Very good; very honest - he truly is a lovely person (as anyone who's read 65 knows).

Maybe, but, to an outsider, he appears to have no taste, no depth and no shame. In a decent culture he'd be a minor figure with about as much prestige as an old K-Tel album. It wouldn't be so bad if he acted as though he was in on the joke, but he seems to believe in his own hype.

No taste? I would tend to agree with you; very little taste at least, but taste is an individual thing and we all have different kinds of taste. No depth? Wrong - he's as deep as any of us - remember, I've known him well for many years. No shame? Indeed - but his shame for some things would be absurd and he certainly expressed shame for some things - like the Susan Boyle problems for example. Simon is a complex character who has done a huge, positive service for some kinds of music. Don't blame him because others have failed to do the same for other kinds of music.

JK, I'm glad you are supporting Simon as people seem to be critical of him only because he has had success.

I do disagree with you about Simon's lack of taste. When he was a musicman he was focussed on "having hits, selling product and making money" an attitude that wasn't always shared by executives looking after other musical genres. Every record executive has had failures but Simons hit ratio is significantly better than most. People may not like his style of music but he has sold enough records to prove that his taste for a hit is present.

Simon is now a TV man with music playing a secondary role. His taste is that of the public. In every busines the recipe for succes is "know your cutomers" Simon knows his customers and its not his taste that should be questioned but that of Joe & Jane Public.

'He's only criticised because he's successful' - patronising, forelock-tugging rubbish.

'His taste is that of the public' - ditto, risibly unempirical and, while you're at it, pass the sick bag, Alice.

It's very generous of a genuinely literate, talented man like Jonathan King to defend someone like Cowell, but it's not that fair on all of the people far more deserving of applause who actually retain a degree of humility. Even ignoring his monstrously inflated status for ripping off Opportunity Knocks and New Faces (that gets you a 'lifetime achievement' award these days), he doesn't deserve as much fame or influence as even Mickey Most (who actually DID something other than raid other people's 'bleeding obvious' back catalogue) enjoyed. He's also lauded by his sycophantic servants for having 'too busy' a mind to read books - well, it's a good job slower-witted dullards like Descartes et al were around to write the damn things then instead of claiming they'd invented the wheel. It's important to retain some kind of perspective, even now, so forgive me if that stops me from genuflecting before someone like Cowell.

Scowl, What an appropriate name for such an angry person.

Shame you aren't able to back up you points with any intelligent argument and I'm certainly not going to waste my time pointing out ALL the flaws in the various points you were trying to make.

I will say this however. I was defending someone's taste and their ability to create hits. This is different from originality, I certainly don't believe Simon tries to be original. Most people who try to be original fail, best to take a proven formulae within Pop music and make it even more POPULAR. In truth Simon Cowell has done that enough times not to need me to defend him.

When I read the comments of Scowl I can only assume someone is trying to stir things up as its so hard to believe those views are actually genuine.

Calling him 'Simon' pretty much signposts how little objectivity there is here.

He is just a DNA update of Mickie Most really - all swagger and "giving the public what they want" - the main difference being that Most was involved in making a lot of great records. Cowell's record is simply that of pushing a lot of crap music to an increasingly stupid audience - these people have learned from past svengali's mistakes and the problems that 'proper artists' can cause with their silly need for artistic freedom etc. Don Kirsher got burned by The Monkees and went on to work with cartoons, Cowell started his hit career with Wonderdog, Mighty Morph'n Power Rangers, and Robson & Jerome.
As for his celebrity status and popularity, it is a case of right place right time for Simon. His audience couldn't care less how contrived the product is or how he is controlling everything the main gripe I have with it all is it's killing decent pop music

Mr Cowell was an A&R man, a record executive, not an artist or producer. He came up via song plugging so he has always accepted and applied the old fashioned approach to record making - match a song with an artist in a way that will entice the public to buy the finished product.

Mr Cowell was a very successful record company executive who choose to work for a large corporation. Other than maybe Muff Winwood I can't think of any other UK A&R man who even comes close to his success within a UK record compaany. Mr Cowell is now a television executive and making a bloody good job of that as well I hear.

BTW - Scowl, his name is Simon or am I missing something?

Muff Winwood was a musician who went into a&r with the knowledge, understanding & creative nous of a musician initially to help his brother establish Traffic and get Island Records off the ground as a 'rock' label - and was successful in that field at a pretty young age. It also helped that his mentor was Chris Blackwell - a man who, whilst not without his own flaws, was driven as much by a love for music over money and mere "product". Musicians tended to respect other musicians a lot more than they did mere executives.
Cowell will have greater detachment from the music (or 'product' - which is what his stuff generally is) and thus be more 'successful' than anyone else, if the yarsstick with which we measure success is just units shifted. In his televisual roles he has just applied that to himself.
All very admirable but ultimately completely soulless - a bit like his music really....

Blue Boy wrote:
Mr Cowell was an A&R man, a record executive, not an artist or producer. He came up via song plugging so he has always accepted and applied the old fashioned approach to record making - match a song with an artist in a way that will entice the public to buy the finished product.

Mr Cowell was a very successful record company executive who choose to work for a large corporation. Other than maybe Muff Winwood I can't think of any other UK A&R man who even comes close to his success within a UK record compaany. Mr Cowell is now a television executive and making a bloody good job of that as well I hear.

BTW - Scowl, his name is Simon or am I missing something?

I agree with JK and there's a lot to admire about Simon Cowell.
He's a different kind of music executive and is very much from the old skool
way of doing things. A traditional A&R man who is succeeding with what he is
doing. We have to respect that. Simon didn't nick Opportunity Knocks or New Faces.
He nicked Popstars and transformed it along with Simon Fuller into Pop Idol which
was a fantastic idea.

All it did was televise the "Spice Girls" way of finding an artist & showcasing
them on TV and selling squillions. For me this only works to a point. You need to
keep the mystique but having said that he's had success with Leona, Susan Boyle and
to a lesser extent Will Young. The jury is out on Alexander Burke and I haven't even
counted all the American Idol stars he's unearthed.

For all the criticism of Simon he is a shrewd man who manipulated the public into
respecting him. He understood TV. From the high waisted trousers the snide almost camp
comments, the posh accent, he knows what he is doing and we have to respect that even
if we don't like it.

It's about drama at the end of the day and he has given us drama. Simon Cowell has in
a way opened the door to a new breed of executives who as long as they follow the basic
principle of "setting your acts apart from everyone else" will succeed. TV is the key
and there will be more executives (younger, smarter, and more hungry for success) who
will come from a diverse range of music genres and styles. The basics work all the time.

Let us also not forget Buster Pearson, a man who shrewdly gave us Five Star. There isn't
a lot of difference between him and Cowell in that he got them on TV, negotiated a very
good deal with RCA (similar to Syco/Sony) and created the drama.

I am not a fan of all of Cowell's acts but I admire his methods and acknowledge deep down
he is actually a decent music man.

There is far too much Piers Morgan on TV. I did watch his visit to Shanghai but couldn't help thinking how much better it would be if he wasn't in it. For this reason I didn't watch the Simon Cowell interview, but I find Simon more tolerable than Piers.

Anyone comparing Cowell's run at RCA/London with Muff Winwood's at CBS/Sony out to have their head examined (In my opinion).

Placing cover versions with Westlife cannot be compared to Muff Winwood in any sense.

If I were to reach out for advice it would certainly be to Muff. He's still got it, and I wish he was still at Sony.

Nothing personally against Cowell, he is what he is. Which at this point in time is a television executive, saturation marketing half-talents to the masses.