Eurovision
Okay, first of all, I confess, I did not particularly like the UK entry. I liked the Finnish, Ukrainian, Norwegian, Israeli, Armenian and even the Spanish entry but there's no way I thought Russia deserved to win.
So, the question becomes, "does it matter"? Myself, I think it's a sign that the Eurovision song contest is no longer a competition to choose the best song, but a political backscratching. Now to me, this represents an opportunity.
There are two ways forward. The first is "Cymrw am byth", "Gora Euzkadi", "Visca Catalunya" and even "Freedom for Tooting" if necessary, just to make sure we can outvote the Eastern Europeans. Failing that, perhaps the time has come to treat the Eurovision song contest as it was meant to be... instead of the bland lowest common denominators we were often stuck with. So... since we can't win, and we still love the programme, why don't we start entering songs that we think are wonderful.
Morrissey offered to be the entrant last year, so did I for that matter and neither of us got anywhere near the battle of the bland (I mean A Song for Europe). Wouldn't it be great though if our entries had been Led Zeppelin instead of the New Seekers, Queen instead of Cliff Richard, Fat Boy Slim instead of Gemini, or even Leona Lewis instead of Andy Abraham?
If we can't win, then let's start insisting that every single UK entry from now on will be one we'll be proud of 20 years later.
So, the question becomes, "does it matter"? Myself, I think it's a sign that the Eurovision song contest is no longer a competition to choose the best song, but a political backscratching. Now to me, this represents an opportunity.
There are two ways forward. The first is "Cymrw am byth", "Gora Euzkadi", "Visca Catalunya" and even "Freedom for Tooting" if necessary, just to make sure we can outvote the Eastern Europeans. Failing that, perhaps the time has come to treat the Eurovision song contest as it was meant to be... instead of the bland lowest common denominators we were often stuck with. So... since we can't win, and we still love the programme, why don't we start entering songs that we think are wonderful.
Morrissey offered to be the entrant last year, so did I for that matter and neither of us got anywhere near the battle of the bland (I mean A Song for Europe). Wouldn't it be great though if our entries had been Led Zeppelin instead of the New Seekers, Queen instead of Cliff Richard, Fat Boy Slim instead of Gemini, or even Leona Lewis instead of Andy Abraham?
If we can't win, then let's start insisting that every single UK entry from now on will be one we'll be proud of 20 years later.
posted by ur.alcuin@googlemail.com at 4:44 AM
6 Comments:
Further to that, this afternoon, I've had a Eurovision of my own. There are four countries that automatically qualify for the final on the grounds that they provide the most money for the contest. They are Britain, France, Germany and Spain.
None of the four of us are going to win, so how about this... produce entries aimed at the wildest, least Eurovisionesque audience possible...
von Deutschland...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxUZUnRwH7s
de la belle France
"Stress" by Justice (sorry I can't manage a link that goes straight to a clip because You Tube has taken it down... needless to say, it would have been a great way of telling the cliques "nous vous emmerdeons"
See it here on Wilbert Baan's blog.
http://www.hypernarrative.com/wordpress/2008/05/05/videoclip-justice-stress/
From Spain perhaps...
http://youtube.com/watch?v=jhryrQ3sZi8&feature=related
And from the UK... just to show they're still going...
http://whitesnake.com/redsite/index.asp#media
4 great vids Alcuin! The first one of Rammstein (Feuer Frei) is fantastic! a great Lego video!
The Justice one is very disturbing...currently live in France but coming to the UK streets in the near future?
P.S. One Eurovison I'd watch if I were only so!
The Justice one may or not spread to other countries in the west, but in a way, it's a problem to contain rather than solve. I have no intention of linking to any of Khottab's videos of mayhem in Chechenya to show how much worse it can get when you try to control it.
The point is to remove the conditions that cause it... but how DO you stop people like Basaev, Arkan and Abdullah Ocalan existing? Basically, you have to stop young men reaching the age of 25 unemployable but with a history of violence.
Back on the Eurovision subject. I had a dream.
"Bonsoir Moskou, beinvenue a St Helier, ici les resultats du jurie Jerseyais.
Le Serk un point, Sark One point;
La France Deux points, France two points;
La Guernsey trois points, Guernsey three points;
L'Ierland quatre points, Ireland 4 points;
Jebraltair cinq points, Gibraltar five points;
L'Isle de Man six points, Isle of Man six points;
Les Isles Faeroeses sept points, Faeroe Isles seven points;
La Malte huit points, Malta eight points;
Royaume Uni dix points, United Kingdom ten points; et finalement, Le Portugal douze points, Portugal twelve points."
Holland have put forward an idea that each country must sing in its own language - quite how this helps Holland I'm not sure, they are on a par with Kernow when it comes to the number of people who speak the Dutch language across Europe!
You would have thought that Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain as the main financial contributors to the EBU would have managed to fix the competition in the same way that the big four of UEFA manage to get more of their teams into the Champions League.
Perhaps next year UK could get Cristiano Ronaldo to sign our entry whilst Didier Drogba leaps around the stage.
I agree that it's surprising that the big four didn't stitch up Eurovision. I suppose they have recognised that if you have a good song, you don't need to win... after all, the New Seekers' "Beg Steal or Borrow" went to number one throughout Europe but only came fifth (I think it was fifth anyway).
As for Holland... misschien is dat vaar maar kan ik Nederlands talen (and not a word of Cornish).
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