How The X Factor And Sony BMG Fixed It For Katie Waissel, aka Katie Vogel
THE X FACTOR is returned to our TV screens and thus to the newspapers’ front page. And there is a story linking Katie Waissel to Simon Cowell and Sony BMG. You see, Katie is no enthusiastic amateur fluffing her lines and begging for one more chance to live her “dream”.
Had she just got her song right first time over, Katie would have been less memorable. But she ‘fluffled’ it, and having begged for another chance, Cowell gave her “20 seconds”. That make-or-break time limit was extended when Katie started singing.
As such, Katie ended up on stage and on camera longer than most. Why? Is it because she is in with the management at Sony BMG, where Simon Cowell also works?
The 24-year-old from from Harewood, Hertfordshire, who looks like Kelly Osbourne channelling Vanessa Feltz, is also known as Lola Fontaine, singer of a jazz album and owner of a record deal in the US. But that’s not all.
You might know her as of Katie Vogel, star of a reality TV show, sponsored by Coca Cola and watchable online. Here’s the trailer:
Green Eyed World follows the life adventure of Katie Vogel, a talented girl with a green guitar, killer tunes and big dreams. Each week, the new episode is your backstage pass into the music business as Katie travels through different cities and countries in search of fun, freedom, fans and friends.
But that is not all.
Katie has a sympathetic backs story. When she was 10 her grandpa died. And she was bullied:
Back to my teenage years, i was bullied terribly at the same time as my family were going through a major crisis (Very long story for a rainy day!)
She’s also on nodding terms with Chaz Jankel, of Ian Duty and Blockheads repute. And she opened the bill at East 17’s comeback show at The Shepherds Bush Empire.
Oh, and at a party in LA she met “DAVID MASSEY VP OF SONY BMG!”. Yeah, that’s the same Sony that Simon Cowell works for.
I went to Dave Massey’s office a couple days later and spent the entire day there! We went through all my music, we jammed on the guitar, he introduced me to his team! And at the end of the day, he told me he wanted me to come back out and perform at a venue in NYC for him and Sony.
And Katie also knows X Factor starlets:
My agent at the time who is at Creative Entertainment Group, called my management and told him of a tour that was happening around the UK. As soon as i heard i could hit the road, i jumped on board. Andy Abraham’s runner up in that years X Factor was going out a theatre [sic] tour across the UK.
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And:
Sharon Osbourne came up to me after the Lodnon [sic] show and told me what a wonderful and powerful voice i had!
That would be Sharon Osbourne, the former X Factor judge? Anyone else the girl billed on the X Factor as a “receptionist” knows??
So with my new material and a tour under my belt, i decided to manage myself. I got in touch with my friends down at BBC Radio and asked for help. My friend Simon Ward who produces Dermot O’Leary on BBC Radio Two told me that he did A&R for Sony BMG
That would be Dermot O’Leary who presents the….. X Factor.
Joe Charrington from Sony BMG jumped back on the band wagon and introduced me to a wonderfully talented writer Ian Barter. Joe and Simon together decided that a female version of Coldplay indie rock sound would be best for me. So i visited Ian at his studio in Reading and we wrote a couple of tracks in this genre. However surprise surprise, Joe wasn’t happy.
And so to the X Factor show in which Simon Cowell, of BMG records, sits on the judging panel. He’s introducing and judging an act apparently well known to Sony BMG.
And the punters at home watch the telly show – which is less a talent show than an advertorial for new acts and friends of Sony and the X Factor.
Still, no-one said the X Factor wasn’t manipulative and cynical…
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This post was originally published on August 23, 201o
December 6th, 2010 at 4:43 pm
Of course it is fixed.lol
You dumb cretins who vote are funding this contrived rubbish.
Just do not vote….SIMPLE
November 29th, 2010 at 6:24 pm
glad to see she finally got the boot. wtf is she thinking career after the xfactor seriously does she think anyone’s going to buy her single / album’s? she is more deluded than her grandmother.
November 29th, 2010 at 12:54 pm
hello people. i am very happy
want to know why?
last night’s double eviction ended in kicking katie and wagner (or should i say vagner)
November 23rd, 2010 at 6:38 pm
EVERYBODY TO VOTE 4 WAGNER!! WHAT A FIX….
November 23rd, 2010 at 6:36 pm
she so IS katie vogel-how u can pretty easy tell after putting her on google, the singer of one tree hill (mia) is KATE VOEGELE. u smartarse…
November 22nd, 2010 at 7:57 pm
MATT OHBOYOHBOY commented:User rating: Neutral
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WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED AT THE GRANDMOTHER, JUST LOOK AT THOSE PICS…. HOPE SHE PAYS TAXES ON ALL HER ‘EARNINGS’ if she puts it on www then ITS PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE
ALONG WITH another cheat busted…first Katie and NOW MATT..I did think it strange that he was picked out of hundreds and hundreds in audtion queue.FOR INTERVIEW…NOW I KNOW WHY….FIX FACTOR AT ITS BEST…argue with this Matt Fans….he is a CHEAT!!!!!
“I thought Matt WAS OKAY too UNTIL I found : “Matt is a member OF A BAND called SECEN SUMMERS who RELEASED AN ALBUM earlier this year. Matt’s girlfriend LAUREN CUTMORE was with him at his first audition but as the live shows began, Matt apparently broke up with her as he felt he stood a better chance at winning if he were single.”
November 22nd, 2010 at 7:09 am
X factor is a fix, without all the the silly parents allowing their kids to phone in, votes being rigged to keep that silly man in, with an alter ego bigger than Simon Cowell, a show being used as a publicity stunt for our forces in Afghanistan, and the show is contrived to get people watching, no wonder the UK is so gulable.
Play scrabble or something other than watching this, there are very few good acts on their, other than the Liverpool girl .
As for the judges, well if thats the best glove puppets Sony can come up with, they want to devolve their compnay
November 20th, 2010 at 11:25 pm
No, Wagner is still on the show because a bunch of people are intentionally voting for him in their version of throwing a temper tantrum when they didn’t get what they wanted except it’s grown adults throwing the temper tantrum, and not a two year old. Does it matter if Trayc stayed or was axed instead of Katie? Rating wise, yes, otherwise, no as neither is likely to win. Aiden shot himself in the foot with both his save me song and his version of Rocket Man. I can only hope that Katie did good enough this week to avoid the bottom two, and see Mary and Wagner in the bottom two instead. She doesn’t deserve to be dumped into the bottom two because a bunch of the viewers are acting like two year olds who had their favorite toy taken away.
November 16th, 2010 at 6:00 pm
THE ONLY REASON WAGNER IS STILL IN THE COMPETITION IS THAT THEY ARE USING HIM AS A ” FALL GUY ” TO SHOCK US INTO SPENDING OUR MONEY TO VOTE FOR SOMEONE ELSE. THE WHOLE THING IS FIXED AND XFACTOR’S DAYS ARE NUMBERED. IT USED TO BE A GOOD SHOW AT THE BEGINNING, BUT LIKE ALL THINGS, ITS GOT TOO B IG FOR ITS BOOTS AND IS NOW A COMPLETE SHAM
November 15th, 2010 at 4:29 pm
KATIE WILL NOT GET A RECORD DEAL SHE PROB HAS BEEN PAID A LUMP SUM TO BE THE BAD GUY TO KEEP VIEWERS WATCHING AND KEEP VIEWERS VOTING MAKING THEM MORE AND MORE MONEY. SIMPLE DO NOT VOTE , BUT IF YOU MUST VOTE WAGNER AND WASTE THERE MONEY WHEN HIS ALBUM FLOPS
November 15th, 2010 at 1:59 pm
Matt C – seems like you have some underlying problems to sort out yourself, before heaping your bile onto contestants from the X-Factor….
unnecessary, unwanted and uneducated….
November 15th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
DO NOT VOTE, PUBLIC WASTE THERE MONEY VOTING AND DO NOT EVEN GET THE FINAL SAY UNLIKE STRICLY COME DANCING. JUDGES HAVE FINAL SAY AS IT IS ALL RIGGED. YOUR CALLS GOES TO ITV AND XFACTOR PRODUCTION COMPANY MAKING THEN MILLIONS. IF YOU DO VOTE, VOTE WAGNER SO THERE MONEY WILL BE WASTED WHEN HIS ALBUM FLOPS.
November 15th, 2010 at 9:38 am
“the deal is rotten, and the fight is fixed.” (leonard cohen) it’s against the x-factor’s rules to have a record contract already when you’re applying to be a contestant. in the past, previous contestants who were found to have done this were immediately expelled from the competition. but this time, simon bought out katie (vogel) waissel’s record contract instead! but, think about it . . . doesn’t that mean she’s still under contract? but now she’s the darling of simon cowell, who has a vested interest in her doing well in the competition. it is impossible for him to remain un-biased in this situation. he has saved her 4 times from the bottom two already! he needed her to at least get to the tour to have any hope of making his money back. people are furious, and rightly so. they know who they voted for, and it sure as hell wasn’t katie. many are saying they will boycott watching the show, and that they will not buy tickets for the tour if she is in it. others said they will not call in anymore, because they’re vote doesn’t really count, and their money is being stolen. the odds of aiden’s public vote having put him at the bottom, is zero. and what of the twitter sent to aiden ONE HALF HOUR BEFORE THE RESULTS SHOW telling him he’d be in the bottom three? i think an investigation is called for. last night, new web sites popped up all over the net – some demanding an investigation, some reporting them, some expressing their support for aiden, and outrage at simon. others insisted aiden be reinstated. the consensus was clear (over 17,000 comments were posted to x-factor’s facebook page within 40 minutes of the results show, the majority claiming the results had been “fixed” by simon). aiden needs to be brought back, katie needs to be given the boot, and simon should be ashamed. aiden, if you’re listening, you do have fans – many hundreds of thousands of us, and we’re demanding a re-count!
November 15th, 2010 at 8:13 am
Matt C… have you met Katie W? how well do you now her? Have you got some insider knowledge of her (apart from reading the tabloids and forums) that lets you judge her so nastily?
She’s just another contestant playing the role she’s been given to up the ratings for ITV and the income for Cowell.
I don’t understand how can anyone get so worked up and be so poisonous over a plain and simple talent contest that every simgle year pits the baddies against the goodies….. madness. Think about how you’d feel if she was your girlfriend/sister/daughter being slated for her looks (duh!) and doing what every other contestant does.
November 14th, 2010 at 9:41 pm
Aiden lowest vote for tonight!!!! totally fixed! Katie the useless B1 tch should have been long gone!! A receptionist?? yeh right! Green eyed world?? what the F ck was that? BMG knows who she is!!! This whole X factor is a fix!
She looks like the wicked witch from Wizard of Oz!!
Stuff the ugly witch! Have you seen the size of that CHIN!!!! LOL!!!
You cant hold a note and your FUGLY!!!
Katie will not win it but they will keep her in to annoy the public so that they still tune in to watch and then eventually she will be booted out, but by that time she has had plenty of publicity!! Bad news for her is that the public will hate her more every week!!
X factor is sh1 t everyone vote for WAGNER to win but then he would’nt as votes will be rigged, he will lose and ITV will still make money from phone votes.
The odds are the witch will still be in until the 5 or 6 weeks from the end.
I dont believe Aiden had the lowest vote tonight, another BMG influence or manipulation! I feel sorry for every singer on the show, it does’nt matter who wins because Shitman Cowell and BMG will still profit from you and if you flop they will send you over to ASIA like CHAV whats his name? Shane something?
November 12th, 2010 at 1:46 pm
Dermot has since denied he said this….according to the Daily Mirror. Take whichever conspiracy theory you like this week
November 12th, 2010 at 1:08 pm
The ITV1 show’s host revealed a plot was hatched to save oddball singer Katie Waissel minutes before the four judges voted.
It relied on Cheryl Cole – mentor to both Katie, 24, and ousted Treyc Cohen, 28 – being made to vote early and abstaining until her fellow judges’ verdicts.
Dermot, 37, outraged viewers by then giving her no say.
He said he was told: “If Cheryl decides to opt out we go to majority vote.”
The plot – which involved refusing to let Cheryl Cole have the last say on who got the boot – was cooked up at the 11th hour, according to the presenter.
It means livid X Factor fans who accused the ITV1 show of a fix after Sunday night’s travesty were RIGHT.
As mentor to both the acts in the bottom two following the public’s vote, Cheryl was unwilling to choose between them as she and her fellow judges decided who to send home.
Bosses had banked on her doing just that – and went out of their way to make sure.
Viewers had expected that since her acts were involved, she would be the last of the four judges to vote.
She was instead asked to choose BEFORE she knew all the other judges’ votes – so initially abstained.
With the decision at 2-1 to send Treyc Cohen home, Cheryl then desperately tried to level it at 2-2.
But Dermot enraged viewers by ignoring her – meaning she had no say at all.
Deadlock would have seen the singer with fewest public votes – Katie – being axed.
Last night Dermot lifted the lid on what happened with show chiefs behind the scenes.
He confessed: “We talked about it in the break because you find out two or three minutes before what’s going to happen.
“My producer said, ‘Look, if Cheryl decides to opt out we go to majority vote’.
“She did decide to opt out – and then she said, ‘Come back to me and we’ll do deadlock’.”
Dermot defended not letting her put Katie’s fate in the hands of the public by saying: “You can’t do that because then it kind of devalues the other two judges’ votes so that wouldn’t have made sense.”
But he admitted of the order in which the panel had to vote: “It would have been a lot easier for me for Cheryl to be last.”
The presenter said of Cheryl abstaining: “There’s no precedent to it so it’s tricky.”
He insisted he only followed the rules – but last night X Factor said there were NO rules.
A spokeswoman said: “Cheryl was well within her rights to do what she did. There are no official rules on X Factor.”
Show supremo Simon Cowell has twice seen two of his acts come bottom – and on both occasions was the judge who got to vote last.
He even admitted on Sunday that Treyc was the better singer – but Katie made for better TV.
November 10th, 2010 at 10:50 am
I’ve been a singer all my life and have always watched the X factor until now. This is probably the best bunch of singers that have been on the show but it is let down by the ignorance and biase of the judges. Wagner is the comedy element and should never be there. One direction are a bunch of boys that can’t sing any harmonies and only reason they are there is because Simon wants to win, not their talant. Katie is the drama element, totally talentless. Trayc, John, Mary, Matt, Rebecca and Paij are the only real singers and Mary gives a go. This isn’t a talent competition because the judges can’t be objective in their voting. So, I agree, with a previous view, vote Wagner if your going to vote and give the X factor and Simon a taste of their own medicine by ruining the interest of the show. Don’t be a sheep and follow the hype. Think it out!!!
November 8th, 2010 at 5:32 pm
DO NOT VOTE, PUBLIC WASTE THERE MONEY VOTING AND DO NOT EVEN GET THE FINAL SAY UNLIKE STRICLY COME DANCING. JUDGES HAVE FINAL SAY AS IT IS ALL RIGGED. YOUR CALLS GOES TO ITV AND XFACTOR PRODUCTION COMPANY MAKING THEN MILLIONS. IF YOU DO VOTE, VOTE WAGNER SO THERE MONEY WILL BE WASTED WHEN HIS ALBUM FLOPS.
November 8th, 2010 at 1:03 pm
well the thing i don’t get is that katie has been in the last 2 3 times in a row and survived all of them. and in the x-factor yesterday katie v trace, in the last performance, katie more or less sat down and gave up. BUT WHAT HAPPENED THEN???? tracey sang a lot better than katie and TRACEY GOT KICKED OUT??? it makes you wonder if the show is a fix.
October 30th, 2010 at 2:53 am
OK – I am NOT a Katie Waissel fan. I admit she can indeed sing – certainly better than I can(!) However, as we all have an opinion, here’s mine – she is trying to become famous so is going on the X-Factor despite already being known by BMG/Sony/Simon. This is CLEARLY true as she’s all over the internet and seems that she does have an unfair advantage over those that have entered the X factor trying their luck an displaying their undiscovererd talent – Katie’s talent (which is CONSIDERABLY LESS than many on the show – Trayc, John, Mary, Matt, Belle Amie, One Direction & Aiden are ALL much better than her) is not undiscovered and has not been good enough for BMG to push forward – simple. And she certainly DOESN’T HAVE STAR QUALITY!!!!! She comes across as a very annoying girl who will wind the public up the wrong way – she makes me cringe every time she speaks on X Factor and I look forward to having her booted off – this may seem harsh, but I believe others deserve a chance that Katie has had over the years and no made it – Those named above can make it and all have Star Quality – and the personalities to match too.
October 27th, 2010 at 9:05 am
What does that make you?
A naive, believe anything they tell you robot?
October 27th, 2010 at 12:09 am
i think you r all bull shitters out to smear good peoples names and you should really give this girl a chance you load of arseholes!!”!!
October 23rd, 2010 at 11:30 pm
I don’t know why people have to be so mean and horrible towards others. If you think the show is a fix then don’t bother voting, or if it annoys you then don’t watch. There is no point in annoying yourself.
Everyone has their own opinions on what is tallent and what makes a good singer. Personally I like Katie Waissel, but of course there will be others that don’t, which is only natural. I don’t think that it is fair to give people so much stick because you either don’t like them or don’t think they should be on the show. She is a human being and she is in a competition trying her best, there is nothing wrong with that. There are some acts that I don’t like but I would never try to turn other people againt them that would not be right. I like Katie’s voice and think she can sing.
October 20th, 2010 at 5:15 am
Gamu sucked, she had zero personality and she could never have been a popstar. Those who think Katie shouldn’t be here are completely oblivious to the way superstars are formed. Katie has so much star potential, while Gamu had none. I applaud Cheryl’s choices; she wasn’t looking for some good singer, she was looking for a STAR.
October 11th, 2010 at 11:30 am
Nick, agreed. Entertainment is all. Which is why Wagner should win:
http://www.anorak.co.uk/261964/tv/x-factor-2010-wagner-fiuza-carrilho-is-the-cheryl-cole-antidote-we-crave.html
October 11th, 2010 at 10:12 am
Great article and I applaude your attention to detail.
To be honest I don’t think the general public care if it’s rigged or not.
It’s not a reality show or a talent contest, it’s an entertainment show. No more, no less.
October 10th, 2010 at 2:55 pm
It’s a fix for a boyband to win…
October 7th, 2010 at 11:52 am
http://www.indielondon.co.uk/Music-Review/katie-v-the-indielondon-interview
Q. Do you think there’s too much reality TV? Or is it a good way of making a name for yourself nowadays? How does something like Green-Eyed World compare to something like The X-Factor?
Katie V: It all depends on what genre of reality TV you are talking about. Shows such as Big Brother are entertaining and give the public something a little different to what Green-Eyed World gave. Unfortunately, shows such as Big Brother attract people either because they want the experience or because they just want to be famous.
So, it all depends on what you want to be known for really. Green-Eyed World is a ‘rockumentary’, it follows the journey of a singer-songwriter trying to make it in the music industry by constantly writing new material, meeting new people and networking, having faith in the emotional and inspirational moments that whirlwind their way into life. The X-Factor, on the other hand, is a singing competition. There are genuine artists that feel that this is their way to get themselves out there, but it would be very interesting to see what made them apply and what their music lives were like before the show.
October 6th, 2010 at 3:03 pm
we know one thing cheryl not in it to win this year i thought going to judges house is to prove you got real talent what a disgrace 2 at cheryls house did nt sing a note they should have been sent packing what a way to lose viewers
October 5th, 2010 at 11:14 pm
wow, what a lot of jealous vindictive people in this world leave the girl alone….