No Simon? It's like Christmas without Santa...

By Jan Moir

Last updated at 2:47 AM on 22nd August 2011

 

Big miss: Simon Cowell's authority is missing in the new lineup

OK. It began with Frankie from Brighton dropping his trousers to show off his tattooed buttocks. Closely followed by Goldie from Birmingham vomiting into a Morrisons carrier bag. Classy. Tone set for the entire season.
Then, as tradition demands, a shy wee Irish pixie with a big, big voice and an even bigger heart stepped on to the stage. Bless you, 16-year-old Janet Devlin, trembling in your school tights as you sang an affecting, frangible version of Your Song.
Everyone has gone bonkers about you, even though – to be honest – you’re not actually that brilliant. Never mind, some footage of your actual home in Northern Ireland was shown, which can mean only one thing. Last 12 klaxon! You’re in the live finals. 
Elsewhere, as tradition demands, tears were jerked, screams were scrum and egos were buttered up and coddled.
Yet as The X Factor’s eighth season got under way on Saturday, the big question was this: would it be the same without Simon, Cheryl and Dannii?
Perhaps we can wave goodbye to the girls without too much regret – but already X Factor 2011 is defined by what it is not, rather than what it is.
Primarily – and there is no getting over this, certainly not in the padded cell department of Moir Towers – it is not starring Simon Cowell.
The two-timing rat has gone off to launch X Factor in America, leaving many British Factor fans with serious abandonment issues. How could he do this to us, after everything we have been through together, up to and including Wagner and Kandy Rain?
And to be honest, I thought the first show missed his absolute authority, his distilled despair, his directness, candour and awful one-liners. He is still the centre around which the carousel turns. The X Factor without Simon Cowell is like Christmas without Santa Claus.
So what to do without our favourite evil weevil? We’ve just got to get over it, that is what.Galloping into the Simon-shaped void come new judges: Gary Barlow from Take That, N-Dubz singer Tulisa and Kelly Rowland of Destiny’s Child fame.

 

Old hand Louis Walsh is the only original left, a fact of which he is keenly aware.
‘I am the last judge standing,’ he said at one point. And as if to cement his credentials, it wasn’t long before the old boy was going on about the likeability factor and the ownership – of stages and of songs. Some things never change.
For his part, Barlow has clearly been cast in the Cowell tough-guy role, the no-nonsense judge bringing ‘a ton’ of experience to the show.

Something old, some things new: Louise Walsh (left) is the only surviving judge from the original lineup

While the odd, prematurely middle-age monotone of his voice has a mood-flattening effect, Gary took to his new job with gusto. After only 28 minutes he uttered his first: ‘100 per cent yes!’ He also told one contestant he was ‘as appealing as a stale curry’ and another that she had just completed a ‘life-changing audition’.
Tulisa is supposed to be bringing a bit of street cred to the show. Judging by her bouffant and clothes, the street in question is Sloane, although she did look in danger of slapping a contestant at one point.
She described herself as ‘young, feisty, current and opinionated’. What is she? An election-special issue of Grazia?
For me, the most interesting judge was Kelly Rowland. With her pillowy lilac lips and amused smile, she veered between American psychobabble and solid good sense.
‘I freaking love the UK,’ she cried at one point. Patronising, but the dynamic between her and Tulisa looks like fun.

Mr Nasty? Gary Barlow shares a joke with fellow judge Kelly Rowland

Meanwhile, on with the show. All the usual X Factor suspects were there, including an elderly leotard-clad midget who seemed to have tasered the guards and fled her high-security facility just to appear on the show.
There was Roxy, the pizza waitress with a deep-dish voice, a deluded mentalist called George who threatened to turn violent and Kitty, who brushed back a tear and gulped: ‘I have had a lot of no’s in my life.’
Kitty, join the club of Absolutely Everyone In The Entire Universe. She also said that she was 26 years old. Aren’t we all, darling! Of course, Kitty is the kind of mad, nightmarish contestant who is clearly in the frame to be this year’s Katie Waissel – and judge Gary sympathised with her plight. 

Usual suspects: Goldie Cheung was one contestant who somehow managed to get through to the next round

‘Some of the biggest artists in the world are the most complicated,’ he said, with the kind of empathy that can only come of working with Robbie Williams for decades.
Elsewhere there was the usual chorus of wannabes, turning imploring eyes to the cameras and uttering the age-old X Factor incantation: This is my dream! My passion! My music! My destiny!
My favourite contestant of the whole evening was the aforementioned Goldie, the girl with the upset stomach.
‘I think I am born to be a star. I can be as big as Tina Turner,’ she said, between heaves. Her act involved singing in a gravelly voice, wearing a tasselled body-stocking and performing the kind of gyrations that made viewers think: When are the ping-pong balls going to start popping out?
‘Luckily, I didn’t throw up,’ she said afterwards. A nation nodded in silent agreement.
So The X Factor is back. It’s different. It’s Simon-less. But I think it’s going to be OK.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2028636/X-FACTOR-2011-No-Simon-Its-like-Christmas-Santa-.html#ixzz1VjVodBjr