Louis Walsh and Linda Martin need to step away from having any involvement in the Irish entry in the Eurovision Song Contest.
Both Walsh and Martin and seem to live in the 1990s, when the Celtic Tiger was beginning to roar, and Ireland could do no wrong at Eurovision. Ireland's entry "Dying to Try" feels like it could fit in to songs from that period.
Brendan Murray "Dying to Try"
I think Ireland is trying for classic, but instead "Dying to Try" comes across as dated.
I also find the singer total mismatched to the words of the song. Murray is a young man who looks a number of years younger than the 20 years his biography says he is. It's kind of hard to buy a love song from a young man who looks like he's just graduated junior high and has barely passed puberty, much less been able to sing lyrics like this:
I'll keep you safe in my arms/
Build a bridge to your heart every day
The song's not going anywhere, much less the finals of this year's song contest.
Ireland hasdone something that they've needed to do for years--they've scrapped their national final and tried something different.
Instead of doing a national final with a bunch of unknowns, Ireland has internally selected an established performer.
Nicky Byrne became famous as part of the Irish boy band Westlife and parlayed that into a career as a presenter on Irish radio and television and has been a part of the last three Eurovisions as the Irish spokesperson, presenting the Irish votes.
So it was a natural choice that Byrne would represent the country.
Nicky Byrne "Sunlight"
I have to say that it's a step in the right direction, this is a piece of pop without any of the Celtic influences that have popped up in a lot of recent entries.
But I can't say that I see this as a song that will win the Eurovision Song Contest.
First of all, the song sounds dated. Instead of feeling modern, this song sounds like it's from the early 2000s, the heyday of Byrne's former band Westlife. It's not surprising that this would be the sound Byrne would have gone for--that sound has made him a decent living. I just wonder how this will hold up against songs that have a more modern musical feel.
I also have to say in the two live performances I've seen, Byrne has underwhelmed. Westlife was one of the most commercially successful Irish pop acts ever, but it was a manufactured group/ These live performances make me think that Byrne was a part of Westlife less for his musical ability than for his good looks. "Sunlight" is more spoken than sung and Byrne has battled with staying on pitch during those live performances. Still he does look good in those leather jackets.
This is no winner. But it is a step in the right direction for a country who has seemed to be stuck in the 1990s when it comes to Eurovision.
Ireland, you finally got it right! You put on a classy national final with intelligent, honest commentators, good songs, and a straightforward selection process.
Can we please have more Panti Bliss? She was smart, honest, and intelligent.
RTE used their flagship late night show "The Late Late Show" to choose the song to send to Vienna, and although five songs competed, it was really a two song race.
Kat Mahon "Anybody Got A Shoulder"
Molly Sterling "Playing With Numbers"
And after some tight voting, Stirling's song won. And it's a good choice. "Playing With Numbers" is a nice little bit of art pop--a la Kate Bush or Tori Amos. It's perhaps the best song they've sent in about ten years and it's got a great chance to get out of the semifinal.
However, for me, "Anybody Got A Shoulder" is more memorable because of Kat Mahon's performance. Her clear diction and interpretation made a mediocre song into an earworm that I've been singing ever since. (Now off to find some more Kat Mahon songs on Spotify.)
If you want to ever watch live television become a train wreck, I highly recommend you watch the Irish selection process--Eurosong 2014. Eurosong 2014 was part of RTE's Late, Late Show and was broadcast back on February 28th.
Sadly, instead of the focus being on the songs and performances, the focus was more on the "mentors"--the people who selected the songs to be performed and the panelists.
Yes, the professionalism among Ireland's musical promoting community is on show here. Honestly the behavior of Billy McGuinness, Linda Martin, and Louis Walsh was rather appalling.
And while they weren't squabbling among themselves, the panelists were bemoaning the fact Ireland doesn't win and has to fight in the semifinals. I would concede that point to the panelists had Ireland sent songs over the past ten years that were actually worthy of being in the finals in Eurovision. That hasn't happened. They've been passable at best and mediocre at worst. This year is no exception.
Out of the five songs performed, only one of them felt like it was Eurovision worthy:
Laura O'Neill "You Don't Remember Me"
(Sadly, I can't find the actual performance, which she did right after the bickering above.)
It's completely an Adele knockoff, but Adele is huge throughout Europe and O'Neill could have capitalized on that fact.
Instead the Irish public chose this song.
Can-Linn featuring Kasey Smith "Heartbeat"
This song is so generic that it is forgettable even when they throw everything Irish at it. I'm surprised they didn't throw in a leprechaun drinking a pint of Guinness while driving snakes off the stage.
And that's Ireland's problem when they have gone to Eurovision as of late. It's an expectation that the countries are going to respond to mediocre songs sent by RTE just because they're Irish. It worked 20 years ago, but it's no longer the 1990s and Ireland has to step up their game considerably if they actually want to win the Eurovision Song Contest again.
Hopefully the train wreck that was this year's Eurosong will make Ireland do a rethink of their entire selection process--and bringing better, more commercial songs to Eurovision and bringing them a bit of Ireland's past glory.
Although I've been spending most of my time watching songs from the current year's crop of Eurovision hopefuls, my group of Alaskan jurors has been looking back at the songs from the contest in 1965.
The tenth Eurovision Song Contest took place in Naples on March 20th, 1965, put on by the Italian broadcaster, RAI. All the countries who participated in 1964 returned and a new country debuted:
Butch Moore "Walking the Streets in the Rain" Ireland
And for a debuting country in the Eurovision Song Contest, Butch did a pretty good job. He placed sixth overall in Naples--garnering votes from Yugoslavia, Portugal, and Italy. He even did one better in our voting, with one of the Alaska judges declaring him "dreamy".
There was also a bit of scandal this year from the Swedes.
Ingvar Wixell "Absent Friends" Sweden
Wixell performed his song in English, breaking an unwritten rule that songs at Eurovision would be performed in a national language. That unwritten rule was quickly written into the rules for the following year's contest.
But when all of the dust settled, the winner of the Eurovision Contest was a young French girl singing an entendre laced song for Luxembourg, bringing the contest out of the 1950s and bringing it closer to the musical tastes of the time.
France Gall "Poupée de cire, poupée de son" Luxembourg
France Gall's performance won on the night in Naples, but it was performance that divided our jury on gender lines. The men in the contest ranked it highly--considering it the best song in the contest. The women, on the other hand,found Gall's overly childish performance grating, rating it at the bottom of their list, putting "Poupée" into ninth place in the the eyes of the Alaskan judges.
Our winner, however, is a little less surprising.
Kathy Kirby "I Belong" United Kingdom
Kirby's performance did well on the night in Naples, coming in second. It scored well with all the jurors as well, making it "Alaska's Choice".
What is surprising are the two songs that were close runners up.
Conchita Bautista "¡Qué bueno, qué bueno!" Spain
Simone de Olivera "Sol de inverno" Portugal
These two songs from the Iberian Peninsula didn't do well during the voting in Naples--de Olivera received only one point from Monegasque juror while Bautista received the dreaded "nul points". But forty-eight years later, their dramatic performances and powerful vocals put them second and third respectively.
It proves why I love doing this blog... It highlights performances and songs buried in the depths of Eurovision history.
Yes, this came up on the first page of Google Images for "Only Love Survives"
The joys about being a Eurovision fan is that there are a lot of others that are much more fanatical about the show than I am. (And some of my friends would be shocked by that one.)
The EBU has recognized this fanaticism, and has set up the web site www.eurovision.tv to help satiate the need for more information, and one of the ways they do that it provide links to stream a number of the national finals. So instead of watching links posted up on YouTube, I spent a nice afternoon watching the Irish national final as a streamed program on the Internet.
Ireland's national selection process, Eurosong, was broadcast as part of RTE's The Late Late Show on February 22nd. Five artists, mentored by successful people in the Irish musical community, performed their songs and a combination of jury and public voting selected the winner.
Ryan Dolan "Only Love Survives"
Yep, Ireland sent a dance song highly influenced by last year's winning song.
Dolan's a good singer and a pretty compelling performer, and the success of the song is going to depend on him. The song is bland and the music is generically techno--utterly unmemorable in my mind. Yet if he's able to bring it on the night, I can see the song making it into the finals and placing quite well, just like the Maltese entry did last year.
I on the other hand, much prefer the second place song in the contest.
Aimée "Crashing Down"
Who is this young woman? Her voice is like velvet..
I have to admit that it does sound like a song rejected by Adele, but it is pitch perfect. Jaw droppingly so. The fact that this wasn't chosen over "Only Love Survives" surprises me, but again it's a matter of taste, and the Irish public preferred a dance number.
It will be interesting to see how Ireland fares in May...
Dansk Melodi Grand Prix, the Danish national final, took place back on January 26th, with ten songs competing for a chance to perform just across the Øresund Strait in Malmö, Sweden.
It took me until now to review the contest, because some of the songs and performances were not readily available on YouTube, my source for all of the national finals.
But after some digging, I was able to find the full contest, and I feel like I can comment the contest as a whole, even though I may not be able to post links to the actual performances--like Brinck's performance of "Human"--which I would love to vivisect because it was bad in so many ways.
But instead I'll write about:
The Winner
Emmilie de Forest "Only Teardrops"
Denmark wants to win the contest again, and their choice of song pretty much proves it. "Only Teardrops" takes a things from prior successful songs--staging notes from "Euphoria" last year and the Celtic flair from the Irish winners back in the 1990s. Then they stole the lighting and costuming from this song:
Aloysha "Sweet People" Ukraine 2010
Altogether, the song is very eye catching and likely to do well in the contest, fitting in with the goals SVT has for the contest.
Do I personally like it? Not really. I find the song and performance overly melodramatic. But then again Loreen and "Euphoria" didn't speak to me either.
Should Have Won
It's either a good thing or a bad thing that there were really no stand outs for me on what song should have won, and I can't even criticize the songs that made it into the top three and the superfinal. However of the three songs in the finals, I would have voted for this song:
Simone "Stay Awake"
I will admit this this song feels dated--it looks and sounds like something that might have been sent to the contest in the late 90s or early 00s. But Simone controls the stage in a way that de Forest didn't, and I must confess I'm all for a Latin beat and girls swirling around in fringe-covered dresses. So I have to go with my own personal preference here, even though I think "Only Teardrops" will be stronger in May in Malmö.
My Favorite
I'm going to go a little outside the box for my favorite, because I really enjoyed the interval act--a medley of Eurovision winning performances:
Brotherhood of Man "Save Your Kisses For Me" United Kingdom 1976
Herreys "Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley" Sweden 1984
Johnny Logan "Hold Me Now" Ireland 1987
I have to say I enjoy having old winners brought out and have them perform their winning songs, and this medley is more watchable than most of the songs that were presented in the actual contest.
Is that bad?
All in all, I think Denmark put on a good show and chose a strong song. That's what a successful National final should be.
Because my friends will be watching the Eurovision Song Contest after the fact, I've been asked not to post the winner on my blog.
Because of that, I'm not going to say who won or lost, but I will say the winner isn't one I particularly have quibbles about. It's one of the better shows in recent years, and for that Azerbaijan should be proud. They spent enough money on it.
However I am going to post up my personal picks for the best and worst song of the contest.
The thing that surprises me more than anything else is the fact that the song I would have voted for was not the one I expected I would want to vote for.
Kaliopi "Crno i Belo: Macedonia
In my mind, Kaliopi had a great song, performed in flawlessly, and had the crowd on her side. I wasn't crazy about the song at the beginning, butby the time of the final, she won me over.
I wasn't surprised by the song that I rated the worst.
Jedward "Waterline" Ireland
Unlike "Lipstick" the song from the previous year, which played off of their "talent", this song wasn't really written specifically for them, and it showed. Pretty much all they had was their costumes, which the lovely Janet S. has summed up nicely with her appalled declaration "They're tin men!" combined with a stupid fountain that they get soaked in at the end.
I'm all for gimmicks (the Buranovskiye Babushki charmed me as much as the last person), but really this song was a train wreck.
And since I'm analyzing, I'm still sad that this song wasn't in the finals.
Izabo "Time" Israel
They didn't give the best performance, but I'm going to go buy their CDs. Which is what I'm sure Izabo was hoping to get out of their participation.
Both Austria and Ireland chose the songs they're sending to the Eurovision Song Contest this pas weekend, and considering they sent both sent male duos, I figured I'd put them together in one post for comparison and contrast
Ireland's Eurovision Final too place on RTÉ's The Late Late Show, where five acts were presented. And for the second year running, Jedward won the chance to represent the Emerald Isle
Jedward "Waterline"
I have to admit, this song from Jedward was a disappointment. Last year's Irish song, Lipstick, was not the best song, but it was high energy and entertaining. This song is a bad retread, and really highlights how mediocre the brothers are as singers, but after watching the other four songs competing, I can understand how they won again.
I just can't see them coming in eighth, like they did in last year's contest, though.
Austria, on the other hand, has taken over the "so tasteless it's good" spot Jedward had last year with their entrant
Trackshittaz "Woki mit deim popo"
Arguments can be made against the song quite easily. It's tasteless. It's sexist. It's tacky. And I can agree with those arguments. However, I have to admit I love it for those reasons--it's so different than anything we've seen so far in the contest. It's high energy, fun, and quite honestly, hilarious.
Who doesn't like a song that translates into English as "Shake Your Ass".
I just hope the rest of the countries enjoy the joke as well and it does well in the contest. Austria's great when it does funny.
