American Idol Season 14 Starts January 14 While Thailand's The Voice Is All About That Bass

The guy you see here is a judge on The Voice.

Don't recognize him from NBC's The Voice?

You don't recognize him because he is not on NBC's The Voice, he is on Thailand's version of The Voice.

I have watched very little of the American version of The Voice. It did not hook me like early seasons of American Idol did.

Have any of the winners of America's The Voice gone on to become known names like so many of the American Idol contestants have?

Is there any The Voice equivalent of American Idol's Kelly Clarkson, Clay Aiken, Carrie Underwood, Fantasia, Jennifer Hudson, Catherine McPhee, Chris Daughtry, Jordan Sparks, Adam Lambert, Phillip Phillips and others I'm likely not remembering?

Speaking of Phillip Phillips. He seems to be the last hit American Idol has had. I don't remember who won the season after Phillip Phillips. I quit watching when it got down to only a few remaining, none of whom I found pop star worthy. I also bailed on last season. Has anyone heard the winner, Caleb Johnson, on the radio?

No?

Me either.

Season 14 of American Idol starts up January 14. I won't be watching. Jennifer Lopez, Keith Urban and Harry Connick, Jr. are back as the judges. Jennifer Lopez and Keith Urban's head bobbing and dancing to the singing got on my nerves. It was an uncomfortable thing to watch.

I think it likely that the current era of singing competitions shows on American TV is coming to an end.

Below is a YouTube video from Thailand's The Voice. A girl butchers Meghan Trainor's All About That Bass. Do all the singer's on this Thai show sing songs in English? Everything else is in Thai, including the amusing Listerine commercial....

The X Factor Voting Blunder Caused An Un-Bloated Not Overly Produced New Competition Show

One would think after years of reality tv shows having viewers vote for contestants that the voting methods would have been perfected by now.

However, a couple weeks ago Dancing with the Stars had a voting snafu which resulted in no one getting kicked out of the glittery ballroom, that week.

And now, this week, I went to watch the DVRed X Factor results show to have the annoying Mario Lopez informing viewers that due to a blunder with the voting the previous night's excruciating Motown night would not count, and that rather than booting anyone, the acts would all act again, with a new song.

To me this resulted in a vastly improved X Factor.

Rather than a bloated two  hours, it was a fast  paced one hour. With no time to come up with tacky production numbers, with backup singers and dancers and way too many flashing lights, this was X Factor-lite.

Like I said, vastly improved. Maybe X Factor has accidentally come up with a production formula that works.

But, it may be too late to save this show. Apparently the ratings have tanked.

X Factor has never done well in the ratings, never on a par with the other singing competitions, as in fellow Fox show, American Idol, or NBC's The Voice.

I have heard no mention made of the X Factor winner winning a $5 million dollar contract, unlike its previous two seasons.

I am not the only viewer to note that neither The X Factor or The Voice has found a singer who has gone on to have a hit record, be in a movie or another TV show. I think the first X Factor winner was in a commercial, during the Super Bowl, which may have been the last time the public has seen her.

American Idol has given the world Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Jennifer Hudson, Chris Daughtry, Clay Aiken, Kris Allen, Kellie Pickler, Adam Lambert, Jordan Sparks, Scotty McCreery and Phillip Phillips, and likely others I am not remembering right now.

I don't seem to go a day without hearing Phillip Phillips on the radio.

Fast forwarding through The Voice's result show, last night, it does not appear, to me, that that show has found an American Idol type popstar, this year.

It will be interesting to see how American Idol does this year, after last year's version, which is widely regarding as a dud. Because it was.

I Am Sort Of Liking The New Britney Spears Version of The X Factor

I must have set my DVR to record The X Factor season one, though I don't remember this, because my DVR recorded this week's premiere episodes of season two of The X Factor.

Maybe The X Factor has special powers and forces itself on to DVRs.

I had all sorts of problems with liking last year's The X Factor. It was like a real noisy, flashy version of American Idol, was one thing I did not like. I also did not like the host, Steve Jones. Paula Abdul's predictable routines with Simon Cowell got old years ago. I had other issues, that have faded from memory with the passage of time.

So, with not much else to watch, I watched the Wednesday and Thursday episodes of The X Factor.

So far I am finding season two much more entertaining than season one. Steve Jones is gone. So far no one seems to be replacing him. Paula Abdul is gone, along with that Nichole person whose last name I don't know how to spell.

I never would have thought that I would like Britney Spears as a judge. My longest exposure to Britney Spears was on her awful Reality TV Show with her equally awful, now ex-husband, Kevin Federline.

I'd heard the name of the other new judge, Demi Lovato, but know nothing about her, except that she sings songs. She plays the really sweet nice girl judge, in contrast to Britney Spear's brutally truthful, some think mean, judge.

The behind the scenes parts of The X Factor seem to be filmed in some sort of super saturated hyper realistic mode.

There are a lot of what appear to be obviously staged bits. Like, we were supposed to believe that a son is driving his mom to the audition, talking about it, with one camera filming mom from the passenger's side of the car, with another camera filming the driving son from the other side. And then we see the son sing and, of course, he does well.

Anyway, I don't know why, but I'm finding the new version of The X Factor much more entertaining than last years.

But, unfortunately, apparently a lot of viewers prefer and NBC singing competition show I've not watched, The Voice, which airs when The X Factor airs. The X Factor's premiere had only 8.5 million viewers, down 3.5 million from last year's premiere. The Voice had 3 million more viewers than The X Factor.

Methinks there are way too many singing competition shows on TV. The suffering original, American Idol seems to be having trouble finding replacement judges. I'd volunteer, but I'm tone deaf.