Entertainment Centre vs RSL: what's the difference

[Fiona]

I was interested in what Dicko said to Natalie on Sunday night that she's "too cabaret", and that he's looking for someone who can "sing the Entertainment Centre, not Rooty Hill RSL". What IS the difference between the two performing styles, cabaret vs pop? What did Natalie need to do to make her performance less cabaret?

[miao chairman]

I think it comes down to choice of song and gestures you use while performing said number. Pop Stars do pop songs. Pop stars move the way styles of today say and not like broadway singers with rehersed passion, and a kind of rigid end product. Pop is something you know in your gut. Yes, old songs can come into vogue again, but not performed the way they were originally. If your parents and grandparents like it - it ain't pop. Entertainment centers are filled by young people more often than not. And young people know what they like. Who is going to see a pop singer doing old songs in the style that they don't like. RSL's are filled with older people, and the young people there certainly don't care much for pop stars. They want to hear the old classics belted out the way they have been for twenty years or more.
This show isn't about great singing, or great singers (though some are). This show is about the whole package of Pop Music.