With apologies to McDonalds, reviewing a Westlife CD is like rating a Big Mac Meal. Like most things touched by the hand of Cowell - from the Tweenies to Pop Idol - they exist only to serve a function. In short: they make money.
Now't wrong with that, obviously. That's the aim of the entire music business. Even Godspeed You Black Emperor! need to eat. Only, there is more than that - in that, much of the music business actually relies on artistic talent to make its bread. It's what they call 'intellectual property' and they used to call 'long-term development'.
But, where Mr Cowell is concerned, artistic merit doesn't really come into it. Nor is it meant to. That just gets in the way of making money. There'll be no fancy notions of innovation here thankyou very much. Being a pop star is bloody hard graft.
This makes your average boyband an accident waiting to happen. Give 'em a few awards at the poll winners' party and they start getting ideas above their station. They start thinking George Michael or Robbie Williams - that kids buy their records because they're really talented not because they're shoved down their throats on CD:UK every other week. It's why Cowell will always prefer the malleable likes of Gareth Gates rather than, say, Will Young, who might have a few ideas of his own.
And, for all of three minutes, it looked like Westlife were going down that fateful but well-trodden path. Earlier in the year they'd all bought Stetsons and were about to conquer America. They even had a new 'rock' single called 'Hey Whatever'. It might have been a rewrite of Relish's 'Rainbow Zephyr' with the difficult words taken out but it wasn't 'Flying Without Wings II'. And then there was the album: 'Turnaround'. As in: 'change of direction'. Maybe this'll be their 'Kid A'.
But, of course, it won't. Luckily Mr Cowell spotted the signs too. There was to be no reinvention here. Forget that loser Timberlake, what we need is a reinstatement of the core Westlife values - dress the lads in long coats, sit them on stools and get them singing a ballad. Preferably a cover. Something safe and familiar. Something like Barry Manilow's 'Mandy'.
And we know the rest. 'Mandy' goes straight to number one and 'Turnaround' retreads everything they've ever done before. It's chock to the brim with inoffensive piano ballads that won't be remembered next week, never mind next year. The sound of five Irish redcoats singing their little hearts out. The only exceptions would be the title track, which incorporates some mild electroclash influences - consequently sounding like the gayest gay disco song ever, which might be intentional - and the cover of Mr Big's 'To Be With You'.
This is music too scared to offend anyone or anything. There's barely even an adjective in the song titles titles! It just is.
It'll make loads of money, of course. That's the great thing about pop as it might go into funding the development of a young band with some 'long term' talent. Only, of course, it won't. The only person who'll be making money from this will be you-know-who. It's Mr Nasty's world - we're just living in it.
