Photo: The Voice, BBC One
We wake this morning to the news that the BBC's new Saturday night programme, The Voice, has beaten ITV yet again in the overnight ratings. Although some might argue that if you include ITV+1 then The Voice looses, yet lets not forget that the great stonking triumph that is the BBC iPlayer is still not yet included in television audience figures and BBC One does not have a +1 service. But to take audience figures as the be all and end all is not conducive as the real meat of the matter is in the content of the programme, not the statistics.
When The Voice was launched this year Simon Cowell said 'I would query whether you even need another singing talent show but we have armed ourselves and we are in a good place to beat them'. But what he was not expecting was the simple fact that sums up the difference between the BBC's recent foray into the talent show and the Cowell/ITV output: every singer in the 'Battle Round' this weekend were better that Matt Cardle. There, I said it - we were all thinking it. Many dismissed The Voice because they believed without a regular injection of talentless idiots it would keel over like deprived heroin addict who has ran out of cash. But thankfully this was not the case and The Voice has superseded the need for hapless circus rejects with actual, outstanding talent. Although one of the more trite moments of the show, Jessie J was beyond correct when she said 'television isn't ready for the talent on this show'.
For a long time I have watched the X Factor and Britain's Got Talent but when they trot the old 'we're looking for Britain's next star' for the sixth year running when all you have to show for the last hour on the sofa is five DFS adverts, three appalling school-children dance troupes and one guy with a guitar (who might be good but to be honest thats probably just because he came after a dog which refused to do anything stare blankly into space) you feel a little cheated. However, when presented with 40 excellent singers who are all clambering to exceed one another you obviously are more inclined to stick with that because no number of 'oooh isnt Simon in an appalling mood today' montages are going to sway anyone.