SI Bitching Part 2: Judge and be judged

One of the most enjoyable aspects of watching American Idol is unravelling the contestant "pimping". This is that wonderful practice of propping up chosen contestants and subliminally telling audiences to vote for them. It is an intricate endeavour, calling into action the talents of lighting directors, stylists, make-up artists, musical arrangers, band musicians, even the lawyers who get copyright clearance for selected songs to be sung on the show. Of course, the ones with the most influence are the judges. With a few well-chosen comments, they can sway opinions and therefore, outcomes.

I never saw much "pimping" in the first season of Singapore Idol, although Ken Lim came close with his early championing of Sly. On the whole, I thought every contestant got equal treatment from the backstage staff and the judges' critiques did not show undue favouritism.

This season, however, the pimping has started early and is getting out of hand. A handful of contestants got disproportionate amount of face-time in the first two episodes. As if that was not enough of an upper hand to have, they received undue praise from the judges for the piano show performances.

Three cases in point: Jonathan Leong, Rahimah Rahim and Gayle Nerva. Jonathan and Gayle got special video clips in the first episode, while Rahimah had extended airtime with the whole "2nd song" drama and her show of tears on the theatre audition episodes. They predictably got through to the top 28. No surprises there.

Then they sang. And the judges promptly lost their critical listening skills. What was that about?

True, these three did not stink up the joint, but these were not GOOD performances. Jonathan lacked control and was vocally sloppy. Rahimah was one-note and clearly did not understand what she was singing (not could we understand her because of her atrocious diction). Gayle was flat on her low notes, screechy and stretched to a string on her top notes.

Listening to the judges, you would have thought they hit some of the heights reached by Taufik, Olinda, Jeassea and Beverly last year. Not even close.

Sure, they stood out amidst the sea of s**t surrounding them, but how hard is it to stand out from s**t? A little constructive criticism would not have gone astray.

Of course, that would have meant exposing the generally poor talent in this year's crop of hopefuls. That's a big no-no. If we have learnt anything from American Idol, it is that the judges are contractually bound to proclaim that "this year is the BEST group of singers we have ever had".