The Sing-Off was a bit of a disappointment this year.

Last season was the show’s high water mark to date, with four or five legitimate A-level contenders and two acts – Committed (the winner) and Street Corner Symphony (runner-up) – that stand head and shoulders above everybody else in the show’s three seasons to date. (And please, click those links to see what I’m talking about.) Season 2 just shimmered, from the first note to the last, with depth and resonance and nuance and soul. It was a show that, week in and week out, was a must-see and a joy to listen to (especially if you were DVRing and could ffwd through Nick Lachey and Nicole Scherzinger).

This season, though, something was different, and I didn’t really detect it until we’d gotten the first few bands out of the way. I’ll admit right up front that those who disagree with me will be able to dismiss some of my complaints as issuing from “mere taste.” Maybe so, but I’ll make the argument and let you decide for yourself.

As I see it, there were two problems, with the big one dictating the second one.

First: Season 3 of The Sing-Off wasn’t a musical competition, it was a SONY A&R showcase. The grand prize was a SONY recording contract, so obviously the label has an interest in who wins. But on seasons 1 and 2, the judging hewed to a pretty basic standard: who was the best? In the entire run of the first two seasons I think I only quibbled with a judging decision once. The best act (Nota) won in season 1 and in season 2 you could have made a very strong argument for either of the top two, but I think the Committed was better by a hair. If you look at the final standings, top to bottom, there was almost nothing to complain about.

The first two seasons were dominated by what I guess we’d call pure a capella acts, as well – it was as if talent scouts scoured the country and came up with the best of the tradition as it stood at the moment.

This year, though, something was different. Whereas in seasons past the record deal was the prize, this year it was the sole judging criterion. Not “you’re the best so you win,” but “you win because you’re best suited to SONY’s marketing goals.” As the season wore on, it felt more and more like the label was sitting right behind the judges, “consulting” with them on their decisions.

Off-putting, to say the least. One of the things I used to like about The Sing-Off was how different it seemed to be from American Idol. This year the goal was apparently how can we be more like AI (and The X Factor). In fact, if you’d never seen The Sing-Off and I had to describe season 3, I’d call it “X Factor without musical instruments.”

Looking back, the producers were clearly attempting to “innovate” this season. And the innovations were all driven by one factor: can SONY turn this into something that Top 40 radio listeners will pay for? Had I known at the outset what I know now, I’d have predicted that your final two would be Pentatonix (who won) and Denver’s own Urban Method, who took third. I’d have liked the chances of a couple other acts assuming they could gel quickly. Pentatonix features three 19 year-old singers and everything they do – everything – is about emulating club and hit radio. Urban Method has gone a step further and invented “rap-a-pella.” Here, everything is about hip-hop of the radio-friendly variety. The anomaly in the final three, runner-up The Dartmouth Aires (which looked at a glance like another all-guy university a capella group), stood out for one reason and one reason only: featured singer Michael Odokara-Okigbo, who is going to be a freakin’ superstar. Gods, the young man can sing, and some nights seemed like the best (if not only) reason to tune in. If he hasn’t signed a deal yet I’d bet the farm that he has had conversations with SONY. (Probably nobody else, though, because I’m guess that all the groups signed contracts for the show granting SONY the right of first refusal.)

Other clues, looking back:

• Delilah – all women with a couple potential stars out front
• Kinfolk 9 – sort of an all-star collection of singers from LA new to the a capella game, but with a serious featured singer in Moises Navarro (his performance on “Let It Be” was perhaps the season’s most chillingly amazing moment; it was also the night they got sent home)
• Sonos – like Pentatonix, except that their approach made ample use of effects pedals (which they obviously couldn’t use on the show; still, had to look interesting to SONY)
• The Collective – sort of like a Nashville answer to Kinfolk 9, with a series of solo artists that a label might want to have a look at
• Afro-Blue – I assume SONY has a jazz imprint, and if so I imagine conversations are under way with Christie Dashiell, at the least; smart A&R reps might even bet on A-B being the next Manhattan Transfer

Everybody else was there to provide flavor. I’m not saying that these people aren’t talented – they are very, very talented – I’m just saying that the pool as selected by the producers was obviously geared toward certain outcomes friendly to the agendas of A&R personnel.

Does this make it evil? Not necessarily. But it undercuts what was so essential about the show’s first two seasons and it certainly raises credibility questions.

As for the judging, I expect the absolute highest in standards out of Ben Folds (who hails from my hometown) and all I can do is hope that he was embarrassed at times. Shawn Stockman was what he always is – a savvy guy who knows all about the system. Sara Bareilles was … less annoying than Nicole Scherzinger but generally about as useless. As a group they gave us moments to ponder and scratch our heads.

• The Aires survived to the end for the one reason noted above, even though I thought for sure they were gone at least twice.
• Urban Method – I love that somebody from the 5280 is representing my current city proudly, but they were lucky a couple of times and I think they know it. They could easily have been gone a couple of times, as well.
• Delilah should thank their lucky stars they were born pretty because while they’re good, they last a couple weeks longer than they should have.

And so on.

The second problem, flowing directly from the first, was the song selection. The first two seasons presented us with a broad range of styles and genres. If you didn’t like something, sit tight because something different would be along shortly. This go-round, though, was all about Top 40 and whoever writes Rihanna’s songs can probably retire comfortably on the royalties from this season alone. If you weren’t deeply into hit radio, you had no idea what was going on most of the time and no hope that it would get better.

I’m sure the producers did their research, although I’m not sure how the ratings finally stacked up to expectations. I can guarantee you that a good portion of the audience over 25 is gone for good, though. Abandoning a context driven by great, timeless music and replacing it with prefabricated song-like disposable product that no one is going to remember in ten minutes is a strategy that sheds loyalty building in favor of shameless pandering to the most fickle segments of the entire US music market.

The result, from my couch anyway, was a season that was too often cold and distant, alienating and soulless. In other words, the very antithesis of what a capella tradition has been built on.

I don’t want this critique to be taken as a suggestion that the winners aren’t worthy talents. The fact is that all my bitching aside, Pentatonix did things that I’ve never heard anybody do, period. UM does, in fact, take the genre someplace new. The issue is whether new is good. The Aires featured a superstar in the making and a bunch of other kids who understood their role in the production. Afro-Blue I look forward to seeing live someday, even though I don’t much care for jazz, on the hopes that they’ll reprise Sam Cooke’s “A Change is Gonna Come” (and ‘splain to me how they got eliminated after that performance, by the way).

The lasting impression of season 3, fittingly enough, will be of Pentatonix. Time and time again they gave us brilliant, nuanced performances of songs that … simply were not worthy of their talent. The saying goes that a thing not worth doing well isn’t worth doing, but the reverse is true for this group (and the rest of the contestants): too many of these songs simply weren’t worth singing in the first place.

So that’s my argument, and I’m sure some readers are already yelling to their families to come look at the old guy across the street shaking his cane and yelling at those damned kids to get the hell off his lawn. Maybe that’s a fair take on the song selection argument. But you have to be naïve not to see the powerful hand of SONY’s talent execs behind the selection of contestants and the general slant of the whole production.

If it worked out for them, season 4 will be more of the same. If too many people reacted like I have, though, then season 4 is going to be a lot more like season 2 than 3. If there is a season 4. It all comes down to the dollars. For my part, I hit iTunes and bought probably 25 tracks from season 2, but I’m not likely to plop down for more than one or two tracks this year.

SONY is hoping I’m the exception and not the rule.

[sigh] If only there had been more of this…