AUSTRALIA'S GOT (Little) TALENT - Praising THE BELLES

The "winners" of most of the "Got Talent" shows usually don't deserve to win. It's that simple. Looking back on the American version, there was the sobbing fatso Neal E. Boyd, who got the sympathy vote and is now in limbo where he belongs. Great operatic voice, but there's no shortage of them. Last year's winner, a homely no-talent hillbilly named Skinner, also was nothing new. Nashville is full of people like him. After his win did anyone buy his CD? Know that it existed? Of course not.

The newest "Got Talent" show is from Australia, where they marvel at embarrassingly stale gutter "dance" acts doing the same old spins and posturing, precocious brats who sing in irritating nasal voices, cutie-pie boys with too much hair or teeth (or both), and the rest of the tripe. Last year's winner was nothing special, a boring "hunk" with an egocentric flair for showing off his demi-operatic voice. Sergio Franchi, dead, would be more interesting to watch than him. This year? The viewers picked, you guessed it, a moronic street dance troupe, the kind who like to pretend to be zany robots. You wonder if their thug friends and hackers rigged the phones to constantly dial them in. The real winners could've been the brother-sister illusionists or the runner-up, an Aussie version of James Taylor who specialized in weepy self-written ballads about his wonderful family (his toothy son placed 3rd…having been voted through by the judges for the sake of drama, not because the kid was so much better than Alana Conway, the female harpist/vocalist who actually managed to sing "Unchained Melody" in a way that didn't make people puke.)

Your sample from the show? A novelty singing group called The Belles, whose unfortunate desire was to be Bette Midler in triplicate…ie, they love the Andrews Sisters. After their first number, bright, bouncy and pretty annoying, Danni Minogue suggested they "update" their Andrews Sisters fetish and try something modern in that three-part harmony style. Like something by Lady Gaga. The girls obliged, and did a pretty novel and funny job with "Bad Romance." And what did the judges do? One of them buzzed The Belles in mid-song and all three complained that the number didn't work. This is an example of moronic judging. The Belles gave the three idiots exactly what was requested, and got scorn and abuse. Well, not from the Illfolks blog, where they managed to break through the monotony..although not as well as the belly dancers and pole dancers who seem to frighten the cameramen away from close-ups.

No surprise "Australia's Got Talent" was the least interesting of the talent competitions. It wasn't helped by the judges who were mostly boring (even the pudgy, Kyle, who was supposed to be the "mean" one, but mostly acted like an overgrown petulant baby). There was a lack of real eccentricity or humor among the auditioners. One un-funny clod was voted through because he growled and broke watermelons over his head. On his second appearance, he ran afoul of the judges not because he did the same stupid act over again, but because he failed to break every watermelon over his head. Too bad he didn't break the watermelons over the heads of the judges. At least then the judges might've had a seed planted where nothing seems to grow.

the BELLES do LADY GAGA