Slightly Random X Factor Post
I haven’t yet worked out how I’m going to link X Factor into a parenting blog but hopefully within the next 500 words or so I’ll have figured it out. If not I’ll fall back on the fact that the blog is technically about me and my ordinary life, so X Factor definitely fits into that. Anyway, here goes…
As I watched X Factor tonight with my other half we discussed the importance of having a good back story. If you don’t have a decent, tear-jerking back story there’s pretty much no point in auditioning. Some of my favourite X Factor back stories are:
1. My granddad / nan have been so supportive and I’m doing it for them.
So you’re saying that you’re trying to become a pop star to impress your grandparents?! Implying that actually you don’t really want the fame and fortune yourself but you just want to make them happy – as if they have spent their last 20 years hoping and praying that their grandchild would become a pop star. Then there in turn follows the obligatory appearance of the aforementioned grandparent in the audience wearing a T Shirt with the contestant’s face on it. Then a trip to the grandparents house. Then something about the war. In reality the poor nan would probably much rather be down the bingo drinking a nice G&T than hauling her arse up to London every Saturday night and having a film crew setting up in her gaff.
2. I just want to do this to improve my life and my family’s lives
Yes, that’s all good but then we have to sit through dimly lit video footage of council flats and caravan parks with rats running past and juveniles pissing up walls in the background just to show how bad they have it. ‘This is the room where I live with my 17 siblings and that is the hole in the floor that we all have to piss in because we can’t afford a toilet, and that is the large bucket of porridge that we all eat for dinner because we can’t afford food. And we all have cholera, and my brother is still recovering from rickets, and my sister has just recovered from the bubonic plague and my mum gets a burning sensation when she goes for a piss.’
3. I come from a small village just outside Tinyville in the Arse End of Nowhere and things like this just don’t happen to people like me.
Except of course they do happen to people like you, because at least 3 contestants trot out that tripe every frigging year. ‘I’m just Lucy from Lanarkshire. I’m just sooooooooooo ordinary. I’m doing this for all the ordinary people out there. Me, me, me, me, me. Ordinary, ordinary, ordinary, ordinary.’ Jog on.
4. I’m going through a really tough time at the moment. I’ve just heard that the goldfish that my aunt’s milkman had in 2012 has been off his food and they don’t know if he’s going to survive.
Leading to films of the goldfish and the contestant breaking down in tears at opportune moments, and a newspaper article about goldfish. All filmed in black and white with a piano playing in harmonious discord in the background.
5. I NEEEEEEEEED this. It’s all I know how to do. It’s all I’ve ever thought about.
Although the contestant is only 16 and is still at school, their entire lives have allegedly been dedicated to music. They went to a dance class once. Watched MTV a few times. Went to a Little Mix concert. Tweeted Justin Bieber. Maybe, just maybe, you could just get a job like the rest of us. Your life will not end just because Louis Walsh doesn’t compare you to a young Tina Turner. Suck it up and crack on.
6. I just CAN’T go back to my day job. It just doesn’t make me happy.
Boo bloody hoo. Get yourself back to Primark, work hard, apply for other jobs and stop whining!!! Accompanied by a soft focus video of ASDA and a mock shift in the checkout, just to illustrate the abject misery of working a normal job. Those normal jobs like the rest of us do.
7. I have a baby and I just really want to give him / her a better life.
So to achieve that noble objective you have decided to aim for a place on a live TV show where you have to live in a contestant house without aforementioned baby for 3 months?! To ultimately seek out a career where you will spend your time touring the country and hardly ever be at home. Where your baby will grow up being filmed and photographed at every opportunity. Top plan. I cannot see any drawbacks…
For me, if a contestant sings well, isn’t a massive twat, smiles a bit and admits they are purely there because they fancy being a pop star, making some money and having some fun for a few years they would get my vote. Unfortunately those contestants don’t seem to ever make it to the final stages for some reason!!
PS – note the seamless segway back into parenting blog mode in point 7. Didn’t see that one coming I bet ???
Seriously my friend – you make me howl! The council flat / rats / cholera / plague section actually made tears come out of my eyes! The same eyes that roll to the back of my head every time that bloody piano music starts and you just know that you are about to have a pitty vote dragged out of you kicking and screaming. Brilliantly funny as always. #chucklemums :0)
Your comments are always the best!! I would have stopped blogging by now if it weren’t for the comments ??
I can’t watch X-Factor because of all these terrible reasons people give! Infuriating!
#Chucklemums
http://accidentalhipstermum.com
It does get a bit much after a while!! Thanks for reading and commenting!
This rocks James. Super funny and spot on. The worst phrase for me is “sing for your life!!” As if they will drop down dead if they lose. Pathetic! No one is going to die if you don’t get a number 34 in the charts in two years’ time!! Yet I still watch it. ?And have friends that work on it… ? Sorry chaps! ???
Oh yes I still watch it too! However bad it gets it’s quite addictive ?? Thanks for the lovely comment and apologise to your friends for me please ??
Item 2 just had me absolutely wetting myself. Maybe on a Friday one of the thousand siblings manages to find enough loose change on the streets to afford a small bag of chips, which they’re really bloody grateful for. And yet they’re all still a bit fat and there’s a sneaky can of Red Bull under the shared mattress… Thanks for linking to #Chucklemums!
My life is focused around trying to make you piss yourself!! Success!!
It’s all bollocks! But still occasionally entertaining!!
I thought it was just me that whined on about all the bullshit these contestants spout. As soon as I hear the Adele music coming on I switch over for 3 minutes. I can’t bear it. Hilarious.x
Oh those back stories with that awful sodding music, and teary old ladies. I’m with you, if they aren’t a twat and they can sing, then they deserve to win. I also get annoyed when Simon Cowell does that “stop, stop the music, that was awful, do you have another song?” Then they are suddenly amazing! Do one Cowell we are not stupid! #FridayFrolics
A cunning parenting post, seriously I am a bit of a closet X factor fan but I do agree they need an angle for good TV #KCACOLS
I love this. You had me chuckling at the bit about pissing in a hole and a giant pot of porridge! It’s so true that you’d think after all these years of X Factor, they would choose some different sort of back stories instead of the same old thing. I still watch it though. And Louis Walsh is still shit at choosing acts. #kcacols
I agree. And this post IS funny…The reason I no longer watch X-factor is because it makes certain living/working situations seem negative when in actual fact they aren’t always. Growing up in a council flat…i did and so what?, Worked for primark… me (and it was one of the best companies I have worked for). The reality is that people with REAL problems probably haven’t got time to audition for X-Factor or wouldn’t be able to get there. Anyway thanks for making me giggle despite being in a flat on a council estate with two small kids… maybe I should become pop star! (I’ve lost it,I need to go to sleep, sorry.) #KCACOLS
Definitely audition for the next series!! I look forward to seeing you on there, filmed in black and white with Adele playing in the background!!
The sob stories seriously drive me insane!! Like just get on and sing and stop fussing about how hard you have it whilst you’re off doing laps in Nicole scherzingers Olympic sized swimming pool at her mansion! #fridayfrolics
Exactly this!!
Bloody brilliant. I must say every single one of these things every single year. It’s predictable now. It’s like they have to fit a certain criteria! That being said, I’m still going to watch it. Watch it and judge them haha! #fridayfrolics
It’s as if there’s a set script every year! Just like any other soap I guess!!
Haha! I can’t actually even watch the X Factor at all these days. I find it all cringeworthy and transparent. Not to mention it often actively mocks the desperate or mentally ill… Thanks so much for linking with #KCACOLS. We hope you come back next week.
It can get a bit much after a while!
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Loved this! I don’t watch X factor, and one of the reasons is I can’t be bothered with the daft back stories! Where are the ‘I’ve led a charmed life, and one of my many fortunes is being able to sing’ people? And why ARE they all from the backwaters of Wales?? Surely the population of rural Wales is quite small – how did they all end up on X factor?
Thanks so much for joining us for #FridayFrolics.
There’s nothing else to do there I guess! Thanks for my award ?
Ha, I love it! You can always tell what kind of back story you’re going to get by the music they play in the background! x #KCACOLS
Oh yes. If Adele comes on you know something sad has happened!!
Oh the sob stories are hysterical! I love point 7!! #KCACOLS
All part of the experience these days!! The baby ones do drive me mad though!!
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