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Does The Voice need 'gimmicks' to maintain an audience?
Ed Sizzers
Posts: 2,671 Forum Member
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In terms of ratings, this year's series of the Voice has improved on the first series. But that has apparently been down to the delay in moving onto the live shows and the more 'traditional' talent show format of people simply performing and being voted for.
Instead we've had more auditions and battle rounds, plus the addition of steals and (pre-public voting) knockout rounds, with only 3(?) live shows to find a winner.
For a show that claims (often loosely!) to be all about the voice, is the show actually more reliant on gimmicks than the artists themselves to maintain it's audience?
Instead we've had more auditions and battle rounds, plus the addition of steals and (pre-public voting) knockout rounds, with only 3(?) live shows to find a winner.
For a show that claims (often loosely!) to be all about the voice, is the show actually more reliant on gimmicks than the artists themselves to maintain it's audience?
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Next year will be the year.
They don't support winners they don't want anyway, why are they being allowed to call the shots?
I really don't think people like the battles, which unfortunately is the basis of the format. The save was supposed to help this, but the way it's been used has made things worse. Viewers don't stop watching at the live shows, they have stopped watching by the time we get to them. Just my opinion. Reducing the number of live shows doesn't help, and will eat away at audience participation, which is the real cornerstone of these shows.
I sometimes wonder what would happen if they showed it midweek instead of at the weekend when it's up against something like BGT. In America the mid-week nights are prime-time not weekends. It really doesn't make any sense to put them against each other for anyone (except maybe Simon Cowell's ego).
Idol performances sound like virtual 'CD quality' without losing the live feel. The Voice sounds like a hastily put together Children in Need performance or something.
I agree. Audition. Straight to Knockouts. So if they have 12 chosen, group them into three groups of four or four groups of three. Let them pick their own songs. So by the end of the knockouts, each coaches will have four members. Then straight to live shows. Battles is supposed to generate 'passion' in the singers, but oftentimes the coaches already made up their mind who they want in the battles to win. So it's oftentimes a pointless exercise.
We started off the battles with 48 contestants who the viewers are meant to know about. That is way too many people, and immediately almost half of them were axed. Apparently in their blind audition the coaches thought these people were sensational but after just 90 seconds or so more singing time, the coaches have actually realised that they're not up to it. We then never hear from these contestants again.
Then to compound things, the following week (in just over two hours), the show gets rid of 4/7ths of its cast. That is insane. If you were a fan of Adam, Ragsy, Cherelle, Jamie, Moni, Jordan, Lem, John, Danny, Trevor, Lovelle, Letitia, Alex, Abi, Connor or Sean, then that is irrelevant as these people have all just been shunted off to Buffalo and just as we were beginning to get to know them. Could you imagine if you killed off that many soap opera characters in one go? Yet The Voice just gets rid of them - even more than the Cowell shows, they seem like fodder.
The other thing about this is that it makes previous episodes really pointless from a narrative basis. Does it matter whether you win your battle or not, if your chances of getting through the next round are ridiculous slim? Who cares that Will picked John over Liam when John had another two minutes' air time before also being despatched? What was the point of the steals? 3 of those contestants failed to make it through the next round anyway, and the one who did, the fact he was stolen is pretty irrelevant.
Finally, the teams concept seems to be a pretty odd idea in practice. Firstly, there is absolutely no benefit in being on a strong team and at no point are you helped out by your teammates. Instead, the goal for any contestant is to pick the weakest possible team which allows you to get through to the final as the strongest member. This is a really major flaw to the concept. Secondly, I'm not actually sure how much coaching any of these coaches actually do? Particularly before the lives. In the battle rounds, the coaches select a song and tell you to sing it, but they don't really coach the individual act to find their take on it. Rather it's just like another audition. Unsurprisingly, most of the acts eliminated at this stage talk about how nice it was to "meet" Tom Jones/Jessie J etc, not be extensively coached by them. The next time they're on at the Knockouts, there still seems to be almost no coaching, it's just further "What's your song choice? Great (or "I don't like that song" - then they change it to something else and get "You're really brave to change it[to the song that I just told you to change it to]). Followed by such technique coaching as "Now make me believe you", or "yeah" (if you're Tom). It's just really pointless. Has anyone actually improved as a singer from the "coaching"?
I actually really like the show but I have found the past few weeks frustrating as so many people have been kicked off (and another 4 will be week one live show boots this week). Ultimately, I would take far fewer contestants through the blind auditions and make the battle round/knockout much shorter). If each coach had 4 final acts and we got to know them over a 6 week + live show format, that would work better. Last year, the live shows failed because they essentially ran two competitions on alternate weeks (Teams Tom + Will competition and Teams Jessie and Danny competition) destroying any week to week momentum. This way, it would all build up and would I think work better.
The Coaches
Get rid of Danny, Tom & maybe Jesse
Replace Danny with Bono
Replace Tom with Robbie Williams or Michael Buble
Maybe Replace Jesse with Adele maybe?
Keep Will he's the only one who's humorous appeals to me & appeals to the young audience
Replace Holly & Reggie with someone like Scott Mills, I think could nail the role, he's like a British Carson Daily, also have a female backstage corespondent like in the US however solely for live shows backstage maybe someone like Alice Levine or Jameela Jemil
Give the show its own TV intro just like other versions
Blind Auditions - Have changes to stage set to make it fresh & have auditioners at a set number making it more fair then held on different days for 6 days where they can only pick 3 each a day then making 16 each by the end of the final day making 64 singers advance to the next round
The Knockouts - Swaped places with Battles, Coaches singers split in to 2 groups where they get a minute each to perform a killer song each before their coach chooses 3 from each group to advance to the Battles
Battles - Have the singers not meet their partner till the actual Battle itself, have the singers practice solely with their coach where the coach would sing the parts of the other singer in the battle in practice who they will face so it creates tension & impactful drama here there would be 3 battles per coach making 12 in total, also coaches can have 1 steal making 16 advance to the live shows
Live Shows - Would go on for 4 weeks with 2 shows on the weekend where 8 would perform on each show with results later on in each night where in each result show 2 would leave making 4 leave every week 1 on each team, this would decrease by week from 8 to 6 to 4 then the final
Final - 4 Singers perform on Saturday then 2 go home on the same night leaving 2 finalists for Sunday where the winner would be crowned
If the BBC moved it to a January to March slot, away from BGT, and gave it a set time of broadcast something around the 7pm slot, it will do far better.
People focus on many things but actually The Voice is doing well its within its original expectations the first shows had far higher ratings than expected.
But ITV unleashing BGT directly against it, making the BBC move it all around does affect it.
Run it in the January slot, starting the Saturday after Strictly ends.
I would actually run more live shows rather than less, and have more viewer choice in that, have a live show and live results same night, like this coming Friday.
Running a show like this into Summer when people go on holiday and want to go out and when there is an overload of talent shows on ITV due to BGT, makes the viewer weary.
There isnt that much wrong with the Voice, bar when its transmitted. A few people who do not like the BBC use the voice as a whipping stick against the BBC but actually its the best light entertainment launch for a long time yes some viewers have gone but also on the other hand it does very well on IPlayer so people like it enough to view it on catch up.
New Coaches, or new hosts may have a slight effect but not a lot, its about the show, Just run it in the dark winter months and it will work.
The BBC does have Six nations Rugby that does cause some Saturdays to have some commitments, but a slot circa 7pm or 7.30pm will work, Starting with a clear run in January with post Christmas ratings high giving it a great start.
I'm sure a lot happens off-screen. On the other hand, with 12 people on each team there's a limit to how much time they can be given. For the battle rounds the coach has a side-kick, which presumably helps; but then again it confirms that the coach would otherwise be too stretched.
(Good analysis, by the way. I'm not quoting tonnes of stuff I agree with.)
I think your right.