The Raw Sessions is RTÉ's new indie-music reality-TV show.  JIM CARROLL reviews the series so far and readers give their views

THE IDEA behind The Raw Sessions, the new music show on RTÉ 2, is quite smart. Take a couple of Irish bands, stick them in a studio for 12 hours and film them writing and recording a song from scratch. But the execution of this simple idea? Oh boy ...

The presenter doesn’t seem to have a clue about the acts and doesn’t demonstrate much empathy with them.

The editing focuses more on inane quotes (such as “if all these Irish bands were in different parts of the world, they’d be the biggest bands in the world”) than on the blood, sweat and tears of being in a band.

The preambles are too long (it took half a show to introduce the first two acts, Sweet Jane and RSAG) and are about capturing the “personalities” of the acts rather than showing the musicians performing and working on new songs.

If the above were the only reasons why The Raw Sessionsmakes a hames of a very simple idea, it wouldn't be too bad. But the real "fail" came at the end of the first show. After watching Sweet Jane and RSAG perform their new songs, the viewer was then asked to vote on which act should progress to a second round. Cue collective groan around the nation – yep, we're in You're A Star/The All-Ireland Talent Showterritory here, folks

Why does nearly every show on RTÉ these days involve this sort of interactive bull? I’m waiting for the day when viewers are asked if Eileen Dunne should wear a pink or a black jacket when she is reading the news (calls and texts cost 50 cent).

Does The Raw Sessionsreally need this sort of add-on? Such voting probably handicaps the show in the eyes of its potential audience. Then again, RTÉ's entertainment moguls generally go ga-ga for interactivity of this sort. It's as though they went to a conference in 2003, heard the word "interactive" and now get a thrill every time they can shoehorn texts or voting into a show.

Each "vote" for an act on The Raw Sessionscosts €1. For this, the viewers get to download the track in question and the act knows this download counts towards the Irish charts.

And the act will be getting a share of that €1, right? Well, no, it seems. The acts don’t actually see a cent for some time. In fact, according to Sweet Jane’s rep, the rights to the song belong to the production company and RTÉ for a year.

The Raw Sessionswould work far better and be more useful to both audience and musicians without this inane battle-of-the-bands-style voting nonsense. Isn't the whole point of this show to look at the creative side of an act writing and recording? JIM CARROLL

• This is an edited version of a post by Jim Carroll on his blog last Monday. Read the full version on www.irishtimes.com/blogs/ ontherecord. Part three of The Raw Sessionsis on Tuesday at 11.45pm on RTÉ 2. The first two episodes can be seen on www.rte.ie/player

music