Finally we got to catch up with a ridiculously upbeat Jamie Archer to talk about what he’s been up to since leaving X Factor on Sunday night. I’d already read a few interviews by the time we caught up, and Jamie was refreshingly candid in each one.

Often, when you chat to an X Factor contestant they’re media prepped to the point that you get nothing interesting or relevant to report – not so with Mr Archer, who spoke openly about his frustrations with the X Factor format and his gratitude to the show for giving him such a big break.

Here’s the transcript of our chat (and thanks to Jamie for being a great interviewee!)

It’s just been madness. I’ve been doing loads of press and sorting out the upcoming shows I’m doing. You do a tour after the show, when you come out. I did my first show yesterday in Rochdale and it was amazing! I felt really natural on stage because I wasn’t under the constraints of the show – I could really be myself. And I had a great time up there, the crowd were really receptive, it was brilliant.

There’s loads coming up – there’s the X Factor tour after that, it’s non-stop. The X Factor tour starts sometime in February I think.

What are the signs of a record deal at this stage?

Well at the moment, everything goes quiet until the end of the X Factor show. No-one knows what’s going on with that. None of the X Factor contestants do. We don’t find out until between one and three months after the show.

Can we go right back to the start for a moment – what brought you to apply for the X Factor in the first place?

Well, I’d been playing for a long time. I’d tried to get record companies and A&R people down to gigs. I’d tried everything to get people to take note and just give me a chance. But nothing was working. I knew that if I could get people to see my performances, then they may give me a chance, and I just wanted an opportunity to do that. So, I went on the show, knowing that I was coming from a rock background in a pop competition, but I thought it was worth a shot.

I thought “What’s a great way of getting people to see me in a short space of time?” And I thought X Factor. I came on thinking I’d probably go out in the first round or something because that’s not what people want in the show. But then it kept working.

It’s funny, because people keep having a go at the X Factor and Simon Cowell because it’s plastic pop. But I have to say, it was Simon Cowell who gave me my break after all these years of people not giving me a chance, so I’m really grateful to him for that.

So you’d agree with what Simon said on the show last week – talking about Sting’s comments about X Factor.

I completely echo that. As a lifelong Police fan, I can’t say anything bad about Sting, but the public deciding who they like is an age-old thing – since the days of Opportunity Knocks. Out of that have come some brilliant acts.

You’ve got Leona, who’s a superstar because of this show and JLS…

Let me stop you there! Come on, you can’t seriously think JLS would have been a success if they’d been picked up by Louis Walsh?

Ermm, no, I wouldn’t have thought so. But they got the exposure that the record company was able to go “we’ll do them, but we’ll do them in a different way”. I’m not saying that the show always does the right thing with people, but it gives them the exposure to go off and do something else.

The X Factor doesn’t really have a good track record for the Over 25 category. Steve Brookstein is still the only winner from the older contestants. Was that a concern for you when you applied?

No, not really, because I just saw it as “I’m going on The X Factor” Either it’s going to work or it’s not going to work. And ultimately it didn’t work because I’m totally different to the artists that usually go on the X Factor. I think we’re going to have another Over 25’s winner this year in the shape of Olly Murs.

The audition footage of you, Danyl and Olly had some of the best audience reaction. Is that a sign of how strong that category is this year?

It’s also a sign that sometimes the show works and sometimes it doesn’t work for certain people. If you look at Olly’s first audition and you look at him now, it’s basically the same audition. They’ve sorted out his hair, given him a nice suit but basically he’s doing Superstition again – you know, the dancing, the cheeky grin. It works for him.

What I did in my first audition was never really repeated again, because I wasn’t allowed to repeat it again.

You alluded to that earlier on when you said you weren’t able to be yourself within the constraints of the song. How was that for you?

It was frustrating to be honest. You’ve got two things going on – what you think is right for you and what the show thinks is right for you. When I came on the X Factor, I fully was aware of the fact that I probably wouldn’t be able to do what I wanted to do. But I thought maybe in time they’d let me do my own thing. But it became apparent that my vision and their vision weren’t really reconciling in any way shape or form. So, that’s what took me out of the show – I think people could tell I wasn’t able to do my own thing!

When you were doing Queen week, I was hoping you’d do something heavier like Stone Cold Crazy.

Well I had my own ideas of songs I wanted to do on Queen week…

Like what?

[Laughs] Ah, I can’t talk about it unfortunately, because if I told you then it would go all over the place. I had my own ideas and they weren’t listened to. I love Radio Gaga, but I wanted to do something else.

The problem was, every week I wanted to do something chancy and edgy, something people wouldn’t expect me to do and the song was one not everybody knows very well, but they’d love it when they heard it.

Like on Rock Week, I wanted to do Mr Brightside coz it’s fresher, more modern and not something you’d expect me to do. But obviously being a Saturday night TV show, the people in charge wanted to go with something a bit more obvious, like normal rock which is not really what I wanted to do.

That’s a shame – because it’s the first time they’ve every tackled a rock theme and I was hoping that they’d give it a bit of an edge.

I knew in Rock Week that I was in trouble. I knew that this was the one week that I was supposed to come across with something. Rock Week was supposed to be the one week where people said Jamie did something special and he’s a real contender.

In the end I don’t think that I did. I don’t think it was brilliant or anywhere near world class, and I think people thought I’d peaked when I hadn’t.

On the weeks that you weren’t doing rock stuff, you were getting amazing comments about your soulful vocals.

But that’s who I am – I’d rather take chances, do something edgy. Hurt was Simon’s idea. When we were doing Christina Aguilera, I said Beautiful, he said Hurt. We tried that out and liked it. And Hurt is not a song everybody in the country knows and it went to #9 in the charts, and Sex On Fire went to #6 after I sang it for my audition. Again, that wasn’t a song that everybody knew – I was more into that, people saying they didn’t know that song, but they really liked it.

Do you write your own material, Jamie?

Yeah, I do. I write my own stuff, I play guitar and I’m a producer as well. I’ve got plenty of demos and stuff and I’m gonna continue to write and demo and hopefully by the time all the X Factor stuff is done, by the end of the tour, I wanna go straight into the studio and record. Because the X Factor is not my career, it’s the start of my career. It’s a launchpad, so that’s why I’m not sad in any way, because it’s given me a chance, this show. Simon Cowell took a chance on me when no-one else would, and I love him for that, I respect him for that and I thank him for that.

A lot of tabloid speculation around the contestants this year – is there any truth in the rumour about you and Coco from Kandy Rain?

That old chestnut! The truth of it is, it’s really nice to see her from time to time, but obviously she’s really busy, I’m really busy, but we catch up from time to time and enjoy a drink and what have you, but that’s it. We have a bit of fun from time to time.

Nothing formal…no rings exchanged then?

No rings exchanged!

You’re in a unique position, you’ve been in the bubble of possibly the biggest X Factor ever. There’s more speculation, more watercooler speculation this year than ever before. How much of the press you get is made up and how much is real?

I’d go 50/50. Some of it’s absolute rubbish. Usually, the basic point of the story might be true, but it gets blown out of all proportion. It’s like that thing with me and Simon having arguments. We just disagreed over song choices and we disagreed with passion. That was it, but it got turned into “We’d fallen out, we’re not speaking” It was ridiculous. Sometimes the nucleus of a story might be right, but it gets blown out of all proportion.

It’s like the Stacey and Olly thing – it’s not happening, it’s not true. They hang out because they’re from the same neck of the woods. They have the same sort of sensibilities, I guess, because they’re both from Essex. It’s natural in a house of strangers that you move toward people that are like yourself.

You make Essex sound like a foreign country…

[Laughs] Well, maybe in some way it is!

What’s the strangest thing you’ve read about yourself in the papers?

[Thinks for a minute] I don’t know, because you don’t really read the papers when you’re in the house. One of the things that X Factor said – and quite rightly – is that you shouldn’t read the papers or websites and forums, because it’ll drive you nuts. So, we don’t get internet in the house in case people read negative reviews.

I reckon over the next few months I’ll take a look at some old articles. I’ll tell you the one that made me laugh was that the house was out of control and that John and Edward were looking at porn. That story had absolutely zero substance to it whatsoever. We had three researchers in the house, security around the house and people from X Factor coming in and out.

You’ve got to understand that we work so hard during the week that literally there wouldn’t be the energy for everyone to go nuts in the house. That’s it really.

We talked a little bit earlier about Sting’s comments. This week, a lot of people have been talking about the impact of The X Factor on the pop charts at the moment.

I think that people look at this in the wrong way – I think it sets the bar for record companies and artists to rise to the challenge set down by X Factor. This is why I talk about the fact that it is OK to have X Factor around. Whether you like ‘em or loathe ‘em.

If there’s a lot of X Factor acts in the charts, that’s because the show’s huge and the public are making all the decisions. Other artists can stand around and complain or they can raise their game.

What do you think about the final 12 this year – is it safe to say that they’re the 12 best singers in the country, or are we looking for entertainers at this point?

We’re probably looking for a bit of both – and that’s what the final 12 were. If you look at the final six in our category, Olly, Danyl and me were the entertainers while the other three were probably the better singers. They do want more than just a great voice. You want to be entertained and to be engaged and people want to be part of their lives. People need the whole package and that’s why it’s called X Factor.

It seems this year is all about crazy themes and over the top productions. That’s what this year is all about, it’s the year of the entertainer I think, and maybe next year people will be like “Let’s get it back to being a singing competition again.”

You know who I blame for that? Brian Friedman.

Brian Friedman! What a crazy guy, I love him! He’s a complete mentalist! But that’s what his job is, to make it bigger and better and bolder. As a people in this country, we don’t generally big up ‘over the top’. We’re always playing things down. The X Factor gives us an excuse to say ‘over the top’ is great.

Brian’s productions are over the top, they’re ridiculous, they’re entertaining.

You know what I want to see? If it’s still George Michael this week, I want to see someone perform Outside on a giant oversized glitter toilet with dancing policemen, glitter balls and the whole works.

If Brian had his way and it wasn’t 8:00 in the evening on Saturday they probably would do that! But you see even you’re saying it – you want over the top, you want outrageous.

Well, if you’re going to be over the top, you have to be right over the top.

Yes, and that is why Jedward are so successful…

One last question – what are you doing tonight?

I’m playing two gigs – one in Southampton and one in Brighton. This is what I love to do – performing live.