Cheryl Cole: Her Story - the Unauthorized Biography (25 page)

It had been a nerve-wracking, but ultimately fruitful experience for her. Not everyone was going to be a winner here, she knew that. But for the next few weeks, these talented people had the opportunity to shine and to convince viewers across the UK that they indeed had ‘the X factor’. Cheryl was sure that she and the other judges had done well in selecting the cream of the crop – but she was also glad to be done with having the responsibility of make-or-break decisions on her shoulders. Now, it was down to the public.

As the weeks passed by, it was clear that Cheryl’s girls were by far the most interesting acts: each demonstrated a unique sound, not often heard on shows like this. Diana was very folksy; Laura had a cutting-edge soul vibe; and Alexandra proved to have a belting R&B/pop vocal. Week after week, the girls delivered amazing performances. It seemed ever more likely that Cheryl might pull off an unprecedented coup and take her three contestants all the way to the prestigious final – much to the chagrin of the other judges.

But, just over a month into the run of live shows, during the Mariah Carey-themed week, Cheryl and her protégée Laura were in for a shock. After the phone lines had closed and the votes had been counted, it emerged that Laura, together with over-25s contestant Ruth Lorenzo, was in the bottom two. Cheryl was devastated. As early on as boot camp, she had been sure that Laura had what it took to reach the final. True, the judges’ comments on that particular week’s performance hadn’t been great, but surely Laura deserved to continue on her journey?

Singing for what could be her last time on
The X Factor,
Laura chose ‘Over The Rainbow’ as her survival song, while Ruth belted out the rock version of ‘Knocking On Heaven’s
Door’, made famous by Guns N’ Roses. Both performances were top class, but Ruth’s gutsy rendition clearly made an impact on the audience and they went wild for her when she came to the end of her last-ditch attempt to stay on the show. The decision was now down to the panel. Cheryl predictably chose Laura to stay on another week, but – sadly – the other judges thought Ruth had more fight left in her. A chorus of boos from the audience greeted the decision, as a very relieved Ruth dissolved into tears.

But it wasn’t all bad news for Laura. That same week, the
X Factor
finalists’ charity single ‘Hero’ topped the charts, knocking Girls Aloud’s ‘The Promise’ off its number-one spot after it had been there just a week. Magnanimously, Cheryl said that she was happy that the contestants’ song had usurped her single. ‘It’s for a good cause. I couldn’t be happier for it to do well,’ she commented to the
Sun.

‘The Promise’ was Girls Aloud’s first single from their fifth studio album,
Out of Control.
Released at the end of October, the song proved a massive hit with fans and critics alike. Sounding unlike anything they had released before, the Hi-NRG, sixties-influenced epic – backed by a stunning video clip, which saw the girls squeezed into body-hugging silver dresses and an array of sixties fashions – had smashed straight into the charts at number one the previous week, giving them their nineteenth top-ten hit. Cheryl and the rest of the band were thrilled.

As the autumn rushed by and the TV series continued, more of the talented wannabes were shot down in the public vote on
The X Factor.
Early favourites like Rachel Hylton were voted off the show while the likes of widower Daniel Evans, whom it seemed the judges disliked, remained for longer than
expected. Yet of all the contestants fighting for their musical lives, it was young Diana Vickers, with her stunning looks and distinctive voice, who captured the public imagination. The press had found a sexy new star to splash across their pages, and predicted that she’d be the runaway winner.

But when Alexandra Burke performed Beyoncé Knowles’s song ‘Listen’ the week before the semi-finals, the competition took a totally different turn. With a wind machine blowing her dress around her like she was already a true superstar on her own arena tour, Alexandra stunned the audience and the judges with a vocal so strong and defiant that the panel was left almost speechless. Louis said she was incredible, and branded her the ‘best girl singer’ in the competition. Dannii said that she deserved to be in the final, while Simon said she had made him proud to be British. ‘You’ve really got to me,’ the esteemed pop mogul revealed. ‘Taking every performance from the show into consideration, that was – by far – the best performance of the series.’ Cheryl’s confidence in her artists was now stronger than ever.

And justifiably so. Following the public vote, Cheryl mentored her two remaining contestants into the semi-final. ‘I am proud of both of my girls. Reaching the semi-finals is a massive achievement,’ she gushed on
The Xtra Factor.
‘Both my girls are terrified. There is a lot of pressure on Alexandra so she is more nervous. And Diana feels like she needs to step up. The reason why I have two acts is because they are so talented and so easy to work with. I just need to choose the right song. I have to be true to them.’

She added: ‘The semis are such a hard place to be. You’re one show away from the final, when it’s out of everyone’s hands.
Cos I have two girls, I’m guaranteed to have an act in the final … and I will feel terribly ill when I get to the final.’

She was right, of course. She did get one act into the final. But it wasn’t bookies’ favourite Diana. Her versions of Avril Lavigne’s ‘Girlfriend’ and Dido’s ‘White Flag’ failed to woo the viewers, and – sensationally – she was voted off the show.

Cheryl was stunned by the shock cut, having believed that Diana had what it took to make it to the final. Nevertheless, she was still confident that the Blackburn lass had more to offer the world. ‘I know people always say it,’ she said on
The Xtra Factor
, ‘but we haven’t seen the last of her yet.’

Cheryl was, naturally, now fully behind Alexandra as they concentrated on the challenge that lay ahead. In Alex, Cheryl not only saw a singer desperate to succeed, but also a humble girl, one who wasn’t in the least bit calculating. Now that Alex was through to the final, Cheryl was confident that, with her amazing vocals, there was nothing that could stop Alex from achieving her goal. Or was there?

The final episode of the series, on Saturday 13 December, was nothing short of spectacular. The three remaining acts – Cheryl’s Alexandra, Simon Cowell’s young Northern Irish singer Eoghan Quigg, and Louis’s hunky boyband JLS – were to sing three songs each: a festive number, a duet with a surprise celebrity guest, and their favourite song from the series. After these performances, one finalist would be eliminated, after which two acts would battle it out to be crowned champion by performing what would become the winner’s debut single: the Leonard Cohen classic ‘Hallelujah’, made famous in part by Jeff Buckley’s 1994 cover version.

After their Christmas songs got everyone in the festive mood, tensions began to run high when JLS teamed up with
Westlife for a version of ‘Flying Without Wings’, and Eoghan was joined by Boyzone to sing their hit ‘Picture Of You’. But neither performance had the emotional or show-stopping impact that Alexandra brought to the competition when she was joined on stage by her idol Beyoncé Knowles, to duet together on the song ‘Listen’. The pair were sensational, and proved perfect vocal sparring partners. Although she was an amateur, Alexandra put up a fight and took on Beyoncé with the power and might of a woman who had been singing professionally for years.

It seemed clear, after Alexandra’s amazing turn with the R&B legend, that the contest was pretty much over. Their rendition was certainly enough to get the audience and the judges jumping to their feet with appreciation. Even Beyoncé heaped praise on the London-born songstress and told her she was an incredible vocalist.

Unsurprisingly, Alexandra made it through to the final two, and was joined by JLS. After their respective versions of ‘Hallelujah’, a tearful Cheryl couldn’t contain her emotions or her pride.

But there were more tears to come … when Alexandra was announced as the winner. Cheryl held her protégée’s arm aloft like the champion she was. Afterwards, the triumphant mentor promised to stick by Alexandra and give her advice whenever she could. Her first suggestion was to keep men on the backburner while Alex concentrated on her first album.

Following the show, Cheryl exclaimed in a press conference: ‘I am so proud of Alexandra. She is an amazing singer and I have every confidence that she will be a world-class star.’

Of course, while it was Alexandra who was named the
X Factor
winner, and who would go on to spend weeks at number one with her debut single, it was Cheryl who had stolen the series and captured the hearts of the nation. She was no longer just ‘the fit one’ from Girls Aloud. She was Cheryl Cole, a household name, and the woman who could seemingly do no wrong.

‘She is Princess Cheryl,’ former tabloid columnist Jessica Callan said on Channel 5’s
The Cheryl Cole Factor
, a TV show celebrating the rise and rise of the
X Factor
judge. ‘She is the nation’s sweetheart. She can do no wrong – unless she had an affair with Simon Cowell.’

Of course, canoodling with her fellow judge was the furthest thing on Cheryl’s mind – she had far more important things in hand.

While Cheryl shone on
The X Factor
, Girls Aloud were caught up in the reflective glare. In fact, things couldn’t have been going better for the girls. That autumn, their fifth studio album
Out of Control
hit the shops – and was met once again with universal praise. Very different-sounding from their previous work, some reviewers noted that the album didn’t include any traditional Girls Aloud-type stompers, like ‘Love Machine’ or ‘Wake Me Up’. Instead, the new collection featured a more laidback electro sound.

Among the stand-out tracks was ‘The Loving Kind’, a rather bittersweet dance tune, which had been penned by Xenomania and the Pet Shop Boys: a union that had had fans squealing with glee on Internet forums for months, ever since the collaboration was first announced. And the wait was worth it. The melody and lyrics were typically melancholy, while the girls’ voices sounded more emotive than ever.

Working with the superstar pop duo, who were given a
Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2009 BRIT Awards, was an experience Cheryl confessed she’d never forget. ‘Neil Tennant came in and taught me a harmony,’ she told
Attitude
magazine, ‘and I couldn’t do it because I was so overawed. I always think of myself as a child in front of the telly singing “West End Girls.”’

If she had been worried that Neil and his sidekick Chris Lowe would be scary Marys, though, she didn’t have anything to fret about. They proved to be anything but intimidating divas. ‘They are two of the nicest lads you could find,’ Cheryl revealed to
Attitude.
‘Down to earth, lovely and genuine. Just nice lads to be around. I was going all blotchy red with my nerves and Brian [Higgins] told us they were nervous to meet us!’

Around the same time as the release of the album, in November, Girls Aloud published their first-ever official autobiography,
Dreams That Glitter: Our Story
(Bantam Press), in which Cheryl spoke for the first time about the heartache she had suffered during the Ashley-gate scandal. She confessed how she had sat in her house with the curtains closed, so that she could escape the paparazzi.

Yet she was also philosophical about the whole heartbreaking episode. ‘People make mistakes, stuff happens,’ she explained. She expressed her firm belief that every individual should be a free spirit, including her husband. ‘I’m not his keeper. Ashley can have time with his friends when he wants, he can go out when he wants – of course he can. I’m not the type of person to ring him and be, like, “Where are you, who are you with, what’s happening, what time will you be in, why haven’t you answered your phone?”’

She went on to explain that she had experienced these
tough feelings before and was determined to learn from them. ‘I’ve been that person in the past and I don’t like it. I won’t let anything change me and make me revert to being that type of girl, because it’s not me.’

She also reasoned that marriage was a lifelong commitment – one that she didn’t intend to shy away from – and that life was never meant to be easy; she was changing and learning all the time. ‘When I said my wedding vows, I meant them,’ she confided. ‘I said them for life: for better, for worse. There’s going to be worse times and better times. What’s worth having anyway if it doesn’t take a fight? Whatever happens, you learn another lesson. Things are sent to test you and I would hate to be an untested person.’

The book, in which she opened up about her childhood, when her mum could barely afford a can of beans, was another smash success, with a breakneck-paced ascent up the bestseller lists. Meanwhile, the girls celebrated Christmas with an ITV1 festive special, in which the group performed some of their biggest hits … and also got to flex their comic muscles in a series of hit-and-miss comedy sketches, alongside guest stars like Cilla Black, Paul O’Grady and Julie Goodyear. They duetted with credible chart stars – such as James Morrison, on a live performance of ‘Broken Strings’ – and even teamed up with their old ‘pals’ the Kaiser Chiefs.

The TV programme, broadcast on the same night as the
X Factor
final, rated over 8 million viewers and was in the top thirty of the most-watched shows of 2008. As the year came to an end, it was clear that, even after six years on the scene, Girls Aloud were still way ahead of the game, having seen off numerous rivals and gained the respect of their peers.

At the start of 2009, the band hit the ground running. They were over the moon when they discovered that they had been nominated in the Best British Group category at the BRIT Awards – and shortlisted for Best British Single for ‘The Promise’. In addition, they had been invited by rock band Coldplay to join them at their summer shows at Wembley. The girls were finally being taken seriously – and they couldn’t have been happier.