13 replies »

1. Azerbaijan 6th?CAME ON!!!!!!!OMG + LOL…..The people are not serius!!

   Reply

2. RE: My post below – I forgot to say that there should, of course, be a full voting sequence in the grand final; the ‘announcing the successful songs at the end’ bit would only apply to the heats and in the second chance competition.
   🙂

   Reply

3. I think it’s time that RTE changed the manner in which our entry is chosen. How about dispensing with the current ‘mentor’ system (which has proven itself to be less than satisfactory), and simply have an open call to all songwriters and performers, both in Ireland and beyond? Then narrow the submitted entries down to, say, twenty songs, which could then be split into four groups of five. Then have a series of four heats over consecutive weeks in which the top two songs from each heat go through to the grand final. The remaining twelve songs could then take part in a second chance competition comprising two groups of six, with the highest placing song from each group joining the others in the final. The voting in the heats could could be split between jury scores and televoting, as is the case now, with the successful songs simply announced at the end, rather than a full voting sequence. That would create a national final of ten songs. I would also propose altering the voting procedure so as to reflect the votes from the seven national area codes, each of which could also have a representative jury attached to it; that is, the seven area codes would be called in to give their scores (perhaps 2,4,6,8,10, and 12 for the six highest placed songs), which would be comprised of televotes and jury scores from that region. The current system of assembling a handful of juries and scattering them throughout the country could hardly be said to be representative of an inclusive national poll. It may also be helpful to include an eighth jury comprised of international judges, in much the same way as the Swedish Melodifestivalen, giving a total of eight juries to vote on ten songs.

   In this way, the national song contest could become an event in its own right, rather than just a special edition of The Late Late Show. The heats could be held in-house at RTE, and the final in the Bord Gais Theatre or somewhere equally fitting.

   What do people think? Does this change sound feasible?

   Reply

   • 1. it is feasible
     2. it is expensive
     3. It does not guarantee any better results. Israel had a big 5 night production for the first time in years and still couldn’t find a descent song.

     Reply

     • It may not guarantee a better result, but having a more open competition – rather than counting on mentors to select singers/songs – may help to improve the quality of the songs that are submitted. Moreover, the more songs we have to work with the better the chance of finding one that can do well. I would still advocate making the national song contest into an even in its own right. I know times are tight, but plonking it into an edition of the Late Late one night a year just seems a bit stingy, especially if RTE is serious about finding a song that has a decent shot at the top five.

       Something’s gotta give, because the current system is just not cutting it.

       Reply

       • So good points there Anita

4. To be fair, that’s only because of the Irish expat vote – indeed, the only people who seem to follow the contest here in Australia are the ethnic minorities (hence countries like Greece, Ireland, Malta and Italy doing so well) or people who watch only for the camp, kitschy acts (hence the success of Romania). You can see this through the post-contest rankings of the songs on the Australian iTunes… whilst songs that defy this trend like Denmark, Norway and Finland are within the top forty, Ireland is nowhere to be seen even within the top two-hundred, which you wouldn’t expect for an act ranked fifth overall on public vote.

   Ireland deserved their low placing, the song was poorly put-together (the “ethnic” and dance sections didn’t meld well at all) and the performance just wasn’t good enough – Ryan’s vocals were shrill at times, the backing singers were out-of-key and the shirtless dancers just looked tacky. He may have managed to squeeze into the top twenty in the public vote, but he would have been nowhere near the top in my opinion. I had always said this would just be another Norway 2012…

   Reply

5. Australia is one country. The results were based on 39. This question is loaded. You might as well ask if San Marino’s vote was better than the rest of Europe. Very few of the final top ten were in their vote.
   Personally I don’t understand why Ireland came in last. In my opinion, it deserved better. I also don’t understand why Greece, Romania, or Italy did so well and I think Azerbaijan should have been in the top 10, but not second.
   But then again, I was outvoted. Others think differently and I accept that. For the most part, I agreed with the final results. I got 7/10 of the top 10 and 5/6 of the bottom 6, so the results are not too far off of what I wanted.
   It was a very good show and the strongest contest in many years.

   Reply

   • Think Australia is an interesting vote as it is a young country with huge emigrant populations from Europe – so a Mini Europe. Eurovision – someone has to won and lose. There are always surprises at Eurovision every year.

     Reply

6. Certainly not. I am rather glad that we have professional juries. Puting Romania on 3rd position is Blasphemy for me. Yes, it did wel with televoters. But I’m glad juries put this……circus-show out of the TOP 10.

   Reply

   • Have to admit Gert that I was very happy with Romania doing so well. It was pure entertainment and he has an amazing voice and is one of Romania’s biggest stars. You have to applaud a country for sending one of their biggest stars. A good comparison would be UK sending Jessie J or Ireland U2 – that is how big he is.

     Reply

     • Thanks for supporting CEZAR. Apart from your site and EuroBeatBox, practically all the bloggers just trashed Romanian entry going beyond insulting Cezar (i.e. untalented son of Freddy Mercury, his voice is breaking glasses, scaring kids and dogs and so on…). I am happy that there seems to be an intense love on YouTube for his voice though and that he had that result in Australia where I doubt it’s a lot of Romanian diaspora…I don’t bother to reply to Gert – I did notice his name all over the place saying things about Romanian song and while I don’t doubt he hates it and it’s his choice he also mentioned that he’s happy that Italian jury voted CEZAR that low that he had only 1 point from Italy while the public voted him first. Gert forgets though that his country (Netherlands) and Belgium awarded each other 12 points – so neighbor voting is OK for him…

       Reply

       • I loved Cezar throughout the Eurovision months and he put on a great show at Malmo and deserved scoring so well.