Back to eMusic, and the independent download platform today revealed the results of a survey that says that Simon Cowell and his X-Factor has had the "worst influence" on the UK music industry in the last twenty years. Perhaps unsurprisingly for a survey of the kind of music fans that eMusic has a relationship with, over half of the people who took part in the survey cited either Cowell or X-Factor as being the bad guys of British music, with Stock, Aitken & Waterman, Steps and The Spice Girls all runners up.
Perhaps also unsurprisingly, the late great John Peel was voted as having the most positive influence with 61% of those surveyed commending the former Radio 1 DJ. Other good guys voted for included Alan McGee, Jools Holland and Michael Eavis.
Elsewhere in the survey, almost half of those questioned said they thought that the UK's taste in music was becoming too similar, with the rise of reality TV and manufactured music artists, similarity of radio playlists and an industry driven by money not creativity all blamed for that trend.
Commenting on the survey eMusic boss David Pakman told CMU: "The X-Factor may be entertaining television, but it does not produce important or lasting musicians. The moguls throwing cash behind reality-TV artists only create short-term phenomena and make it harder for truly talented acts to break through. The results indicate that we could be seeing a backlash against these over-hyped and over-manufactured artists. In the long run, authenticity and integrity will win the race."