Audience at auditions, audience at six chair challenge, audience at judges houses, audience at live shows. There's no audience st boot camp actually, but that stage is a farce in itself...who cares if a boy, girl, group and over can sing on stage together...it's pointless. They're obsessed with the bloody audience. They listen to the audience at the the auditions, they let the audience scream who they want out at six chair challenge. Tonight was ridiculous...they had that ten second countdown so the audience could scream who they wanted through. As a result...crap people are through...novelty acts and people with good voices but who are not relevant or current in today's music industry.

I don't think any particularly good and commercially relevant acts missed out tonight though. Certainly not in the groups category and not in the overs either. Jennifer has a great voice but she's hardly more relevant than the others.

Both Simon and Cheryl did out a novelty act through but neither Rita nor Nick have any of those and those categories also hold the most 'relevant' acts as well.

Not that all 12 need to be 'relevant' anyway. A few do for sure, but it also needs to be entertaining Saturday night TV. If they try and go too relevant and edgy they'd end up with the 2012 series which isn't generally considered a vintage year.

2008 (Series 5) is one of the best rated series and without a doubt had the most talent. It had no joke acts and every act was relevant and had potential. I don't understand why they feel the need to have a screaming audience at every single stage.

I feel you
I didn't think they were too bad tonight (Ceetainly nothing like they were at six chat challenger :O that was awful) but I have a feeling that Rita's decisions tomorrow will be heavily influenced by the audience who will be inclined to go for the stereotypical acts I.e Kiera, Monica

However I do enjoy auditions with the audience much more
I found the room auditions exceptionally dull

I hate the audience/mob, they give me a headache! I always end up shouting shut the f*** up!

Not every act in 2008 was relevant. Eoghan wasn't, Ruth wasn't, Rachel wasn't, Daniel wasn't, Austin wasn't, Scott wasn't and neither were the two girl bands. So that's 8 out of the final 12! Some of them (Ruth and Rachel) had very good voices but were never destined to be stars.

True that there were no novelty acts, but Eoghan may as well have been giv how bad his vocals were and Daniel was only there on the sob story and I think I'd rather have a novelty act than that.

I agree that series 5 was one of the best with a lot of talent but I do think you've got the rose tinted glasses out there a bit.

I actually had not thought about it like that- or realised that actually, there has been an audience there pretty much all the way this year! I also don't really like it. Instead of making it like this, I think they should just give it a rest a while. Put it on the shelve a few years! Then if the demand is there, bring it back. They are changing it too much and desperate to make it work as it once did and instead it is making it less enjoyable to watch and actually is making it a bit uncomfortable at times with the live audience at every stage turning it into mob mentality and people begging for "their life" as some did today- it was all so ridiculous!

Do people actually even know what makes an act relevant or current?

I always find it funny how there is this interpretation about certain acts being relevant or current on a show like this or The Voice, Popstarts, Idol and what not.

None of them are really relevant or current until they release their own stuff and are out there singing their own stuff in their own style and actually being successful. In X factor terms, no one is current or relevant, they are just there singing someone elses songs in a style chosen for them by either the judges or the producers. Some of them may have the most potential to fit into the current music market and be within easier reach of what is "current" trend in music and so that then would make them seem more "relevant". But they aren't current or relevant until they are out there doing their own thing and succeeding.

I think the level of singing and music talent was higher in the 5th series. This series it also seems higher than usual so far, unfortunately it seems novelty and fun has won over some of the better talent already in the groups (both the boybands and the girlband were better than the duo group) and also the overs (all 3 girls who went home were better than Bupsi)

I liked Judges Houses for being more one-on-one between the mentor and the act with the performance and the feedback/decision where they could talk about their strengths of the performances and the worries they may have about putting them through. It was the only stage where you take away the audience, the stage creating the distance between the act and the mentor and create more of a connection. By adding the audience tonight it was just "you three acts are through, the rest get off the stage." Plus, isn't it kind of lazy to have the audience half making the decision for each mentor during each stage? Isn't the point of it that they're supposed to know what they're doing themselves, as people who are familiar within the industry rather than average Joes?

Mel94, I would agree with you that the whole point of having a judge within the music industry is that they should know better than the average Joe and therefore should be making the decisions.

However, I think you are a bit naive if you think they REALLY let the audience change their minds. All that OTT deliberation is completely fake. They already know exactly who is going through, well before the show starts (probably at their house) and certainly not 10 seconds before they are about to announce!!