Austin Drage - X Factor 2008

Former X Factor contestant Austin Drage has claimed that Cheryl Cole has made the wrong choices on this year’s series.

Cole has chosen Lloyd Daniels, Joseph McElderry and Rikki Loney as her final three acts.

Speaking on Five TV’s chat show, Live From Studio Five, Drage said, “I think Cheryl got it wrong, didn’t she? I was a Duane fan.

“I thought what Duane did was really current, he did Ne-Yo, he had that whole soul thing going on. It really killed him, didn’t it?

“I know Duane and Rikki quite well personally, and Duane’s got such a great vocal. Rikki’s got a good voice as well and they both want it badly, but it’s really hurt Duane.”

Austin Drage - X Factor 2008

Well this is a turn up for the books. Former X Factor contestant Austin Drage has thanked Simon Cowell, even though many would suggest that Cowell neglected him during his time on the show last year.

Drage told BBC Newsbeat that even though Cowell hadn’t been in touch since he left the show, he understood that he is a busy man.

Drage said: “Simon’s a busy guy. He’s a multi-millionaire, in a multi-million pound company. He’s very hard to get hold of because he’s got a lot of things to do, which we all understood.

“I understand he’s got the new X Factor coming out, Britain’s Got Talent and he’s got it all going on in America as well. I understand he’s busy.”

He added: “When you’re working hard, that’s what happens. None of us hold it against him. If it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t be where I am, so he’s one of the biggest people I’ve got to thank.

“I’m in no way, shape or form sort of angry at the show. I’m just pleased that I’ve been given an opportunity to get my voice heard. I really appreciate it.”

Drage is still performing regularly and is planning to release some new material on his own record label and has been working with people who have collaborated with Lily Allen and Tinchy Stryder.

Every X Factor reject has a busy day on the Monday after getting voted out – but none more than Austin Drage, who is at Number 1 in the singles chart with the Help For Heroes charity song. So this Monday is a little busier than usual, and we eventually catch up with Austin in the afternoon.

He’s getting a little tired out from all the questions, but we get what is possibly the most frank and honest X Factor interviews we’ve ever done.

Unreality TV: Harking back to Saturday night, one of Louis Walsh’s comments was that you were failing to connect with your audience.

To be honest with you, I thought that was a bit of a silly thing to say, because obviously I’ve connected with the audience every week since starting the competition. I’ve connected with the audience as much as anybody else, but I haven’t had the great songs that everybody else had, I haven’t been that lucky.

At the end of the night, did you feel cheated that Cheryl and Louis voted for Rachel based on her potential rather than her final performance?

Yeah, because I don’t think her potential is as much as mine, and I think I’ve showed plenty of potential since the first week. If they’d let it go to deadlock, I think I’d have ended up staying in the competition.

Rachel’s done one song well. I’ve done all my songs well, bar the last one, and that was a bad song on a night when it should have been a really funky song.

If you could’ve chosen your own song, what would you have sung?

I would have chosen Average White Band Let’s Go Round Again. It’s a great song.

And do you believe that song choice was the reason for you going?

Yeah, I believe that song put me in the bottom two. And I believe the fact that I was in the bottom two gave them the opportunity to vote me out rather than let it go to deadlock, which is what they should have done.

I wanted to ask you about that, because I would have thought you would be a threat to JLS

Yeah, I would have thought so. I mean, JLS are a great group, but I would have thought I’d be a threat to them.

And Simon now doesn’t have to worry about splitting votes between you and Eoghan…

I think with me gone, it leaves the market open for other people in the competition. But I think people should also be concentrating on what they can do when they’re out of the competition. I mean, I have an opportunity to release something now that I’m really proud of.

There was a rumour last week that Scott Bruton was thinking of challenging his X Factor contract, specifically the restriction on releasing any records until three months after the competition is over. Do you think that’s a fair term of the contract?

Well, you know, that’s the way the cookie crumbles – that’s the contract you were in and you knew what you were signing when you signed it. But hopefully I can get out of it sooner, I’ll be phoning my lawyer and see if I can get out of it sooner. We’ll see what happens.

(Note: It must be frustrating when you get voted out of X Factor, and everybody including the judges is telling you to get out there and use the publicity for your own good. But the one thing you really want to do – if you were serious about a career in music in the first place – is release a record! Unfortunately a restriction in the contract for contestants prevents them from releasing any music until 3 months after the show airs. Basically they can only gig and make personal appearances.)

So what will you be concentrating on now?

I’m going to focus on writing, producing and getting my face out there for people to know who I am and know that I am a talent. I think I just need to remind everybody what I did at boot camp and what I did back at the start and not what they tried to mould me into.

Yeah, I’d heard that you weren’t happy with the styling…

The haircut just wasn’t right. I tried to make it work, but it just wasn’t me.

I was reading today that you’re involved with a band called The Cameron. Can you tell us a bit more about that?

Yeah, we’re going to hopefully release something when I get back on my feet and hopefully everything will be all gravy when we get back together. We haven’t got a website or anything yet, we’re just waiting for everything to be ready to kind of jump out. I don’t want to give too much away at the moment.

What would have happened with the band if you’d won X Factor?

I’d have come out with the band still, for me it’s not a negative thing. I’m out of the competition now and I can take all the positives out of it.

Before you joined the X Factor, you had a lot of TV experience. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Yeah, I’ve done Boys Will Be Girls, Snatch with Brad Pitt, I’ve done The Bill, Casualty and loads of other stuff. But to me it was important to get on something that really blew me up and got me in the public eye, and I think I’ve done that now. I want to get out there and push myself into the industry and get a single out, because I know I’m worthy of it.

On Saturday, Simon said to you “You probably have a girlfriend, I’ve probably got you in trouble”, which said to me that as a mentor, he doesn’t know much about you.

I don’t think he knew me as well as he thought he knew me. I mean, when he made the comment about me fancying one of the dancers, well of course, all of the dancers were gorgeous. I think that was just a flippant comment really.

Does he spend much time with you when he’s mentoring you?

No, not really. We’ve got a team that work with us on the actual show. Don’t get me wrong, he’s there, but we have to go through that team to get to him because he’s so busy. He’s not there all week, when you need to speak to him about a song.

But you’ve got your vocal coaches there as well, don’t you?

Yeah, but you don’t get much time with them, you don’t get much time with any of it. And it’s such a tight schedule to get everything right for Saturday night. There are weeks where I’d go on, they’d have a routine set out, then they’d take it away from me, and I’d have to learn something else, then end up going back to the original routine. It’s quite confusing when you’re worrying about sound, choreography and everything. It’s a lot tougher than people think.

Did you see yourself as competing against the other acts like Eoghan, Scott and JLS? Because you’re essentially appealing to the same group of voters.

No, I never thought of anyone as competition. I just thought “I’m in it to do my best and win it as best as I can.”

[Austin turns the tables on me at this point and asks me if I thought he should have gone out on Saturday. I explain that in our chart we said either Daniel or Rachel should have gone. Turns out we ranked him higher than Ruth Lorenzo too.]

You’ve been styled in a way you’re not happy with, and you’ve had to fit in with theme weeks that you’re not necessarily comfortable with. But what music inspires you and do you identify with?

I listen to a lot of BB King, Stevie Ray Vaughn. I listen to Guns N Roses, some soul like Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder. I listen to a diverse amount of music, do you know what I mean? I love blues, I love soul, I love rock. I think X Factor stripped me of my musicality, because they tried to mould me, and I’m already moulded in what I do.

[We lapse into a bit of random banter about the Michael Jackson night, and he tells me that they played him the David Cooke (American Idol contestant) version of Billie Jean. I am suitably outraged and tell him to go and check out the Chris Cornell version which Cooke ripped off.

If he'd had a choice, Austin tells me he'd have sung The Way You Make Me Feel]

Finally…who’s your tip to win the show this year and why?

Laura White – because she’s really talented and she’s a musician and that’s what I want to see more of – more musicians playing music and not puppets. I wish her all the best of luck.

We had a chat with outgoing X Factor singer, Austin Drage today (keep your eye on Unreality’s homepage for the fully transcribed interview) and he revealed that not only would he be pursuing a career in music, but that he already had a band set up and ready to go.

Before auditioning for the X Factor Austin had actually been lead singer and guitarist for a band named ‘The Camerons’ and the group have recorded almost an album’s worth of material.

We asked Austin about his band and what they had planned for the future, he replied:

“Yeah, we’re going to hopefully release something when I get back on my feet and hopefully everything will be all gravy when we get back together. We haven’t got a website or anything yet, we’re just waiting for everything to be ready to kind of jump out. I don’t want to give too much away at the moment.”

The clip above is of Austin and The Camerons playing Stevie Wonder’s ‘Master Blaster’ live at The Globe Hackney.

So what do you think of Austin and his band? As always leave your comments below!

Austin Drage - X Factor 2008

Outgoing X Factor singer, Austin Drage has revealed that he is kicking himself for not standing up to his mentor, Simon Cowell over his disco song choice.

Simon gave Austin Rose Royce’s ‘Wishing On A Star’ to sing, a song which the 22 year old wasn’t sure about from the word go

Austin told The Daily Star: “I felt it was a weak song, it wasn’t the one I would have chosen. But it’s my own fault. I trusted Simon and maybe I should have trusted myself more. Simon actually asked me if I was OK with the song.

“I’m kicking myself now because I agreed to go along with it – even though I didn’t think it was right.”

We have been inundated with complaints from X Factor fans today, most of you objecting to Cheryl Cole  and Louis Walsh’ decision to save Rachel Hylton on last night’s show.

At the start of this series a new twist to the show was revealed in which the bottom two acts each week were to sing a different song of their choice, and then the judges were to choose a singer based on their final performance.

However, on last night’s show, both Louis Walsh and Cheryl Cole saved Rachel Hylton on the basis of what she had yet to give and not on the song she just sang. In fact in the shows spinoff, Xtra Factor, Cheryl admitted that Austin Drage was a superior vocalist to Rachel, but that she wanted to keep the mohter of five in and give her the chance to show us the full range of her talent in the upcoming weeks.

Many of you are up in arms about this decision, and most seem sure that if Louis had abstained from deciding, forcing the decision to be based on the public vote, Austin would still be on the X Factor and be practising his best Mariah Carey song right now.

So what do the rest of you think? Is anyone out there backing Rachel Hylton or do we have a consensus that Austin was wrongly voted off X Factor last night?

As always, leave your comments below.

Daniel Evans  is said to be feeling a little guilty today after he survived another X Factor week while his pal, Austin Drage got sent home.

At today’s press conference, Austin revealed that Danny spoke to him after last night’s result was announced.

“Even when I went last night he said ’it should have been me going, you’ve got more talent’. He’s the biggest gentleman I’ve ever met,” Drage said.

I always knew I liked Daniel. He’s such a cutie!

Austin Drage - X Factor 2008

When the first pictures were released of Austin Drage’s X Factor makeover, the lad was hardly recognisable from the trendy boy we saw auditioning for the show.

The new look wasn’t very popular with our readers and it seems that Austin didn’t think much of it either.

In an interview with ITV.com Austin stated:

“I think I’m going to leave the Duran Duran-type haircut behind now and go back to being me. People seemed to like me better when I was more myself up there!”

Good idea Austin!

Austin Drage - X Factor 2008

It was a shock result tonight as Austin Drage was voted off X Factor 2008.

Austin ended up in the bottom two with Rachel Hylton and in my opinion completely out sang her in every aspect.

Cheryl Cole, Louis Walsh and Dannii Minogue voted to keep Rachel in, for reasons unknown to me, and so Austin is a gonner.

Austin is Simon Cowell’s second act to be voted off the show, he also lost Scott Bruton last week. I bet he is starting to get nervous now, and Eoghan Quigg, Simon’s one remaining act can no doubt expect to get a LOT of attention from now until the final of the show.

Austin Drage - X Factor 2008

An old pal of X factor star, Austin Drage has revealed that the singers vocal skills have always been an asset to him when it came to pulling the ladies.

Nick Desborough told The Daily Star:

Nick said: “Austin knew very well that when he sang it drove the girls mad. They would crowd round him and go weak at the knees.

“They were just besotted with his voice, their knees would turn to jelly and they’d be like putty in his hands.”

So he’s not gay then…..