Wow really cannot believe some of the cynical and unsympathetic attitude of some of these posters. What Nicole did on that stage was both very brave and extremely professional. She handled herself and the situation with grace and showed what a real superstar is all about. Most ‘so-called’ popstars would have panicked and crumbled in that situation but for me she just won a whole load of fans after that. And for the idiots saying they could hear her fine on TV, it was obvious the audience could not (Gary said so himself).

was she miming..??

Brave She snatched the mike while Jahmene was still singing. Very rude. She's a mentor which means she is meant to give him the spotlight.

I think you are misinterpreting her intentions. Her not singing or her having a problem singing her part may have put Jahmene off his parts of the song because he was clearly confused as to what was going on for several seconds. I could interpret her actions differently to say that she was more concerned for the impact on her contestant of the microphone problem than on her moment in the limelight.

I am no Jahmene fan. In fact I wanted him to go out long before now but I think that without Nicole's actions Jahmene's performance would have turned out to be a huge car crash. Nicole saved that performance.

Nicole was furious at the end of the song and rightly so, whatever happened could've really thrown Jahmene, thanks to her quick thinking it didn't. They said on xtra factor she couldn't hear herself and Jahmene couldn't hear her through his ear piece either. Her grabbing his microphone was probably more panic than trying to steal his thunder as some have suggested.

You do realise that the radio mic signal must be played both in the auditorium AND to the TV transmitter. The reactions in the auditorium shown on the TV were all consistent in that they portrayed an audience reacting to a microphone problem so it is likely that the TV sound feed was fine and the auditorium feed had a problem.

No, definitely not.

Whatever her reasons where she completely stepped over her own contestant.

She's also lying about it never happened before because she had a mic failure in that very same town not long ago. It's on the tube.

There are a lot of vitriolic characters on these forums who leap to the most unpleasant, negative judgements whenever they can.

Anyone being honest with themselves would say she was worried she'd miss her next line and screw up the performance entirely. What should she have done? Ruined the song by going on with a dud mic, unheard in the duet?

Some people are complaining about the way she snatched the mic out of his hand - which tells you all you need to know about just how unforgiving and petty Digital Spy can be. A sane and sensible person would understand she was probably a little panicky, as she had a split second before she had to start singing. Unfortunately there's a large contingent who are anything but sane and sensible.

By sharing the mic, the duet turned out pretty good in the end.

In order to give her contestant a good chance of actually finishing the song.

If she'd stood there and sung into a microphone that wasn't on do you think that Jahmene would have done worse or better for not being able to hear her? He would have been confused and his mind would have been somewhere else. Chances are he would have tripped over the song at some point and screwed up.

Nicole was the professional out there and was expected to take charge of the situation and ensure the best outcome instead of standing there dumb with a thunderstruck look on her face. She took action, took control and they finished the song with no major errors. That was the best outcome possible in the situation and it was because of Nicole, not Jahmene, who stood there for the best part of 20 seconds not having a clue what was going on.

I am not a Jahmene supporter and, in fact, would have preferred him to leave the competitoon weeks ago but credit where it is due to him and his mentor for stepping up in this instance.

Just watched the clip on youtube, wow! Nicole is a very good singer.

My take - it wasn't so much the mic that was the problem as the sound engineers. Jahmene's mic was turned up to a ridiculous level of echo at the start of the song, the sound engineers had just about sorted that out by the time Nicole came out, then hers was set ridiculously low and I think they had just about sorted that out by the time she gave up on that mic and had Jahmene's in her hand. I think they both handled the situation extremely well. Having said that, overall the sound mix was better than it usually is on a live show except for that particular incident.
I don't know if Nicole would have been aware at the time that there were blips in the transmission during Jahmene's first song also.

Her mic wasnt working - the sound you heard was her mic on her clothes picking up the singing. It meant she and Jahmene couldnt hear each other properly and blend together, he said at the start of the song he couldnt hear Nicole and the music. They did their best in a bad situation - Jahmene isnt a professional so he's not used to working around these problems, when they did sing together it was great - just a shame that the start wasnt so good.

did her clothes even have a mic on them? she changed into that dress purely for jahmene's performance, same as she changed into the leather number purely for james'. the dress she wore that was miced up was the red one?...

Good point. Then I dont understand what happened, there was sound but it obviously wasnt working right, Jahemene saying he couldnt hear her properly so something was messed up there. Does anybody understand this technical stuff that could explain.
Was a shame as it messed up the start and Jahmene was clearly thrown for a bit but when they worked it out together they did sound good.

My favourtie bit was on Xtra Factor when she said she beckoned him to her and was yelling "I need your mic mine isn't working and Jahmene just waved at her"

it sounded like it wasnt on, i assumed we could hear her a bit from the general mics which pick up the audience

You could tell straight away she had a problem, Whether it was far too low or her IEM's were not picking it up.... more than likely a matter of the two.

PLUS.. had her mic been live, you would have heard it when she tapped it to tell Jahmene it wasn't working and then when she threw it on the ground, it would have banged. There are stage mic's all around anyway, and there is a change Nicole could have been mic'd up which would have picked up her sound. She didn't look one bit happy AT ALL, and you can't
blame her

If you look at Kelly Clarkson's performance, she was having sound problems, checking her own IEM's and adjusting the pack at the back!! Somehow I think the Sound-Engineering team and production are in for it!!!

The Duet would have been more of a powerhouse performance had it been through two mic's!!

She had a room mic on and thats what we heard. As to what was wrong with the radio mic it could have been anything. Operator error, batteries out, transmitter not turned on, out of range, dropped out for some reason. I use radio mics all the time and occasionally you get some strange problems with them.

She also missed the end line of her part to make sure she got the mike back to him for the beginning of his next line.

You must have missed that bit.

That is hilarious.... poor Jahmene.

Everyone going on and on about how "nasty" we are being to her, calm yourselves. She recovered well. Jahmene recovered well. Train wreck was averted. They shared the microphone beautifully, etc.... We're just commenting on something that appeared very funny watching it.... lay off on the pity party for Nicole, it wasn't a failure like http://oi49.tinypic.com/2h88ej9.jpg , it was just a funny moment!

She did superb last night, it was like the culmination of her redemption tour .... and during the microphone failure, she saw all that potentially unraveling, and she reacted accordingly. She wasn't going to let anyone, including Jahmene, get in the way of her belting that next note out

The singing we could hear at the beginning of her lines was just a pre-recorded version that played along in a lower volume.

The echo in Jahmene's parts was actually his own pre-recorded backing vocals as well.

It could also be heard when Nicole grabbed his mic before the end of his part.

Rubbish!!

I'm sort of glad it happened. It made it the best duet in the history of X Factor. They dealt with it so well and put so much emotion into it. I loved every moment of it. Not to mention they both sounded amazing! Jahmene to win

it made her angry and she really belted it out - jahmene stepped up to the plate and his confidence soared when he heard her let rip. Fabulous!