INXS to use reality TV

This was on our late news yesterday..not sure what I think - reality tv is on overkill here and the ratings are showing it...though of all the reality tv shows, Burnett has done the best ones. Obviously, the writer of the article at The Australian has strong views about it.
[though I would think it would be a great opportunity for whoever wins]

http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,14268,00.html

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au...E16947,00.html

Reality blights INXS's credibility
By Iain Shedden, Music writer
June 14, 2004
SO who exactly would want to be the singer in INXS?

That's a question that will be answered a thousand times in the next year, as the Sydney band trawls the world with TV cameras, looking for the person who can fill the shoes of late singer Michael Hutchence.

The announcement that the once massive rockers were to seek a new singer by means of a reality TV show, Rock Star, might seem like a new low for a band who's trajectory has been downwards for the past 10 years.

Once able to fill Wembley Stadium, INXS exist now on the fringes of rock credibility, doing the occasional tour overseas to ever-diminishing crowds.

Offering themselves to reality television is a crass act of desperation, a last throw of the dice for a bunch of mates and brothers who have been playing together all of their adult lives and who simply don't know how, or when, to stop. After all, they can hardly be in it just for the money.

All the members -- Andrew, Jon and Tim Farriss, Kirk Pengilly and Gary Beers -- are wealthy.

Yet they have signed up with American TV guru Mark Burnett, the man behind US Survivor and The Apprentice, to produce a show -- not unlike Australian Idol or American Idol -- that will audition would-be frontpersons for the group across five continents.

Twelve finalists will be nominated, with the eventual winner recording an album and going on a world tour with the band. The show will go to air next year.

INXS has plugged away using stand-in singers -- Terence Trent D'Arby, Jimmy Barnes and Jon Stevens -- since Hutchence's death seven years ago, in an effort to keep the band members' collective career on track.

Since Stevens quit last year -- ironically, to pursue a doomed reality TV career in Network Ten's flop The Resort -- speculation over who would be the next lucky Hutchence replacement in INXS has been circling the media.

Former Baby Animals singer Suze DeMarchi, who has been writing songs with the band's guitarist Andrew Farriss, was top of the list. It is not known if she is to be a contestant on the show.

What is clear is that INXS are addicted to fame -- at any price. What's scary is that their plan might just work. Who knows what sort of reality would result from that.


S.

I don't think any one can fill Michael Hutchence shoe.

well Jon Stevens did a pretty good job IMO... it's sad to see him leave as well . I wonder if this reality TV thing would be anything good, maybe they do find a perfect candidate for the job. But still I'm really wondering why they're so eager to continue as INXS but with a different singer. Like it's said in the article, it's been going downwards a lot the past years... Why don't they just look back to all their successes in the past, but continue with something completely different?

exactly and they will lose fans trying to do this in such a tacky way. Its disrespectful

Dawn

The answer is noone. They tried and it didn't work. Like Sara said, I think it's time that they move on from INXS. They are all talented musicians, they can still be successful.

That is exactally the point, they just leave the Inxs into past and should start new band or something. It is not great idea to fill Michael's shoe.

they should turn it into a musical like Queen did, we will rock you, have u seen the lead singer of the Queen musical, he is really good + looks similar to Freddie.

Dawn