people have huge success where years ago, if you had to tick certain things off a list, you wouldn’t pick them.
It’s because they are real, genuine and talented.
What is the character trait in an artist that you hate the most?
BEING a puppet. I find that the most frustrating and boring. If they can’t stand up for themselves, know the difference between a good song and a bad song, or if they allow anything to happen around them – it’s frustrating because no decent artist would allow that to happen. I like people who stand up for themselves.
This year we’ve seen what you did with the Grenfell charity single and also Ariana Grande’s One Love Manchester concert, how does that make you feel about the industry you’re in?
IT shows that music has that ability to connect. There are a lot of artists, unfortunately, in the world today who are so up themselves that they are not aware of what’s happening around them in the real world. I think with Ariana and the people who turned up to do our single, they all turned up because they care.
We got letters from families involved in the fire and what they said was that it had helped them a lot.
This is the 14th year of the show, can X Factor make it to 20?
IF you’d asked me years ago how many more years I could do, I would have said if we can get to five more years then we’ve done well. Then you get to five years and it becomes ten. What I have noticed over the last two years, which is a good sign, is that I’m seeing younger and younger kids turn up to the show. That’s always the fear, that, like a lot of music shows, you don’t stay relevant. That’s why, outside of the show, what I do with my label, is still important because I couldn’t sit on this panel if my label wasn’t having success outside of the show. I just couldn’t do it... So, that’s a long-winded way of saying yes, I do think it’ll last a little bit longer than I thought.
You’ve got a mini me in the making thanks to your son Eric, who showed his musical knowledge while sitting in the wings watching auditions…
AT the moment he seems to know more about music than I do! If I say to him, ‘Can you tell me the lyrics to this record’ he will literally repeat the entire song. So, when he watches all these movies, like Trolls, which has an amazing soundtrack by Justin Timberlake, he knows every word, who the original artist is, and if I tell him the song he just repeats it. I think he’ll probably end up doing what I am doing.
The X Factor, ITV, tonight, 8pm and tomorrow, 8pm