Earlier this year, the documentary “20 Feet from Stardom” explored the life of the backup singers who toil in the stars’ shadows.
Contestants on “The Voice” should watch that movie closely, because the way things are going, they’ll be in the sequel in 15 years.
As that TV series wraps up its fifth season on Dec. 17, its track record minting chart-toppers and touring sensations is terrible.
Nobody remembers who won the first three seasons, back in 2011-12. And while the show launched the hit “Move Like Jagger,” it was performed by two of the coaches — Adam Levine with his band, Maroon 5, and an assist from Christina Aguilera.
This only reinforced the idea that “The Voice” is more about the celebrity staff than the contestants.
“NBC addressed the issue by saying that they’re not trying to make stars, they’re trying to find the best voice in America,” says Caila Ball, who covers the show for Idolator.com. “But who cares about that if you never hear from them again?”
What “The Voice” does seem to spawn is technically adept singers with little personality — in other words, backup singers.
The big question, then, is whether “The Voice” will ever find a Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, or even a Chris Daughtry.
The post-TV record deals may not be the cause, as they are similar across the shows.
“The winner of ‘The Voice’ gets a deal with Universal’s Republic Records,” says Phil Gallo, who covers the connection between film, TV and music for Billboard. “Country people go to Big Machine, which is distributed by Republic. Whereas the winner of ‘X Factor’ goes to Simon Cowell’s Syco, and then he can sign other acts. Syco aligns with a label within Sony Music, so it can be Syco/Epic or Syco/Columbia. With ‘Idol’ they go to Interscope, which has a relationship with Mercury for country.”
More likely, the show’s inability to create a household name actually lays with its concept.
First: that whole coaching thing. The pros want to win by proxy, so that as the weeks go by they avoid criticism and coddle their charges.
“ ‘The Voice’ excels at encouraging people,” Gallo says. “The contestants have a team that, each week, helps them present that one performance, where the song is the be-all and end-all.”
This is in contrast to “American Idol,” which trains for a career rather than a song.
“It’s the best at telling them the steps to be a recording artist, ” Gallo says of the Fox show. “Every day is a new audition — they just have to grind it out and get to that next one.”
Up until this season, “The Voice” has also had a problem with originality — as in, it didn’t build up to the finalists introducing a new song. But OneRepublic’s hit-maker Ryan Tedder was recently hired as the show’s first in-house songwriter/producer, and tasked with penning the finale’s big vehicle.
“That should get more airplay than a cover,” Ball says.
But the biggest problem with the show is that, well, it’s called “The Voice,” a purist take that suggests that all you need to make it is great pipes.
If only that were true, especially now that touring and image-based social media count for so much. Even a non-image is an image: Does anybody really think that Johnny Cash picked black randomly?
But then there’s another way to think about “The Voice,” one in which the show actually achieves what it sets out to do.
“As much as ‘The Voice’ wants to have a star, it’s a TV show run by TV people,” Gallo says. “Their goal is to attract the largest audience, particularly between the ages of 18 and 49. And they’re achieving that goal.”