Sharleen : TV music shows kill the talent
from the Daily Record - 29 September 2003 by Karen Bale

TEXAS star Sharleen Spiteri says talent show judges like Pop Idol's Simon Cowell coach all the life out of young wannabes.

The singer said: ``It's really sad because when they start off they're better and they end up s ** t by the end of it.

``They get really blanded-out. Anything that was good, that needs nurturing, is whacked out of them and they're made to do it apparently how it should be.

``The whole point of creating something new and fresh is not to do it the way it was done before. So you've lost it before you've even started.''

Sharleen has turned down requests to teach the students because she hates the hype surrounding TV talent shows.

She believes ambitious kids would be better to learn the trade the hard way like she did rather than try to copy artists.

The Glasgow-born singer said: ``All the big TV shows in Europe at the moment are these Pop Idol-style programmes.

``They're all saying, `You're a musician, why don't you come and do a class on songwriting?' ``And I'm like, `Because it's not real.' I don't believe that you have to pay your dues -but the amount of attention to go in at that level is massive.

``It's a very cruel and dangerous place to be.

``You will never get that sort of coverage ever if you start off in the music business.

``I never had a choreographer, I never had a singing teacher, I never had a stylist, I never had a make-up artist.

``Obviously I do now, but I never had a make-up artist until The Hush and I'd made a lot of albums by that point.

``I remember watching Pop Idol and they went off in that big fancy tour bus and I went, `My tour bus isn't even as fancy as that!''' Sharleen is due to release her first single with Texas in four years after a baby break with her first child, Misty Kyd.

She recorded part of the new album Careful What You Wish For while she was pregnant.

Sharleen said: ``So many people say having children changes your life and it hasn't changed my life at all it's just made everything a lot better.''


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