My Eurovision Top Ten

Today's the day! And after a 7 hour round trip to Gatwick I'm looking forward to settling down with my favourite television show. Below you'll find my top 10 picks from the final, but in no particular order. I would be happy if any one of these won for all sorts of different reasons. Sweden because Eric Saade is HOT. Estonia and Iceland because the songs get stuck in my head. Blue because they're doing it for the UK! And of course Germany's Lena because her song is absolutely awesome.

I can't wait

Romania



Sweden



United Kingdom



Germany



Estonia



Denmark



Finland



Austria



Hungary



Iceland

Eurovision 2011: The First Semi Final! #esc

So tonight is the night... Eurovision begins! I can't contain my excitement *looks over list of songs for first semi-final* Ok, excitement contained. All the middling to awful songs in one semi-final! What a terrifying prospect...

I thought I'd select my top 5 songs for tonight... a difficult task given I'm not thrilled by any on the list but here goes:

Albania

I've been scathing about Albania's entries in the past. Too many silly hats and traditional dances. But they've done alright this year, with a poor man's Sertab song. Aurela Gaçe does okay with Feel The Passion



Hungary

Hungary's entry deserves to top the winners for tonight. A modern, fast tempo'd song with good vocals. Kati Wolf rocks What about my dreams



Iceland

A touching, well sung song with a good tune. And the story behind it is, of course, heartbreaking. Sjonni's Friends and the awesome Coming Home....



Malta

Not the best song ever. Not the best vocals either. But I love it... Glen Vella and One Life



Finland

Love this song. Paradise Oskar - Da Da Dam



I expect Hungary to walk it tonight. It'll be interesting to see what actually happens...

Eurovision Countdown: Coming Home

Sjonni's Friends entry for Iceland is a very touching tribute song and rather sweet. I don't think it'll stand a chance of winning but this is yet another song highlighting the rather amazing high standard for this year's competition.

Eurovision Countdown: The Secret Is Love

Austria is back! Hurrah! This year's entry is by Nadine Beiler



The Secret Is Love is good, brilliant vocals but a bit too dull to be the winner I think.

Eurovision Countdown: Born in Belorussia

My first "OMG THEY DIDN'T DO THAT" entry is Belarus'. Enjoy...



As one says in the comments... 12 points from Stalin!!

Eurovision Countdown: Taken By A Stranger

In a change to my usual huge pre-Eurovision summary blog post, I'll be posting a daily look at a particular song from this years contest... starting with the hosts; Germany.

Lena Meyer-Landrut's Satellite was a worthy winner last year. Fun, catchy and all round awesome.



This year, having decided they were on to a good thing with Lena, Germany's entry is more grown up and subtle.

Taken By A Stranger doesn't fall very easily into Eurovision stereotypes (such as the "poptastic" or the "OMG they've gone with their country's traditional music" genres). It's a well-crafted piece of music, and it's easy to imagine it in any European pop chart. I don't want to go over the top but, from a personal taste point of view, I think this is one of the best Eurovision songs I've heard. I absolutely adore it. Saying that, I quite enjoyed Scooch...

Check it out and let me know what you think:

Gay Pirates - Cosmo Jarvis

Can't stop myself sharing this absolutely awesome Youtube music video. Gay Pirates is one of the best Youtube productions I've ever seen:

Eurovision Song Contest 2010 - Oslo, Norway - UPDATED

On my main blog it is a yearly tradition that I maintain a Eurovision post in the months leading up to the Final. It is kept updated as and when new selections are made and news comes out. Now that tradition moves here, where it truly belongs... 

Check out this Aussie programme... Eurovision A-Z

Location

The Telenor Arena, Greater Oslo, Norway.  

Presenters

Erik Solbakken 

Haddy Jatou N'jie

Nadia Hasnaoui

What's Different

This year the 2 Semi Final shows will introduce the same voting system as used, with quite some success, in the 2009 final. This means the votes shall be split 50/50 between a phone vote and jury vote. For more see Wikipedia

Countries, Singers and Songs 

Albania - Juliana Pasha "Nuk mundam pa ty"
Armenia - Eva Rivas "Apricot Stone"
Azerbaijan - Safura Alizadeh "Drip Drop"
Belarus - 3 + 2 "Butterflies"
Belgium - Tom Dice "Me And My Guitar"
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Vukašin Brajić "Munja i grom"
Bulgaria - Miro "Angel si ti"
Croatia - Feminnem "Lako je sve" 
Cyprus -   Jon Lilygreen and The Islanders "Life Looks Better in Spring"
Denmark - Chanée & N'evergreen "In a Moment Like This"
Estonia - Malcolm Lincoln "Siren"
Finland - Kuunkuiskaajat "Työlki ellää"
France - Jessy Matador "Allez Ola Olé"
Georgia - Sopho Nizharadze "Shine"
Germany - Lena Meyer-Landrut "Satellite" 
Greece - Giorgos Alkeos and Friends "OPA" 
Iceland - Hera Björk "Je ne sais quoi"
Ireland - Niamh Kavanagh "It's For You" 
Israel - Harel Skaat "Milim"
Latvia - Aisha "What For?"
Lithuania - InCulto "East European Funk"
Macedonia - Gjoko Taneski "Jas ja imam silata"
Malta - Thea Garrett "My Dream"
Moldova - SunStroke Project and Olio Tira "Run Away"
Netherlands - Sieneke "Ik ben verliefd, Shalalie"
Norway - Didrik Solli-Tangen "My Heart Is Yours"
Poland -  Marcin Mrozinski "Legenda" 
Portugal - Filipa Azevedo "Ha dias assim"
Romania - Paula Seling and Ovi "Playing with Fire"
Russia - Peter Nalitch Band "Lost and Forgotten" 
Serbia - Milan Stankovic "Ovo je Balkan" 
Slovakia - Kristina "Horehronie"
Slovenia - Ansambel Roka Žlindre and Kalamari "Narodnozabavni rock"
Spain - Daniel Diges "Algo pequeñito"
Sweden - Anna Bergendahl "This Is My Life"
Switzerland - Michael von der Heide "Il pleut de l'or"
Turkey - maNga "We Could Be The Same"
Ukraine - Alyosha - "Sweet People"
United Kingdom - Josh Dubovie "That Sounds Good To Me" 

Eurovision Song Contest 2010 - Oslo, Norway

On my main blog it is a yearly tradition that I maintain a Eurovision post in the months leading up to the Final. It is kept updated as and when new selections are made and news comes out. Now that tradition moves here, where it truly belongs... 

Location

The Telenor Arena, Greater Oslo, Norway.  

Presenters

Erik Solbakken 

Haddy Jatou N'jie

Nadia Hasnaoui

What's Different

This year the 2 Semi Final shows will introduce the same voting system as used, with quite some success, in the 2009 final. This means the votes shall be split 50/50 between a phone vote and jury vote. For more see Wikipedia

Countries, Singers and Songs 

Albania - Juliana Pasha "Nuk mundam pa ty"
Armenia - Eva Rivas "Apricot Stone"
Azerbaijan - Safura Alizadeh "Drip Drop"
Belarus - 3 + 2 "Butterflies"
Belgium - Tom Dice "Me And My Guitar"
Bosnia and Herzegovina - Vukašin Brajić "Munja i grom"
Bulgaria - Miro "Angel si ti"
Croatia - Feminnem "Lako je sve" 
Cyprus -   Jon Lilygreen and The Islanders "Life Looks Better in Spring"
Denmark - Chanée & N'evergreen "In a Moment Like This"
Estonia - Malcolm Lincoln "Siren"
Finland - Kuunkuiskaajat "Työlki ellää"
France - Jessy Matador "Allez Ola"
Georgia - Sopho Nizharadze "Shine"
Germany - Lena Meyer-Landrut "Satellite" 
Greece - Giorgos Alkeos and Friends "OPA" 
Iceland - Hera Björk "Je ne sais quoi"
Ireland - Niamh Kavanagh "It's For You" 
Israel - Harel Skaat "Milim"
Latvia - Aisha "What For?"
Lithuania - InCulto "East European Funk"
Macedonia - Gjoko Taneski "Jas ja imam silata"
Malta - Thea Garrett "My Dream"
Moldova - SunStroke Project and Olio Tira "Run Away"
Netherlands - Sieneke "Ik ben verliefd, Shalalie"
Norway - Didrik Solli-Tangen "My Heart Is Yours"
Poland -  Marcin Mrozinski "Legenda" 
Portugal - Filipa Azevedo "Ha dias assim"
Romania - Paula Seling and Ovi "Playing with Fire"
Russia - Peter Nalitch Band "Lost and Forgotten" 
Serbia - Milan Stankovic "Ovo je Balkan" 
Slovakia - Kristina "Horehronie"
Slovenia - Ansambel Roka Žlindre and Kalamari "Narodnozabavni rock"
Spain - Daniel Diges "Algo pequeñito"
Sweden - Anna Bergendahl "This Is My Life"
Switzerland - Michael von der Heide "Il pleut de l'or"
Turkey - maNga "We Could Be The Same"
Ukraine - 
United Kingdom - Josh Dubovie "That Sounds Good To Me" 

Eurovision Selections: Two Very Different Shows

This weekend has seen two national selection contests for Eurovision (alright there has been more but I only watched two!). One was Your Country Needs You, which selects the UK entry. The other was Melodifestivalen, which selects Sweden's entry. They were very different entities... 

So this year we went back to the old "all on one day" format of Your Country Needs You. Last year's format of having 6 contestants who were gradually voted off by the public and the judge (Andrew Lloyd Webber) was great especially as Webber hadn't written the song until he saw who was in the final and who might be able to carry it off best. 

This year Pete Waterman was in charge of the song, and after some truly abysmal performances of Waterman classics and then a final 3 set of performances of the "winning song", we ended up with Josh Dubovie, 19 from Essex as our performer singing "That Sounds Good To Me". I can't say I'm inspired by the song. Given Waterman's record it is actually pretty awful. Couldn't we just have sent Steps??? 





Anyway, if you wish to hear the winning entry a video is here. I just wish we had an open competition in which actual artists could compete with their own songs and allow the best one to win. Alas... we must leave that for: 

Melodifestivalen is less a televisual event than it is a Swedish religion. Weeks of musical shenanigans in a large arena resulted in last night's final in which ten songs competed for the glory of Eurovision stardom. Not only were the songs and singers all of a higher calibre than our lacklustre one's. but the voting was done on a semi international basis with foreign juries and Swedish public votes all leading to the final result. That left them with the far better "This Is My Life" by Anna Bergendahl

Although I have to say I really enjoyed Eric Saade's Manboy:

Roll on Eurovision! 

Eurovision: Your Country Needs You!

We knew Pete Waterman would be taking the place of Andrew Lloyd-Webber as songwriter and producer this year. But now the acts who will be competing to take his song to Europe have been revealed as Your Country Needs You! is less than a week away.

Alexis Gerrard, aged 20. 

Esma Akkilic, aged 17

Josh Dubovie, aged 19

Karen Harding, aged 18 

Miss Fitz 

Uni5

A very young crowd, with no one older than their mid 20s. A good looking bunch, it'll be interesting to see how well they can sing and who is ultimately chosen to fight our corner in May!

For some reason the show is on a Friday this year, so this coming Friday you'll find me crossing my fingers and hoping for gold!