If there was one thing my seven year old daughter and I enjoyed on a Saturday night all through last winter it was spending time together watching The X Factor.

As a cynic of reality TV, until I had children I’d never been much of a fan of the show - but it’s not quite the same watching it with your excited daughter.

And so to The X Factor Live Tour – which I knew if it came to Bournemouth, it was only matter of time before she’d ask me to go.

As expected the BIC was rammed with fans, and while a little apprehensive about the evening’s entertainment at least there would be no Rylans, Wagners or Jedwards to endure. It’s fair to say the ‘top eight’ had some degree of singing talent.

Following a build up on screens of X Factor clips, the show opened in style to Tamera Foster on ropes doing her best Rihanna impression with We Found Love. At least she remembered her lines, which was a good start.

Then cut straight to black before the pre-recorded ‘voiceover’ announced the next act: Nicholas McDonald who performed an upbeat Candy. Then the next: Sam Callahan with Summer of ’69. And, like a conveyor belt, so it went and for me it wasn’t until Luke Friend – clearly the favourite - burst through the side doors and actually started engaging with the audience that the show really got going. Rough Copy’s speeded up In The Air Tonight followed before the finalists as a group launched into Ellie Goulding’s Burn.

The second act format followed much the same as Part 1 with each performing a turn or two again, before building up to a rousing six-song finale by the singer the audience was all waiting for – prison officer turned superstar Sam Bailey.

While the presentation, backdrops and pyrotechnics were impressive, without a ‘real’ Dermot O’Leary style compere to keep the energy going, it felt a little bit ‘karaoke’ to me - but ask my daughter and there’s only one word she’d use to describe it: X-cellent.