Haven't put this in the Music section as, well, it isn't really, but was sort of looking forward to seeing what Bonnie Tyler would come up with as our entry for the next contest. May be knocking on a bit but hasn't lost her voice.

Sadly, as you can verify by judicious pasting of the phrase "Bonnie Tyler - Believe In Me (Live in Germany 2013) - UK Eurovision 2013" into a popular video site, the news is not good. A really poor, dirge-like, formula verse-and chorus mass-produced pap effort, without even a decent finish, and no hook worthy of the name, nothing novel, no excitement, it's a bit of a disaster, and a right no-hoper.

Who's in charge of this perennial fiasco now for us? I mean, Engelbert last year was cringeworthy and at least she'll probably finish a few places higher, but surely they could come up with a thousand better prospects than this "song". The favourite at the moment is the Denmark entry "Only Teardrops", by Denmark's answer to Janet Devlin, which isn't great, but at least has some urgency about it, and it would sound a whole lot better and be a shorter priced favourite if Tyler was given the opportunity to get her sturdy tonsils round it.

The point is, though, if that's all there is to beat, surely a country which leads world music should easily be able to piiss this contest, it's not as if we'd even need Adele or Muse to beat the might of other nations, is it?

Bloody irritating.

Bonnie Tyler



Didn't we learn anything from last year?

I always wondered why decent British acts don't have a go at it.

You get the chance to show how good you are to tens of millions around Europe in one go.

Guys, guys ... Eurovision is the musical equivalent of [iJeux sans Frontieres[/i.

Winning it is not a prize, it merely labels the winning country as a wannabe cultural desert.
Why anyone would want to win is is mystery to me.

ABBA ( cough).

OK, Abba, I grant you, made a mint.
But what else has Eurovision ever done for us?

BTW ... my comment about the cultural desert still stands.

"Power to the boys that play rock 'n' roll, and make my life so sweeeeeet..."

Disagree entirely. It's the majority of the songs that do that.

There is no reason why there couldn't be a contest once where there was a significant number of songs from leading /bang-up-to-the-minute acts from a significant number of countries, which would instantly change the whole ethos and status of the competition. Indeed as would the participation of even one decent turn. It would go hand in hand with a different demographic tuning in to watch. If for just a top of my head example, we had put up Kaiser Chiefs, in the year they made their breakthrough, with, say, I Predict A Riot, it would have walked the contest, attracted a whole new young audience and forced other countries to do something completely different to the Europap or novelty stuff. Which is only churned out because that's how it's always been.

There's no reason it has to stay that way.



Well, Abba would be one case in point, they were a brilliant group, with a brilliant song, and used it as a showcase which gave them instant fame plus millions, not that that's the be-all and end-all but you get the point. . This is what you want, new, hungry and brilliant musicians being given the gig and let them do what they want with it. The present format is an over-expensive, dire flop, even the organisers surely know it, but I don't see why a simple change in what acts are entered couldn't change the whole thing round overnight.

If I went to see a concert in Hyde Park in 2012 and all the acts were rubbish, I don't really see what relevance that has to what they could make of the 2013 concert. It's a blank page.

[url=http://www.nme.com/news/black-sabbath/69069Meanwhile real British talent writes for a country that takes it seriously...[/url

almost as good a guitarist as Randy Rhoads

I'm pretty certain that there used to be some rules in place to prevent established acts participating (hence complete nobodies generally being the norm).

In any event, its never ever been about British 'popular' music. Its always been British music with the bands and musicians removed, leaving space for third-rate 'composers' to put together songs-by-numbers and non-entities to sing them (often embarrassingly badly).

The perfromer(s) is/are completely incidental, it's the song that is judged.

So any performer cn be used but the song must be previously unrecorded/released

But we know it will, don't we?


I've already conceded that point (albeit grudgingly as, to my mind, Abba songs were merely jauntily formulaic and a large part of their popularity was down the videos that they gave away to TV companies but, as the first band to do that, you've got to give them high marks for marketing nous).
I can see why the performers would want to win, what I should have said as that I don't know why anyone would want to watch the chosen performer from their country perform a lowest-common-denominator song usually on a par with a nursery rhyme in the hope that that performer would win.


Sure, it's a blank page but pretty much the same stuff gets written on it every year.
With the amazing hope and faith you are demonstrating here, it would be nice for it to be fulfilled ... but, personally, I can't see it happening.

Anyway, I can see the way this thread is going and, being someone whose imagination can't stretch as far as believing that this year's show might be worth watching, I'd better back out of the thread ... a la Dally when he has no answer ... but with better grace, I know when I'm beaten.

Nope. See "Richard, Cliff", for example.


Er, no it hasn't. It's a European song event.

Nevertheless it is valid to reference "British 'popular' music" simply because the best of that, or even the most commercially successful of that, if you look at it ignoring what some might call 'artistic merit' would probably win or finish in the top 3 every single time.

The reason that the winning song rarely dents the UK charts is not xenophobia but because there are usually at least 20 better songs already in the UK charts and plenty of them aren't right cracking either, but still better. So, we could have entered "any of the above" and still won.

Whatever the merits of our song, I don't think we should forget the partisan voting.
It's a joke and skews the contest.
You can almost predict where some votes will go irrespective of song quality.

We appear to held in low regard and will continue to struggle.
I blame Blair and his wars!

Both brilliant guitarists but sadly Randy Rhoads was taken so young. How he would have progressed we'll never know but ask Ozzy about him and he'll tell you what he beieves Randy would have done in the future.

No.
a) if we keep getting flogged and humiliated then eventually things will have to have a sea change.
b) nothing ever stays the same, if you think about it we have been trying to tinker with it and make significant changes, national jury shows, getting Lloyd-Webber in, etc., it's more IMHO a case of the people at present in charge of the tinkering are a bit lost, to be frank.


But they don't. It may get a lot of viewers but I'm certain that in recent times the demographic that views it is loaded with people who are not into music.


... which should make it a piece of pisz to win, there's effectively no competition to a good song.


I can't see the overall contest efforts changing much, as frankly few of the other countries seem to have people who even "get" modern music. But I can imagine us for once making a sensible choice, and winning it, which would be bound to have a knock-on effect as we would then set the bar at a new height (well, as matters stand, at least lift one end of it it off the floor

).

But my point isn't really about whether suddenly the contest will be brimming with great music, I agree with you that won't happen, ever, as most of the countries don't [ihave[/i great pop or rock music or a tradition of it. What I just would like to see is us putting up a fight for once instead of every year announcing yet another turkey, to universal dismay. If WE can all see it's a no-hoper (again), why can't the selectors?


Maybe you do, but sadly whoever is in charge of song selection for the UK clearly doesn't. Anybody could have told him/her/them that it's a turkey. They're not up to the job. As for "worth watching", that's hard one. It was to me always worth watching as a good laugh, watching the truly awful and sometimes frankly laugh-out-loud turns, and listening to Tel's sparkling put-downs, and the truly painful, heavily accented attempts at trendy Eenglish which for god knows what reason the other national presenters invariably affect. But I suppose unless you enjoy cringe-making and cringe-worthy, and countries taking the pisz out of themselves without ever realising it, there's not much else.

PS I doubt very much that the song as sung on the night by Bonnie Tyler will be the same version as on that YouTube vid. It has been so roundly bagged that I bet they have been working on it non-stop to try to inject some life, so at least it (probably) won't be quite as bad as in that vid.

PPS Did you know that the actual national votes by the national juries are cast based not on the live transmitted performance, but all done on the full-scale rehearsal? I didn't know this, but seemingly Engelbert made a right porridge of the rehearsal despite making the best of a bad job in the live show. Seems wrong to me that there already is a winner before anybody sings a note on the night.

I'm quite proud of the fact that the UK is crap at Eurovision.

So am I, it works when you realise that we're rubbish in a rubbish song contest, hence we must be good.

Like two negatives equal a positive?

As an aside, because we part-fund this nonsense, we ought to have a clause inserted to the effect that we have to win the thing every so many years, if only to keep Aardvark happy (if that's possible), otherwise we will withdraw our funding.
It's only fair, value for money and all that.

We need to recruit a bunch of Bulgarian grannies in traditional dress, waving union flags if we really are serious about making a statement of intent to win it.

But it's not "nonsense", it is just the most mammoth thing, it's so big, there's nothing even remotely to compare with it. Literally hundreds of millions are spent on it. So whatever you think of the actual end product, it is as big a deal as there is in that context.

If I gave you exactly the same funding, do you think you could turn it into something credible? I'm damn sure I could. My issue with it is that why pisz all that money down the toilet that the end product has become? The sheer weight of money available should very easily transform it into a top music event, and I can't understand why it doesn't. Particularly as the thing has got so bloody big whole countries wouldn't even be able to afford to stage it if they won.


Heheh there's more chance of Bonnie winning than that

Its fundamental problem is that good quality songs usually need to be listened to a few times to be fully appreciated. Eurovision panders to instantly absorbed bubblegum. To make it into a contest that genuinely attracts good songs would require the judges to listen to each song 3 or 4 times. Eurovision doesn't work like that, certainly not when there's a pubic vote.

Good point, but all the songs are available long before the contest. I'd accept the majority of people wouldn't have listened to them all, though, certainly.

But it is the same for all entries, and so full appreciation isn't required, but yes, instant immediate appeal is.

What isn't immediately apparent though is why so many entries think that the standard cliched Euroclone song fits that bill - it no longer does, those songs never do well.


Is there? Well, that WOULD attract a whole new demographic!



Meanwhile, Engelbert has spoken. He congratulated our Bonnie on "being the one" and went on:



If anybody can post a translation of this for me, I'd be grateful.

Loosely translated it means I was robbed, good luck to the Welsh Warbler.