Music Blogs

After over four months of bad singing, hype, despair, elation and Irish blubbing, the winner of the 2008 "X-Factor" will be revealed tomorrow. Whether anyone will remember the victor, let alone the finalists, in six months time is irrelevant. Steve Brookstein maybe halfway through shooting his softcore porn debut with Michelle McManus (working title "The XXXX-Factor") but Leona Lewis has proved to be one of the biggest pop stars this country has ever produced. Whatever you think of the merits of the show, tomorrow there will be drama.

Yesterday, JLS, Eoghan Quigg and Alexandra Burke hosted a press conference in London with their mentors, where all agreed the £1 million prize would be won by whoever performed best on the night. Perhaps inevitably, events were dominated by the judging panel, after it emerged the last 12 contestants had all signed a contract in which they agreed not to slag off Simon Cowell "anywhere in the world or the solar system". He admitted to being "very embarrassed" by the revelation, insisting "I didn't put that in there". Given the amount of abuse he is contractually obliged to unleash, it does seem reasonable that no-one should ever attempt to get under his mountainous skin and infinite ego.

Elsewhere, reporters asked if the seemingly doomed Dannii Minogue had a future as a judge. "We're going to sit down with everybody in January", responded Cowell, who appears to have so much control over the show that it may as well be renamed "I Am Simon Cowell". Happily, Cheryl Cole looked delectable throughout all this. So much so that Famethrowa can't help thinking she should be in the final. The other contestants seem so drab in comparison. This week, after a riot in Croydon, that well-known pop epicentre, JLS, took the opportunity to suggest the furore around them was "just like The Beatles". Do they mean half dead? As for Eoghan, his hilarious bawling last week will surely have secured the housewives vote but my money is on Alexandra, who is clearly the most gifted. Let the games begin!