X Factor jiggery-pokery

Last week's X Factor reality programme final on ITV1 was memorable for all the wrong reasons. Billed as the talent showdown of the year, the three contestants reeked of mediocrity rather than star quality.   Eoghan, the spiky-haired  'cherub' from Ireland, Black R n B group JLS and the wailing wannabe diva Alexandra Burke failed to impress much like a cheap bottle of flat champaign.   

Despite the shows chaotic mix of flashing lights, deafening noise of screaming adolescent  'fans', winner Alexandra's hysterics and judge Cheryl Cole's bucket load of tears, the finale to the series received record viewing figures and Alexandra's first single, a version of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, is the fastest-selling download ever across Europe, with more than 105,000 copies sold within hours of being available from midnight on Saturday.   A peak audience of 14 million viewers tuned in for The X Factor final  — the highest ever rating for the reality show. Alexandra's sale figures eclipsed the previous fastest download of 82,000 in one day which was previous X Factor winner Leona Lewis's debut release, A Moment Like This, two years ago.

By comparison, pop group Take That's recent No 1 single Greatest Day sold 9,488 downloads on its first day, while female ensemble Girls Aloud's chart-topping hit The Promise sold 7,600 downloads on the day of its release.

All of this has been achieved with a great deal of spin-mastery and jiggery-pokery by multi- millionaire music mogul Simon Cowell, X Factor judge and the show's creator.

Cowell's unashamed attempts to manipulate the opinion of his fellow judges and the public with expressions of exultation at all of Alexandra's performances throughout the series confirmed to the objective eye a desperation to get a winner who might, with expensive and clever marketing and similar profile replicate the success of the show's most talented past winner Leona Lewis. Twinning real  'superstar songstress' Beyonce with upstart Alexandra in the final, Cowell could have earned himself an Oscar as he feigned to near perfection  'overwhelmed' and said   he was still  'getting over' Alexandra's performance as the next finalist was about to sing. Perhaps this sealed the fate of JLS.     

Cowell may also have had a devilish hand in driving up the download sales of Alexandra's single from midnight last Saturday. Anyone who wanted to find out the lottery results and typed the word  'lotto' in Google would have been confronted with  'A Star Is Born'- the site promoting Alexandra and selling her track Hallelujah.