8/21 Top 5 The REAL Results Show Discussion Thread *SPOILERS*

[stickle]

Originally Posted by canadian_angel

Several of our Idol winners just haven't lived up to any potential. I think part of that is being jaded by the talent that seems to have come out of AI and part of it, I really think is Canada picking the wrong winners.
Lets all cross our fingers it doesn't happen this time!

Who hasn't lived up to any potential???? Virtually every Canadian artist who hasn't had international exposure would kill for a gold record and Ryan sold platinum and now is fronting a band that is doing very well. Kalan sold double platinum, toured for a year to sold out audiences across Canada and next week his second cd is being released. The first single off it is high on the charts in Canada, the video for it is at the top of the charts on both Much Music and Much More Music. Radio stations across Canada are having special previews of the cd this weekend, promotion that is usually given to top notch artists, it's very high on the best sellers chart at Amazon and also for downloads at both iTunes and Puretrack. It will very likely be the top selling cd in Canada the week it's released (which includes international releases in Canada). It's going to be a hit.

Melissa sold a gold record, toured with moderate success, had a Top 10 radio single and is going to be in the big musical Dirty Dancing which opens in Toronto in October. Eva is still touring and working her first cd which also went gold. She is the first Idol winner to have two singles make Top 10 and her third single got into Top 20 and has been on the charts for four or five months. She also signed an international modelling contract with a renowned modelling agency and is a face for Maybelline.

So please don't say several of them haven't lived up to their potential. They're all working in the music business and doing very well which is what they hoped for by going on Idol. They've all gotten Juno nominations as well as other honours with Kalan especially raking in a lot of awards. It's not American style success but they don't have nearly the same opportunities here and their management is shamefully bad compared to the big deals the AI's can get and they've done terrifically well in spite of those handicaps. I say without reservation that our talent stacks up to that coming out of American Idol with no problem at all.

That said, my hopes aren't nearly so high for this year's group of contestants. In my opinion none of them are as talented as previous years and are going to have a tough time matching the successes of previous Idols.

[Google]

 

[canadian_angel]

For me living up to the potential would be the success reached by say Chris Daughtry or Carrie Underwood. They didn't win idol and are still vastly more successful. Yes, they don't necessarily get the same exposure/experience here, but I just don't think they could reach that level given the exposure. Personally, none of them fit into my taste. Maybe that's part of the reason I don't think they've done as well.

[AJane]

Ah, but truly "big" success is always measured by U.S. record sales. There are a few acts - The Hip come to mind - who have enjoyed north-of-the-border stardom, but none of the Canadian Idols have come close to even that.

It's kind of a shame that Jake and Zack can't pick the winner, because I think that for the most part they're really attuned to what would sell here. (Incidentally, stickle - I'm positive they would have picked Kalan as a winner.) I see what canadian angel means by "not living up to potential" - Kalan is a good example, because I believe that his talent exceeds the material he is being given to record. Hopefully one day he'll take his music in a riskier direction, because he's too good to churn out standard-issue pop-rock.

[canadian_angel]

AJane, you said it much better than I did. Thank you.

I agree, what the idols are given to work with is terrible. Especially if you look at, for example, Nelly Fertado or Nickleback. None of the idol winners come close to that kind of success.

I really don't know who the judges would pick this season. They rave so much over Carly Rae and I just don't get that. I wonder if they have her pegged to win it? I'd much rather hope that it's Brian they'd pick.

[AJane]

Brian, I think, would be harder to "sell", whereas Carly Rae belongs more to a tried-and-true formulaic type, like Kelly Clarkson (with only maybe a quarter of the vocal talent, unfortunately, but maybe the talent she does have could be developed).

You know, I still don't know why Nickelback is so huge. They've certainly paved the way for people like Chris Daughtry, and to a lesser extent, bands like Default and Theory of a Deadman (who are my personal guilty pleasure ), but it still amazes me that they've managed to garner such a massive following on both sides of the border.

[stickle]

Originally Posted by canadian_angel

For me living up to the potential would be the success reached by say Chris Daughtry or Carrie Underwood. They didn't win idol and are still vastly more successful. Yes, they don't necessarily get the same exposure/experience here, but I just don't think they could reach that level given the exposure. Personally, none of them fit into my taste. Maybe that's part of the reason I don't think they've done as well.

But they can't possibly have the success reached by Underwood (who certainly did win Idol) or Daughtry who's an anomaly. No other Idol non-winner (CI or AI) has sold his level of cd's so it's a little hard to hold him up as a standard that should be reached by any Canadian, Idol or no Idol. No Canadian band besides Nickleback has reached his level either, Idol or no Idol. Bo Bice, runner up went gold; Kat McPhee, runner up, didn't hit gold in spite of massive publicity; Diana DeGarmo, runner up, nowhere near gold; Justin Guerini, who?

For the CI winners, they're not allowed to release their cd's in the States. Idol doesn't let them. Nor is CI seen in the States. They may not be to your taste but just like in the US, they were chosen by the majority of the viewers, so given the same opportunities they likely would have reached similar levels of success as the viewer chosen AI winners. For what it's worth, Simon Fuller (I believe that's his name - one of the grand poohbahs of Idol) is on record as saying that if Kalan had won AI, he'd be a huge international star. There's no reason to think that all the things that make him a relative Canadian star wouldn't have charmed American people the same way.

And then in Canada, there just isn't the star making machine like there is in the US. What tv shows can they go on? eTalk? ETCanada? That's about it. There's no Leno, no Letterman, no Ellen, no Oprah, no Larry King Live, all with millions and millions of viewers. The print media mocks them in Canada rather than idolizes them. You can't possibly hold them to the same standards as the American Idols. There is absolutely no way they could begin to achieve the same levels of success but it's certainly through no fault of their own. Compare them to other Canadian artists who operate under much the same restrictions and then your comparisons have some validity.

Originally Posted by canadian_angel

I agree, what the idols are given to work with is terrible. Especially if you look at, for example, Nelly Fertado or Nickleback. None of the idol winners come close to that kind of success.

But neither Nelly Furtado or Nickleback had huge success with their first albums. It took them a number of years and several cd's to work up to where they are now.

Originally Posted by AJane

It's kind of a shame that Jake and Zack can't pick the winner, because I think that for the most part they're really attuned to what would sell here. (Incidentally, stickle - I'm positive they would have picked Kalan as a winner.)

They both have, as has Farley, said in any number of interviews that they had him pegged as a winner right from the getgo.

Originally Posted by AJane

I see what canadian angel means by "not living up to potential" - Kalan is a good example, because I believe that his talent exceeds the material he is being given to record. Hopefully one day he'll take his music in a riskier direction, because he's too good to churn out standard-issue pop-rock.

Well, let's see how this sophomore cd does. It's definitely more his own choice of material although of course the label still had a lot of input into what he was 'allowed' to choose. But three quarters of the songs on this cd were written or co-written by him. Still, it may surprise, and probably will disappoint, quite a few people. It's not nearly as rock or as edgy as many were expecting or hoping for but it's also not standard-issue pop rock. But as he said in his latest blog, he's had a lot of difficulties in the last couple of years (both personally and professionally) and he guesses he just wasn't feeling 'rock and roll', but he had to write about what he was feeling at the time. What it does show is music and lyrics that are often quite cerebral, thoughtful and intelligent. It's definitely not slam bam simplistic noise like Nickleback and Hedley. Whether it will appeal to the masses like they do remains to be seen.

Originally Posted by AJane

You know, I still don't know why Nickelback is so huge.

Amen! I sure don't either!

[canadian_angel]

Originally Posted by stickle

For the CI winners, they're not allowed to release their cd's in the States. Idol doesn't let them. Nor is CI seen in the States.

They're not? I didn't know that. Why are they not allowed to? That makes no sense to me.

[stickle]

Originally Posted by canadian_angel

They're not? I didn't know that. Why are they not allowed to? That makes no sense to me.

I dunno. Protecting their own turf? Who can figure out why the Americans do a lot of the things that they do? Why were they allowed to keep the duty Canadian softwood companies paid even though numerous world courts said the tariff was wrongly imposed? But the CI's have to sign with 19E (the Idol management company) and Sony BMG Canada. You can't release a cd in the States (nobody can, not just the Idols) on a Canadian label, you have to get signed to an American label. It also works the same way in reverse here in Canada - a cd has to be released by a Canadian record company. The thing is though that virtually any American artist is almost automatically put on a Canadian record label because it's good for their business to have a popular American signed with them, it costs them very little and they stand to make money from it. But it's very hard for a Canadian to get signed by an American label (plus part of the record has to be recorded and produced in the States but that's a whole other story). And while the CI is signed to 19E, they can't sign with an American label and 19E's sister company in the States, RCA I think, won't sign them either so the CI has to get out of their 19E contract first before they can go to the States. It's a very incestuous nasty business. And very unfair to the kids that are stuck in the middle. I think that's one reason why I get so upset when they're criticized for not doing as well the AI's when they just don't have the same chances and options. And I get angry at the media people who, if they're halfway informed about the business they're writing about knows these things, and yet they still blame say, Kalan, for not being as big a star as Kelly. It's impossible and if they don't know that, they should learn so they can publish fair and balanced articles, not make nasty snide comments about them.