Devil Inside, Devil Inside

Am cautiously optimistic about CBS's new reality series, Rockstar: INXS. The concept is pretty simple--an American Idol-type singoff in which 15 rock singers compete to be the new lead singer for INXS. The band members themselves will be judging and ultimately deciding who will get to front them. It's really a neat idea.

They've completed the first week, and so far two of the fifteen have been eliminated. The premiere had me a little worried; the producers structured the episode with lots of cut-always from the performances, some very quick, to show reactions of the band and host/judge/undefined participant Dave Navarro. There was also a fair amount of "backstage" stuff, very The Real World-esque interactions between all of the contestants who are, of course, living together in a big house. But the second and third episodes were much more music-driven, allaying my fears that this show would be more Survivor than American Idol. The singers so far are actually pretty good, although from what I've read many of them have substantial experience, with albums and tours under their belts--one contestant was the lead in the London production of the Queen jukebox musical We Will Rock You, apparently. I'm also loving that the songs are so much more consistently, well, better than most of what gets sung on AI, good, solid rock songs. Yes, the house band has already shown a worrisome tendency to make every song sound vaguely the same, hard, guitar-driven rock, and the contestants so far have been really, really emphasizing the "rock" part of the formula, turning pretty much every song into a raging hard rock piece. Still, I may be hooked.

The schedule seems to be:

Mondays: Contestants pick songs and interact. The night that resembles most reality shows, with the youngish contestants interacting.

Tuesdays: Performances. The viewers get to vote on the website for their favorites.

Wednesday: Elimination. The bottom three perform an INXS song and the band eliminates someone.

Until Whenever