Bab 38: Perfect Picture

Following the airing of the memorable and sensational duet rounds episode, a lot of entertainment blogs had released so many articles within mere minutes just after the episode had finished airing.

However, some of the most popular entertainment blogs actually took their time to release a well-curated and properly written article on it, deciding to go for quality over quantity as their many subscribers would still read their post regardless just for the quality alone.

One of such articles was written by a Pop Times, a very popular and dependable blog for all forms of news pertaining to the entertainment industry.

{Rising Voices – A Truly Spectacular Yet Bittersweet Episode for Fans and Casual Watchers Alike}

[As the reality singing contest show finally hit and all-time record high audience rating of 9.8/10 with yesterday's episode, we here at Pop Times couldn't agree more.

Rising Voices has constantly been introducing new and interesting themes this season that has only served to garner more and more people's interest in the already popular reality show.

From the inclusion of a Three-way Knockout round, to a very innovative idea called 'The Blind Auditions' which we very much believe could still be improved upon, all the way to the Boy Band- Girl Band Knockout rounds, there has been no shortage of themes to keep both fans of the show and casual watchers very interested.

More than that though, the most recent of the themes, was yesterday's Duet Round theme which was further spiced up by the inclusion of livestreaming and voting segments.

The contestants having been previously matched in a fair manner as evidenced by the use of a lottery ball machine, provided some very interesting match-ups.

The Sophisticated Helena Cadieux was paired up with the Handsome Ryan Parker while the Stylish Joe Micheals went up against the Beautiful Katie Chopra.

Savvy Paxton Brown was paired together with Girl-Next-Door June Roberts, while the Amazing Steven Andersson and Lovely Anna Briggs were set to perform together.

Finally, Fan-favorite and Exquisite Lily Lockhart was paired alongside the Wildcard and Charming Kyle Kestis.

As the rounds got off to a pretty great start with Ryan and Helena performing the catchy pop-rock song [Midnights], Ryan was eliminated with a losing vote count of 695,301 votes to Helena's 861,545 vote count.

Moving on, Paxton and June were very evenly matched as they performed the popular ballad song, [Save Me], with Paxton coming out on top against June, a vote count of 643,024 to 602,999.

Steven won by a complete landslide against Anna with a vote tally of 1,128,506 to 331,623 votes after they had performed the well-known R&B song, [Day and Night].

Katie and Joe on the other hand, put up a very close fight with the pop-rock ballad song [Love's A Dream], with the young lady barely squeaking out to win against the young man with a vote difference of 1,092,467 to 1,092,465.

And finally, with the most impactful of all the duet rounds, was Kyle and Lily, both of whom after delivering a hauntingly beautiful performance of the chamber pop-ballad of the widely acclaimed and popular [End Of Us], resulted in Kyle being eliminated against Lily, a vote count difference of 1,128,510 to 1,554, 578.

One thing to note though, was how Kyle, despite losing by a pretty substantial vote count to Lily, actually ended up beating every other major contestant in the show with his votes, Steven included.

It really begs the questions; 'What if he hadn't gone up against Lily Lockhart?'. Would he have also been among those who would proceed to the final rounds?

Sadly, those are all 'What If' questions we'll never have answers to.

Putting all that aside, a lot of fans were very much downcast when their favorite contestants were eliminated, most especially Joe Michael's and Kyle Kestis's fans, most of whom had hoped that maybe, the production team had plans to call contestants back in the final rounds.

However, having gotten the information from a trusted insider of ours, we can very much verify that there will be no such plans and the contestants who have been eliminated truly have no second chances on the show this season.

But then again, lack of second chances are only applicable to things like a high-stakes reality TV show and who's to say that the eliminated contestants won't go even further than the eventual winners of the show.

And if the previous seasons of not just Rising Voices but even other reality singing contests in the past are anything to go by, the possibilities of that happening are very much in the cards.

The only question, will be, if, the eliminated contestants are able to find their footing in the turbulent seas of unsuccessful aspirants and succeed in the long contest called life, or end up drowning along with them.

Only time will tell.

That said, the show will continue on with the remaining eight contestants left and in the next two to three weeks, the show will round up with the semi-finals and ultimately, the finals, that which we here at Pop Times are really looking forward to.]

* * *

___________________________

{Kyle Kestis} – Exp. Points (3579)

⸶Skills⸷

| [Soulful Vocals (P)], [Growth Spurt (P)], [Appraisal(A)], [Resonance (P)] – {D}], [Charisma (P)], [Polyglot (P)], [Deep Dive (A) – {C}]…

* Exp. Points can be used to create skills.

⸶Levels⸷

| Singing › Level 9

| Acting › Level 6

| Composing › Level 9

| Dancing › Level 6

| Instrument Mastery (Piano/Guitar) › Level 7/6

* Levels will increase in accordance to your growth.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Staring at his status screen Kyle just mused to himself for a bit before he then dismissed the translucent screen, returning to reading [Tech Wiz], his favorite comic book.

After yesterday's performance, his system had only awarded him 2000 bonus exp. points and had also pointed out that he was close to breaking through to level 10 in singing, something Kyle didn't particularly mind.

Considering [End Of Us] was pretty much an already perfected song, there was no need for him to tweak it so it came as no surprise that there was no bonus for anything of such.

That perfection of the song was also what made he and Lily decide to make their performance itself impactful, visually, as opposed to trying to elevate the song itself.

Completely alright with the massive growth he had achieved over the past two months with the show, something that he otherwise would've never been able to achieve if he had not taken his chance with the show, Kyle's content heart was just dandy as he refocused his attention solely onto his comic book, a thin smile on his lips.

Oliver on the other hand who was upstairs in the same building of DiscoTune, a mid-sized music distribution company one of his close connections linked him to, was currently closing a deal.

"So we agree on a $150 annual sum for the three songs along with a 5% revenue cut?" Oliver extended his hands to the CEO whose team was seated beside him, a poker expression on his face.

"Yes. That's fine by us" the CEO, a man in his early fifties with dyed brown hair and light-blue eyes replied in a business-like manner but in his mind, couldn't help but be quite impressed at how the suave agent had handled the entire deal without breaking his demeanor even once.

"Thank you for your time" Oliver then got up after all the proceedings and formalities were done, glad that things went exactly as he had planned.

To put into perspective, distribution services were basically the ones that got an artist's song onto streaming platforms with a few royalties and a sum that was at times required to be payed annually to maintain the song.

Usually, Oliver could have just opted for Kyle to upload his songs straight onto [GrooveBox], the most popular music streaming platform without any form of royalties been taken from his earnings.

The songs were sure to even perform very well, especially when considering his five-minutes of fame on Rising Voices which would still be lingering in people's mind.

However, because the agent wanted to maximize the audience Kyle's songs would reach, he had had a discussion with him yesterday night about giving it to distribution company, an idea Kyle had agreed with.

The thing was, [GrooveBox] had a lot of popular charts that were frequently updated each month, all of which could propel a song much, much further to a wider audience.

From 'New & Hot 100' to 'Indie Sensations 100', 'Buzzing 100', 'GrooveList Top 100' and finally, 'All-Time Favorites', each and every playlist was tailored to every level or stage at which a musicians' career was at.

Once a musician or an artist makes it to a more notable playlist, it would increase the likelihood that they would get more followers and more streams, which was exactly what Oliver was after.

Considering Kyle was just starting out and wasn't exactly qualifying as an Indie Singer just yet, Oliver had made a deal with DiscoTune to help promote his songs onto the much higher lists of 'New & Hot 100'.

If normally, Oliver had him simply upload his songs on [GrooveBox] without any form of aid, it would have garnered about a hundred thousand streams per song maybe in a month just solely based off of his popularity on the show, but, with the help of a distribution company, that number was sure to increase even further by a million and even more… possibly around three to four million streams per song at that.

That was a massive traction his agent didn't want Kyle to lose out on as it would give him a stable footing and not completely fade away in the public's mind, at least enough till he was ready to release his next song in either the coming months.

Having sorted it all out now, the suave agent slowly made his way downstairs towards the lobby and soon saw Kyle who sat with his legs crossed on one of the plush chairs while reading his comic book, the many ladies in the lobby constantly sneaking glances and ogling him despite him being completely oblivious to it.

Shaking his head at the sight though, an amused smile on his lips, the agent suddenly remembered how Kyle had been telling him one time about wanting to take the right picture to use for his MediaGram and TweetTalk account since he never really took personal photos before.

Realizing this was a perfect pose that kind of captured the essence of whom Kyle was to a certain extent, Oliver quickly brought out his phone and then took a perfect shot of the young man.

Having done that, Oliver then walked up to him and said;

"Alright Kyle. Let's head back home. We have a flight to catch"

"Yeah sure" Kyle swiftly got up and then asked;

"Negotiations went well I presume?"

"That it did" Oliver coolly replied and then, in a sudden turn of events, threw his phone to Kyle with a heads up.

"Catch"

Swiftly, Kyle caught the phone Oliver tossed to him, a bit of confusion on his features.

However, just as he was about to ask what his agent meant with his spontaneous action, the young man soon got his answer once he noticed the photo on the phone's screen.

Understanding what Oliver's sudden gesture meant now, Kyle simply smiled and then gave his appreciation;

"Thank you Oliver. I really appreciate it"

"You, are most welcome Kyle" the agent casually replied, already walking towards the automatic doors as the young man trailed behind him closely.