Comments on: Ryan Seacrest Blames Simon Cowell for American Idol’s Ratings

By: Brittany

Brittany — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 13:26:29 +0000

Well it looks like all the Taylor fans (all 12 of them!) told each other about this post so they could make their little statement. “..he’s entertaining!!… he’s passionate!!”… they can keep telling themselves that if it helps them sleep at night. People use those two words when they don’t have a leg to stand on about the performer’s musical abilities.

That “passion” isn’t entertaining, it’s hard to watch. He’s trying to get attention for his convulsions….. the disaster he calls dancing. He does all that carrying-on to get attention away from his horrible caterwalling.

Taylor fans should never come out of hiding and actually claim to be fans of his screeching. Katharine should have won that year… and he should have won the Golden Idol for WORST audition, WORST hairstyle, WORST wardrobe, WORST dancing, WORST attitude, and WORST little fanbase.

By: areutonedeaf

areutonedeaf — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:42:58 +0000

You need to check the rating for the year Taylor Hicks was on the show. It was the best year for rating. And to say that Sanjaya could sing better and had better stage present. I think you need to have your ears checked and get you some new glasses cause your must be fogged up.

By: Worster259

Worster259 — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:20:38 +0000

Just for your info Vote For The Worst did not vote for Taylor because he was the worst.It was because Simon was so nasty about him and wanted someone else to win.

By: yesitsme

yesitsme — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:08:13 +0000

This entire blog entry is a bunch of fresh bullshit.

By: Antonie Carr

Antonie Carr — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 16:20:29 +0000

This analysis is wrong on so many levels.

1) Firstly, Season 5 was the MOST WATCHED American Idol season of all 6 seasons. The data also showed that the audience viewership peaked during the finals when Taylor Hicks won the contest. I don’t know how you can blame Taylor Hicks’ victory to this years’ drop in viewership. If any, the data tells us that that it is precisely BECAUSE we don’t have a Taylor Hicks character this season that caused the drop.

You may not personally like Taylor Hicks, but an unbias look at the figures tell us that he brought in the ENTERTAINMENT and PERSONALITY factor that so many contestants lack. He also CONNECTED with lots of people with his raw and passion filled singing.

Hence, the conclusion has to be OPPOSITE what you present — Taylor Hicks HELPED INCREASE audience viewership.

2)American Idol 5 concert tour was 96% sold out and sold over $35 Million in concert tickets. It was one of the best selling concerts of 2006 and ticket sales equaled the COMBINED ticket sales of the first 3 seasons added together.

Given this fact, it should be asked, WHO was the main draw of the concert ? Answer — Taylor Hicks. Inspite of the fact that Kat Mcphee missed the first third of the tour, it was Taylor who compensated for it by singing 1/3 of the songs in the concert tour.

So, if audiences hated Taylor Hicks, why did they flood the Season 5 tour in droves KNOWING that Taylor Hicks ( who you called undeserving ) was headlining it as the winner ?

3) Taylor just did a successful 55 city SOLO tour last spring to mostly jam-packed attendance. Very few former Idol contestants can match this ability ( perhaps only Kelly Clarkson and Clay Aiken could do it ). This should be another argument against your thesis that had Taylor Hicks not won, this season’s viewership could not have dropped.

4) Finally, a word about Sanjaya causing viewership to drop… If this thesis were correct, then Sanjaya being voted out at #7 should have caused viewership to increase after that episode. Sadly, IT DID NOT. In fact, AFTER Sanjaya left, viewership continued to drop.

In other words, there is very little correlation between what you said and what is observed.

By: soulgal

soulgal — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:53:55 +0000

you are entitled to your own OPINION, but obviously you have not been keeping up with Taylor’s concert tour all over the country……the concert’s are sold out all over the country and Taylor is starting his summer concert series and they are getting sold out too…..maybe I should buy you a ticket and you can see for yourself why Taylor is the best thing that ever happened to AI…..ratings were the best ever in AI Season 5….and Taylor won by a landslide and was never in the bottom to be voted off…..VFTW was backing Kevin and Kellie Pickler before they were voted off and Taylor was still getting the most votes back then too……the reason AI6 ratings dropped is that the show was boring and could not compare to the excitement Taylor generated last year and viewers lost interest……Oh yeah, Ryan loves Taylor….have a nice day……

By: BrendaLee

BrendaLee — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:20:40 +0000

Anyone who would say that Sanjaya is a better singer than Taylor obviously has no ear for music. I was an Elliott fan in S5, so I’m not part of the “patrol” (who I imagine you’re poking at just to increase ratings for your blog). But everyone knows that Sanjaya is the worst singer the show’s ever had.

If you want to be taken seriously as a music blog… well your list of “artists” to the right already tells me you don’t care about that.

By: getagrip

getagrip — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:09:22 +0000

Oh please the writer is a flipping idiot, vote for the worst backed a lot of different people who did NOT win the competition, such as Kellie Pickler and Kevin Covais, how long did they last? Their votes did not count for much, so therefore they did not get Taylor the win! Sour grapes, eh? Don’t complain if you did not vote, everyone had the same opportunity to vote as much as you like for your fav, don’t blame someone else because you didn’t vote! Taylor was the best, he won, get over it!

By: Alexa Smith

Alexa Smith — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:07:24 +0000

RE:

——————-
Hopefully, Jordin and Blake (and the other amazing singers who lasted past Sanjaya) have given the show back the reputation it had pre-Taylor.
——————

Has it not even occured to you that the reason why Season 6′s ratings were down was PRECISELY because the last 5 standing were not as interesting as last year’s last 5 ?

People watch the show because they are emotionally invested in the contestants. If the contestants can’t even get the viewers to be interested in them, how the heck do you expect them to even bother to watch ?

And here’s the thing that you missed — whatever you say, Taylor Hicks et. al. in Season 5 got viewers emotionally intvested not only because of their back story but because of the PASSION they gave to their music. Singers like Jordin and Melinda were technically good but it takes more than diva-like technique to draw people in to your performance… it requires PASSION, EMOTION. In other words — ability to CONNECT. Those are the qualities that Taylor Hicks gave that garnered him the Soul Patrol ( not vote for the worst, which accounts for less than 3% of the votes).

BTW, are you willing to change your tune if Jordin and Blake’s albums don’t reach platinum sales level ( or as Clive Davis says — a million “units” ) ?

By: Antoine

Antoine — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 13:58:21 +0000

Your analysis is all wrong regarding the ratings. Taylor Hicks was in fact the BIGGEST DRAW in Season 5 which was about the season American Idol peaked.

The American Idol tour of Season 5 ( featuring Taylor Hicks with more performances than the other idols ) was 96% filled and grossed and all time high of 35 million dollars ( equal to Season 1,2 and 3 combined ).

As for blaming Season 6′s drop in ratings on Sanjaya, what a crock ! Sanjaya got voted off at #7 and the ratings did not go up anyway. In fact, you will notice a slight dip after Sanjaya got voted off.
How do you explain that ?