Goodbye Eurovision Fiasco
The Eurovision Song Contest 2008 has just ended, or should I say - crash landed. It’s never been cutting edge. It has produced a few good songs and it has produced a few good artistes, Abba being the most notable, but it’s been going down hill ever since the organisers took it upon themselves to redraw the world map so that Israel and Tunisia suddenly became part of Europe.
I’ve watched with increasing depression while what used to be a good laugh and highly entertaining, despite some appallingly bad acts, has turned into political crawling competition. At least in the past the Eastern bloc mob tried to look as though their voting was unbiased but now they don’t bother. You can predict exactly who will get the points. Some countries give them to each other every single year without fail, no matter how dire the song they’ve entered.
What has always kept me watching, apart from the laughably atrocious music and the ghastly presenters, was the humour of Terry Wogan. His merciless commentary on the songs, singers, presenters and often cringe making programme production was worth its weight in gold. This year, even Terry was struggling to inject any mirth into the tiresome proceedings.
The UK has submitted some absolute garbage for a number of years and deserved to lose but this year we pulled out all the stops. Andy Abrahams’ song and performance in Belgrade were head and shoulders above most other entrants but everyone knew that we didn’t have a cat in hell’s chance of winning. None of the Western European countries do. You see we have this misguided idea that you vote for the best song, not your political mates or the country you’re most afraid of.
Some countries have started to take the rise out of the whole thing. Submit a load of rubbish, knowing it won’t win, won’t even make the final, and get out before it costs you too much money. The UK should follow suit. We’re being taken for complete idiots and we pay the lion’s share of the cash to set the damn thing up.
Even the terminally optimistic Mr Wogan is now considering whether he wishes to present the programme any more. I can’t blame him. How do you inject humour into an increasingly depressing Eastern European/Western Asian love-in.
It really is time for the grown up European countries to get the heck out and leave it to the newbies and the wannabees to pat each other on the back, and I for one would like the BBC to refund that part of my Television licence that has gone towards Eurovision 2009.
Matt responds:
Posted: May 25th, 2008 at 9:26 am →
i was an avid fan of Eurovision , but i certainly will not be buying the single, let alone a dvd
of this years contest. An unremarkable song , with lame lyrics voted winner by frightened
‘please don’t cut off our gas supplies’ former tied nations.
we would have done better with Joe Pasquale and ‘ I know a song that will get on your nerve’s’
but there again; Russia beat us to it.
Jeremy Clulow responds:
Posted: May 25th, 2008 at 10:13 am →
Well said, I couldn’t agree more. I watch it for Wogan’s banter, but even he sounded tired and lacklustre. He can ridicule something which takes itself seriously, but taking the British Michael out of something which is already a parody of itself - and each year becomes more so - is far more difficult. Didn’t I also hear that he has been told to “tone it down” to avoid offending our European and Middle Eastern (Israel) neighbours whose command of English is constantly improving? Time for out Terry. I’m sure the money is useful, but you’re not *that* short of a Euro or two.
Barrie responds:
Posted: May 25th, 2008 at 11:59 am →
I couldn’t agree more.
I’ve always been a big Eurovision fan and can remember watching Sandie Shaw, Cliff Richard and Lulu representing the UK.
Yes it’s cheesy, but part of the fun… no, wait. What I really mean is *most* of the fun was the chance of seeing it being won by the UK.
Now, as you correctly point out, there’s little or no chance of that happening ever again because of the Eastern Bloc countries voting for their neighbours. That’s always happened in the past, (with Scandinavia/Iceland for example) but not to such a great extent as it does these days.
This used to be due to the fact that Eastern music sounded so different to Western ears - and vice versa - so you voted for close geographical neighbours as the music was similar to your own.
Now however, we have music from all parts of the world incorporated into modern music and Johnny Foreigner’s music is now no longer so alien - to us or them. Plus, most of the contest’s songs are now predominantly Western style music and performed in English.
Close your eyes and the German entry was a slightly altered Suga Babes song - worth far more than the 14 points it got I might add, and the Russian entry was most certainly written by a Cat Stevens fan (just take a listen to Wild World), though it was mixed with another song I can’t put my finger on. Many others also sounded familiar.
So there’s no longer any reason why a neighbouring country should have any bearing on the votes cast. But until the public vote is replaced by a panel of music professionals, it will never get back to being a music contest and will remain the farce it is. And is that going to happen when phone voting raises so much revenue for the broadcasters? I think not…
Terry Wogan should most definitely call it a day because the show really is now a joke. While he continues doing it, the public will still watch and the BBC will still take part. Take him out of the equation and there’s simply no longer a reason to watch it. No-one can really replace him and there’s no way I would watch it if it wasn’t for him.
Viewing figures have dropped dramatically across other parts of Western Europe as viewers have cottoned on to the fact that they are being conned into watching (and financing) something they have very little chance of winning.
Also, who’s bloody atlas are the organisers using any way? The Euro part of Eurovision I always though was short for European. I’ve yet to see an atlas where Europe included Azerbaijan, Georgia, Latvia, Armenia or half of the other competing countries.
True European countries like Ireland, Belgium and Holland should all be automatically included and let the non-European countries fight it out for the remaining available slots. If a country wants to enter a singing turkey puppet so they won’t win and have the financial burden of hosting it the following year then fair enough.
Last but not least, I have to say that this year I didn’t actually like the UK entry as much as some of the other countries entries. Personally I didn’t think it deserved to win. However, I didn’t think it deserved to come last either - there were a lot of other songs far worse - both musically and performance-wise. 110 points for the out of tune Bosnian, the clothes line and four brides?? Give me strength…
But then again, as has already been said a number of times, it’s no longer a song contest…
BC
Caz responds:
Posted: May 25th, 2008 at 3:11 pm →
The important thing to remember is that you don’t actually have to be in Europe to join the European Broadcasting Union, and in turn, to participate in Eurovision. This explains entries over the years from countries such as Morocco and Israel.
The ‘Big Four’ of France, Germany, Spain and the UK, contribute more financially to the EBU than any other countries. Their reward is a guaranteed place in the grand final year after year.
Some reward, huh? Only San Marino and Ireland gave any points to the UK and like you JB I thought that song was really good - musical in fact, but a spectacle it was not. That’s all that’s needed in this event now, not music. When you think about the spread of population in the participating countries with migrant workers in all of the western european countries, the voting seems less of a mystery. It’s the diaspora factor as well as the political and economic ones.
Time for the UK to rethink our financial contribution to the EBU.
RON responds:
Posted: May 26th, 2008 at 4:11 pm →
The ESC 2008 Russian entry was good and “possibly” the right winner,however countries like the UK, Sweden,and Poland should have NEVER been so low down the the final results.They produced world class songs and deserved better recognition for their quality and presentation.Maybe the time has come to bring back the “Professionals”in the industry to decide on the winner with quality, standards and even innovation that moves the music industry along being the key factors.The public at large who vote as they do have brought a once truly reputable and exciting international song contest to its knees to be mocked and sneered at due to what is noticeably a political issue not only confined to the Eastern Bloc countries.!!
Jaybee responds:
Posted: May 26th, 2008 at 8:32 pm →
Any contest that involves public telephone voting is open to corruption and fixing. Given all the recent problems in the UK with the Ant & Dec show ‘winners’ who had been pre-picked, what’s to say that the votes cast for Eurovision are even real? Any of the countries could be making up the results to suit whatever angle they are after. How would we know?
Even when the public vote is valid, it’ll be suspect. Take the Pop Idol type contests. One competitor’s Grandmother proudly told the nation that she had taken out a loan so she could put a huge amount of cash on her mobile phone and just spend the week hitting redial. It’s a farce. Not the best song, not the best performers but the person with the most family and mates with deep pockets. Can it be stopped? No. The TV companies are making far too much cash.
Neil Oliver responds:
Posted: May 27th, 2008 at 12:25 am →
And whereas we used to have some friends who voted for us, in the past a decade we seem to have upset almost everyone
Caz responds:
Posted: May 27th, 2008 at 1:53 am →
I heard a spokesman from the EBU on the radio today talking about why the UK seems to have no friends in the Eurovision Song Contest. Apparently the others have noticed that we sneer at and mock the whole thing ( Sir Terry, you are famous!) so that is why we have no friends.
Am I bovvered?