Si Hunt Brings Down... JLS

[Si Hunt]

Okay, I wasn't going to do this again, but recently there has been endless praise and hype hurled at a particular pop group. X-Factor non-winners JLS have been hailed as a great new British talent - multiple MOBO award winners and BRIT nominees. One of the most popular groups of the last...er.. year. And now this:

JLS have insisted that they have more pressure on them than past boybands.

The 'Beat Again' four-piece, who have previously praised acts including Westlife and Blue, claimed that expectations are higher nowadays.

"Listeners are much more savvy now. You can't just mime and dance to make it," Marvin Humes told News Shopper.

"You have to prove yourself a lot more to the public, which goes for everything from your image and style of music to the quality of your album and performances."

The group, who have sold over 900,000 copies of their self-titled debut album, claimed that the standard of their music is responsible for their success.

"What's been our saving grace is we've come out with very good music, which is, first and foremost, the most important thing," Humes added.

"It was always important for us to make sure the quality was there rather than just rushing something out to keep the momentum going."

"It was always important for us to make sure the quality was there"? On all your vintage albums you mean?

I've seen JLS on recent promotional appearances. They go on "Loose Women" and the like and... mime and dance.

Let's also look at the facts. This hugely monumental group have had two hits. The first was quite good. The second was terrible, the sort of slushy mid-tempo number people like Westlife have been knocking out for years. There is a third single, but it's currently limping up the wrong end of the Top 10 and quite frankly I've not even heard it.

What really gets me about JLS is that they, and others, seem to think they are something revolutionary, just because we haven't had a boy band for a while. But the truth is, if they'd appeared in the nineties, and hadn't been on a huge TV show for three months, they'd probably rank somewhere just below 911 and MN8, a group to which they bear a striking resemblance - they're certainly no Backstreet Boys or even heyday Boyzone. Can they sing? Well, they do a sort of honeyed, processed RNB harmonising effort, but we've had that plenty of times down the years. Do they dance? Well, one of their number does backflips on early morning telly, the sort of cringeworthy minor 'stunt' groups like 911 were making us wretch with a decade or more ago. Have they got good songs? As I said, one and counting and they didn't write that.

What REALLY gets me is that everything about them is substandard. I mean - here's where I get personal, but you have to with boy bands because that's the point - none of them are even hugely good looking! The most popular one is the weedy rat-boy, Aston, although actually the Italian looking one is quite a dish. But the other two - Gosh, I don't want to be rude but there's slim pickings here folks. You always used to get an "ugly one" in boybands, but here you'd be hard pressed to find the "good looking one". But because there's - quick, everyone jump on it - A GAP IN THE MARKET - because a boybands, pre-JLS, was just about the only niche in the market not sown up, what with Westlife getting a bit old, Girls Aloud/Sugababes nailing the girl band market, and more female singers than you could shake a mike at - we seem to have taken JLS to our hearts as a nation in a way that defies all sense. They are, when you get over "Beat Again" being quite good and examine the talent, the songs and the looks involved - excruciatingly average. And yet no-one can seem to see it!

Is anyone willing to don a barristers wig and step up to defend them?



JLS (l-r) Marvin, Aston, B-Rok and Ken. Don't fancy yours much!

Si.

[Rob McCow]

I keep hearing about JLS but I haven't heard anything by them. I like that Charlie Brooker calls them 'JerLuS'.

But aren't they HUGE because they've been marketed to be HUGE?

[Si Hunt]

Only in terms of being on the X-Factor. They've have a lot of marketing, but arguably no more exposure than, say, Kandy Rain got initially. And marketing can't FORCE people to buy into a group. Can it?

Si.

[Dino]

Put them in suits and they look like a "Doo-Wop" group but without the magical songs of Doo-Wop? (I like Doo-Wop, there's a lot of great stuff in it!)
This concept of boyband is a bit of a throwback seeing as most acts that get called "boybands" can play their instruments? (or at least a couple of them can play)

So maybe it is harder for JLS as the audience has come to expect McFly levels of accomplishment?
I did watch their progress on the X Factor and thought at the time they could at least have something. But that appears to have been removed from the bands chemistry? The actual input to the writing and arrangement by the band.
I expect to see a documentary in 5 years time or more in which JLS make this same point.
So I voted yes.

[Si Hunt]

I hated McFly at first, but I love them now - they're actually really talented in the stuff they write and play, even if the vocals are still a bit shonky.

You're right though, why arn't people buying McFly albums when the songs are better than the pap that JLS are peddling in the name of "performance".

I can only conclude that, for some bizarre reason, women fancy them and it's some kind of 'act' like the Chippendales. They come accross a bit like that.

Si.

[Dino]

Never thought of it like the Chippendales and I'm another one who didn't like McFly at the time but would prefer them to what came after?
On that basis, perhaps in five years time we'll be saying we don't mind JLS compared to the next thing? I think however, society should collapse than tolerate a more tedious band than JLS!
But then a lot of people will continue to lap it up?

[Dave Tudor]

I fear I must remain impartial as one little boy in this household loves them.

[Pip Madeley]

I don't mind them, they're just four lads trying to make their way in the music industry, good luck to them, they obviously have their fans. Wouldn't really judge them on their looks but then I'm not gay, so I wouldn't necessarily think about that.

[P-Bal]

Yes, I say good luck to any act who takes part in a TV talent show and releases a record.