While aimlessly flipping channels this evening in search of a distraction, I was reminded why I don't watch much television. This evening's reinforcement of this practice was the CBS show "Rock Star:INXS". It's yet another reality show of the way overplayed talent search variety. It's essentially a rock n' roll version of 'American Idol', except with the added "drama" of having the contestants living together. The grand prize apparently is to become the new lead singer of INXS.

I only bothered watching it because I kept running into promotions for it (MSN is totally hyping it), and the fact that I was a huge INXS fan back in the day. Well guys, I'm sorry to say, but the future of the band does not look too bright. First off, it is nearly impossible to replace Michael Hutchence, who tragically took his life a few years ago. And even if you wanted to, none of these talentless morons on this show are capable of even remotely doing so. It's a mixture of men and women, all under the age of 30, who are 90% image and (on a good day) 10% talent. And the show format is horrible. They intermingle clips of the "drama" at the mansion they're staying at with these live performances of 2-minute excerpts of rock staples. After each performance, the band (all in their late 40s now and still trying to look "hip") along with Dave Navarro (I'm sorry, where is the connection?) whose judging basically consists of things like "nice job dude, you rocked it!". I could only manage to sit through a couple of the performances before I had to shut it off. Maybe I'll dig out a few old INXS tapes to try to erase this from my memory.

This entry was posted by Brad, on Tuesday, July 19, 2005. You can leave your response.