Friday 13 January 2012

We don't need no #TVOH !

It happened last year and although I should've known better this year I fell again for the "purity" and joy of the blind auditions of a new Talent Show on Dutch TV: "The Voice of Holland", on Twitter known as #TVOH. For those who haven't seen it in their country yet an explanation of this concept:
this talent show starts with so called "blind auditions" where the jury members can't see the candidates in the beginning. They're turned with their backs towards the podium. Based on only the vocal performance they have to decide whether they want the candidate to go through to the next round, if they think he/she is good they hit a button and this juror's chair turns around and so he/she can see who is making that great sound.
It's especially nice when the candidate is a bit weird, particular, like the fully tattooed Ben Saunders. He was one of last years' contestants (and winner). Watch the video of his audition below here. Ben turned out to be a sheep -no a lamb- in wolves' clothing.

To make it even more interesting for the viewer the jury members who turned their seats (and thus want the candidate to go through) have to convince the candidate to choose him/her over another juror to join his/her team. So roles turn, it's not the candidate anymore that needs to convince the jury, it's the jury pulling on the candidates' limbs.

But back to what I wanted to point out. Right after so called blind auditions the Voice of X (fill in your country) turns back into being any other talent show with SMS votings and so the best looking boys are way ahead of the other candidates. (It's a known fact that teenage girls are the most active voters. Although Ben's charisma even managed to beat that.) But what made this show even worse is the infinite trust and positive comments by the jury. Even after a lousy performance. Where X-Factor was so interesting because the jury was sometimes very hard and direct this show looses it because it's soft, way too soft and it lacks criticism. So last week it was enough... I couldn't handle it anymore! This was too sweet and t0o incredible!

And then yesterday evening I saw the best "talent show" of this year. Seven teenage girls, tonight they'll  probably be voting for one of the cute boys in #TVOH's semi-final, were selected out a group of over 400 girls by one of Holland's best DJ's trying to become the Dutch Birdy. It was a very compact election, the 400+ girls send in a video via YouTube, the DJ (Giel Beelen) selected the best seven and they performed in the studio yesterday morning. Live on national radio and then Giel announced the winner. Apart from the fact that the best one won (Anna Verhoeven) I was very impressed by the performance all seven gave that very same evening in my favourite TV-show "De Wereld Draait Door" #DWDD singing Birdy's hit "Skinny Love". And that led to my conclusion that we do not need shows like TVOH. We just need YouTube, Social Media to push them and talent watchers like Giel!

Here below the clip of the performance by the Dutch Birdies, judge for yourself and let me know what you think by leaving a comment! (and here a link to the entire item/interview with all seven Birdies - in Dutch)

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