That Show and then some

So based on the first two songs (more on their "first singles" in a moment), I think Taylor won, hands down. His "Livin' for the City" was smokin', and even if his Elton John number was little flat, I still think it was better than Kat's "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," which - despite what everyone else who watches That Show thinks - was so cloying and pedantically choreographed that I had to leave the room and get high to make the performance palatable.

Now, as for their "first singles," if those two songs aren't an indictment of the songwriting by committee system of industrial cultural production, I don't know what is. As much as people talk up the hit-writing machines of LA, New York, and Nashville - and as great as some of the songs that come from these machines actually are - it's important to remember that for every hit these folks produce, they churn out ten pieces of crap that are apparently foisted on unsuspecting That Show finalists. I mean, you go out and buy Foreigner's or Journey's (two certified hit machines) greatest hits albums, right? You don't buy each of their regular albums because you'll get two good songs and a raft of horseshit.

Moreover, did they have to perform songs that are so transparently anthemic mood pieces - "My Destiny"??? "Do I Make You Proud"??? C'mon! - designed to manipulate our emotions as to make the audience roll their eyes and retch. Those were really, really bad songs, which even the judges recognized.

So, whoever wrote those songs should be sacked.
Whoever decided that Taylor and Kat should perform those songs should be sacked.
And if there are some PR whiz kids who are thinking about promoting those two sorry excuses for songs to the general public, they should be sacked before they do some real damage to the children.

[updated on 5/24/2006 at 3:10 PM]: This guy thinks Kat's monstrosity of a "first single" handicapped her relative to the piece of shit with which Taylor had to work.