Which "real world" music stars would have a chance at winning an AMERICAN IDOL ?

[TimmyTony]

You could name anybody old or young, just imagine they are in the right age zone required for AI, and with their voices as they are, which music star would really be a contender for AI?


I think Christina Aguilera, Whitney Houston, Celine Dion, Tina Turner and Linda Ronstadt would all easily be in any AI top five lineup...with Ronstadt and Turner getting the top two spots. Who wins is up in the air.

[Karl J. Barnes]

Luthor Vandross, Elton John or even Aretha Franklin.

[pennywisdom]

I would love to see actual music stars compete on American Idol.

Ashlee Simpson = the next William Hung

[Annie get your Rum]

Luthor Vandross, Elton John or even Aretha Franklin.

Lol!
With Aretha in the competition, why do we need anyone else?
She would obliterate them all...


Anyway, I think Patti Labelle,James Ingram, Peabo Bryson, Oleta Adams and Natalie Cole would definitely be good contenders...

[Karl J. Barnes]

I would love to see actual music stars compete on American Idol.

Ashlee Simpson = the next William Hung

Um...I already thought that she WAS the next William Hung???

[Kaskratiski]

Jennifer Lopez, Paula Abdul, Britney Spears, Ashlee Simpson and Shania Twain.

Call it American Idol:The Pro-Tools/AutoTuners/Pitch Correction All Star Edition.

[Chiasm]

Mariah Carey. I can't stand her or her music but there is little denying (based mostly on her early work, not so much her recent stuff) that she can sing.

On the male side, Elton John would mop the floor with them.

[Adam Crocker]

Otis Redding: His voice is too hoarse, and too burusque.

Little Richard: Too loud and slapdash.

Hank Williams: Too southern. Can't he do something about that accent?

Johnny Cash: Too monotone.

Robert Johnson: Waaaayyy too high pitched.

Frank Sinatra: Not soft enough in his manner. And too masculine.

Joni Mitchell: Not girly enough and did you see the way she talked to that producer? She's not going to work well with our crack production team.

Roni Spector: TOO girly.

Michael Bolton: Perfect.

[Jonathan Bogart]

The young Tina Turner wouldn't have a snowflake's chance in hell. Too raw, too gritty, too willing to stray from the script.

Elvis Presley: Too country, too reliant on hiccups and other vocal tricks, no range, can't dance but pretends to.

Nina Simone: Sounds too much like a man, too angry.

Bing Crosby: Too laid-back. The nation isn't gonna come to you, buddy. You need to energize them!

Madonna: Maybe think about some plastic surgery, honey. For the gap.

John Lennon: Too much of a smart-ass.

Paul McCartney: Too thin a voice, too thick a Liverpudlian accent.

George Harrison: Too shy.

Ringo Starr: Good for a laugh, and so will mysteriously stick around until the final rounds.

Tom Waits: Heh, you kiddin'?

Fred Astaire: Can't act, can't sing. Can dance a little.

[Patrick Ferguson]

Frank Sinatra: Not soft enough in his manner. And too masculine.

Have you listened to any Sinatra from before the 1950s?

[Buried Alien]

Bob Dylan: What the hell did he just sing?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Adam Crocker]

Have you listened to any Sinatra from before the 1950s?

Refer back to my original post and think of the context.

Bob Dylan: What the hell did he just sing?


Wait, you mean he was SINGING?

[Kaskratiski]

OMG...Love all the last few posts!!!

[Woodwose]

Bob Dylan: What the hell did he just sing?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

Doh, you beat me to it.

It's so true though. I've seen Bob live and I couldn't recognise many familiar favourites like Tangled up in Blue, or Like a Rolling Stone because Bob had changed them so drastically and mumbled through the verses.

I still loved every minute of it though.

[Patrick Ferguson]

Refer back to my original post and think of the context.

See, I thought you had a point. My mistake.

All I'm saying is, yes, as Brian Setzer pointed out awhile ago, the fact that Bob Dylan would be booed off the stage of the nation's number one vehicle for pop music is indicative of the sorry shape of mainstream pop today.

But, let's not exaggerate. Otis Redding would have a damn good chance of winning the show, and Frank Sinatra would make it at least to the last couple of rounds.

[Jonathan Bogart]

But, let's not exaggerate. Otis Redding would have a damn good chance of winning the show, and Frank Sinatra would make it at least to the last couple of rounds.
Not really, if we're talking about both singers as they were in their youth, presented as unknowns. Redding would be considered too black (though it would be phrased more nicely), too out-of-control vocally, and too devoted to material that couldn't win over a broad spectrum of people. Sinatra would be a scrawny kid with a big nose and greasy hair; on American Idol, appearance is more important than vocal ability. They wouldn't even make it onto the show.

[Patrick Ferguson]

Not really, if we're talking about both singers as they were in their youth, presented as unknowns. Redding would be considered too black (though it would be phrased more nicely), too out-of-control vocally, and too devoted to material that couldn't win over a broad spectrum of people. Sinatra would be a scrawny kid with a big nose and greasy hair; on American Idol, appearance is more important than vocal ability. They wouldn't even make it onto the show.

See, I'm actually surprised here, because you are hands down the most knowledgeable and perceptive guy on this board.

But what you just said is a simplistic fantasy that's nice if one wants to maintain a rather shallow criticism of the mainstream music industry. There's no way in the world that Redding would be considered "too black" by anyone. As I'm sure you know, sounding black is where it's at for these people.

At the beginning of the season, my suitemates and I watched American Idol so we could have an admittedly mean-spirited chuckle at some of the guys who auditioned and were terrible. During one of these episodes, a girl sang a song -- very pretty voice -- and they told her she didn't sound "contemporary" enough. Immediately the girl starts singing, again, but blacker. After that they let her in. I mean, one of the guys that won recently is a 300-pound black guy that perspired excessively.

We are dealing with a bizarro-world Otis Redding who would even deign to go on such a pitiful show in the first place. If he's going to go on this show, it's to win. His "devotion to [less popular] material" would hardly be an issue, as it assumes that there can be that type of artistic integrity on American Idol anyway. Contestants are there to win. They don't have any problem being told what to sing -- because that's how the first few weeks work anyway.

And while I'm not going to argue that physical appearance isn't a big factor, saying that Sinatra wouldn't even make it onto the show is ridiculous.

http://www.idolonfox.com/contestants/i/f/kevin.jpg

This guy agrees.

[Jonathan Bogart]

There's no way in the world that Redding would be considered "too black" by anyone. As I'm sure you know, sounding black is where it's at for these people.
Up to a point. Aretha Franklin is one thing; Tina Turner is something completely different.

It's difficult to get across what I'm trying to say, because the world changes, but in the 60s, Otis Redding was like Nas or Ghostface Killah is today: he played to a hardcore black audience, at least until "Sittin' on the Dock (of the Bay)". Those guys obviously wouldn't have a prayer on American Idol, and not just because it's about singing instead of rapping, but because they're threatening to White America. The image of fearsome male blackness has changed in the past forty years, but Otis Redding was it, or a version of it, during his early years. He and Wilson Pickett and Sam & Dave all broke big around the same time, in 1966/67, but before that, soul had to be ultra-polite to get a hearing from mainstream America.

That's what was in my head, more than anything.

And I'll gladly cop to a profound ignorance of how American Idol actually works, never having seen an episode. I was working with the idea that each artist presented their normal act before the panel (and America), without allowing for any idiot factor that would make a person an American Idol contestant in the first place.

[blackdragon6]

leela james but she might be considered not mainstream enough

[Patrick Ferguson]

Up to a point. Aretha Franklin is one thing; Tina Turner is something completely different.

The image of fearsome male blackness has changed in the past forty years, but Otis Redding was it, or a version of it, during his early years. He and Wilson Pickett and Sam & Dave all broke big around the same time, in 1966/67, but before that, soul had to be ultra-polite to get a hearing from mainstream America.

I feel you on that. I think this all gets kind of messy though when we think of how that image has changed. If we're talking American Idol 1967, we're on the same page entirely. But that also means Frank's on American Idol 1939 -- and his rise to fame in those next couple years was pretty meteoric.

I don't even post that much, so I'm not sure why I decided to start here, when you guys were just making jokes. I guess the whole "real talent could never make it nowadays" bit seems a little tired. Not that that's entirely what you were doing.

Certainly Frank Sinatra couldn't be today what he was then, but when you deal with great artists, time is such an important factor that it's hard to make any kind of argument when you teleport them to present-day. Sinatra could only contribute what he did to music if it all happened the way it did (if that makes sense). If he was born twenty years later, he wouldn't be a cultural icon, and he wouldn't be (for better or for worse) the only strong link that every generation after my grandmother's has to the pop music of the 20s, 30s, and 40s.

[Valmore]

Mr. Hendrix, please leave the fires to the pyrotechnicians.

[Chiasm]

Freddy Mercury

[Adam Crocker]

But what you just said is a simplistic fantasy that's nice if one wants to maintain a rather shallow criticism of the mainstream music industry.

What criticism of the mainstream music industry? I was getting my shots in at the awful show. I can bash the music industry without American Idol, but at least the White Stripes, Queens of the Stone Age, Franz Ferdinand, the Mars Volta, etc. have made it without having to resort to a tarted-up karoake session.