Eurovision 2024

Philly_Q

I'm genuinely baffled that the UK got zero points from the public vote. 

Year after year I've argued that it's not just politics, I think there has been some anti-UK sentiment but more importantly we have consistently entered terrible songs performed by hopelessly out-of-their-depth artists, and we've had the results the songs have deserved. 

In 2022, when I'd have thought the dust of Brexit had begun to settle, Sam Ryder proved that with a good singer and the right song the UK can still do well.  Would he have won, were it not for the situation in Ukraine?  Maybe, maybe not... perhaps the public vote would have gone elsewhere but he'd still have had a high finish.

When they picked Olly Alexander for 2024 I thought OK, he's a "name"... I'm going to predict top 12, at least.  As it turned out, the song was - once again - not good.  It felt like it should be catchy and memorable, but somehow it just wasn't.  I heard all the songs the same number of times and it was definitely one of those which left the least impression.

But to be the only country to get zero points?  What did we do wrong?

prowla

Philly_Q said:

I'm genuinely baffled that the UK got zero points from the public vote. 

Year after year I've argued that it's not just politics, I think there has been some anti-UK sentiment but more importantly we have consistently entered terrible songs performed by hopelessly out-of-their-depth artists, and we've had the results the songs have deserved. 

In 2022, when I'd have thought the dust of Brexit had begun to settle, Sam Ryder proved that with a good singer and the right song the UK can still do well.  Would he have won, were it not for the situation in Ukraine?  Maybe, maybe not... perhaps the public vote would have gone elsewhere but he'd still have had a high finish.

When they picked Olly Alexander for 2024 I thought OK, he's a "name"... I'm going to predict top 12, at least.  As it turned out, the song was - once again - not good.  It felt like it should be catchy and memorable, but somehow it just wasn't.  I heard all the songs the same number of times and it was definitely one of those which left the least impression.

But to be the only country to get zero points?  What did we do wrong?

I don’t think there’s any underlying anti-UK sentiment at all; the bottom line is that the UK produces world-leading artists who make it in their own right, so the Eurovision gets the dregs. 

Sam Ryder showed that we’re not international pariahs, although I thought the Spaceman song was a bit close to Babylon Zoo. 
As for the UK entry this year, I thought it was forgettable and the performance was unremarkable. 

I wouldn’t have given it a point. 

prowla

Sporky said:

prowla said:

Show-wise, I could do with less male buttocks on display; it's not really my thing and the two acts who overdid it (Spain and Finland) didn't fare well in the scoring.

It did seem raunchier - well into lewd at some points - than normal all-round.

I'm fine with it being silly and overblown and camp in places and only somewhat about the songs, but the UK choreography was a bit much, and the Slovenia singer was basically just wearing a net curtain with light-up undies.

For me, Finland and Spain were funny enough that they got away with it.

I think the Slovenian just stayed in the realm of tastefully artistic and she wasn’t cavorting around with her backside in the air in front of the camera. 

euan

Sam Ryder was a former labourer who got famous on TikTok and ended up doing a Eurovision song. For a year being Sam Ryder the UK Eurovision Entrant was his entire job. He hit all the coutures doingPR on TV and radio while also using his TikTok to promote the song. It got loads of conventional and modern plays as a result. 

As talented as Olly Alexander is, he has a whole load more commitments and couldn’t, and possibly wouldn’t do the same. 

ICBM

prowla said:

I don’t think there’s any underlying anti-UK sentiment at all; the bottom line is that the UK produces world-leading artists who make it in their own right, so the Eurovision gets the dregs. 

Sam Ryder showed that we’re not international pariahs, although I thought the Spaceman song was a bit close to Babylon Zoo. 
As for the UK entry this year, I thought it was forgettable and the performance was unremarkable. 

I wouldn’t have given it a point. 

This. Olly Alexander is a talented guy (and I like Years & Years), but produced an utterly mediocre song and overdid the campness in the wrong way for Eurovision - it just didn't work.

HAL9000

tony99 said:

Used to be good, gone a bit too gay soft porn now

I did wonder if Eurovision is one of those things like Judy Garland or Diana Ross - ie has a lot of gay fans, and the entrants are playing to that particular demographic.

theatreanchor

Gassage said:

Kudos to the French bloke for wearing a head toe trauma bandage to perform.

I actually like Cyprus best. 

Poor Olly- career smashed

Re: Olly. Wasn’t a great choice was it? I don’t know much about Eurovision, but…it was bad. 

Shrews

We could do more to find a better song. As one of the big 5 (?) we seem to do it all a bit half-hearted and yet we have shown over the years that as a whole we like song contests with Popstars, X Factor. The Voice etc all being popular.

We used to have a very weak Song for Europe competition, but at least it was something. There's surely scope there to not only find talented performers, but talented songwriters too, and it could all be done so much better.

Maybe a whole series with phone voting culminating in our song and performer. This would also garner more interest and viewing numbers for Eurovision night. 

p90fool

theatreanchor said:

Gassage said:

Poor Olly- career smashed

Re: Olly. Wasn’t a great choice was it? I don’t know much about Eurovision, but…it was bad. 

But at least Olly has a new tagline for his posters;

"Olly Alexander, hated more than Israel is!"

Philly_Q

Shrews said:

We could do more to find a better song. As one of the big 5 (?) we seem to do it all a bit half-hearted and yet we have shown over the years that as a whole we like song contests with Popstars, X Factor. The Voice etc all being popular.

We used to have a very weak Song for Europe competition, but at least it was something. There's surely scope there to not only find talented performers, but talented songwriters too, and it could all be done so much better.

Maybe a whole series with phone voting culminating in our song and performer. This would also garner more interest and viewing numbers for Eurovision night. 

But you know what would happen... all the contestants would be carefully hand-picked, they'd have a panel of celebrity judges, Ant and Dec would present it, there'd be a massive reality-show element bringing in all the contestants' life stories... and we'd end up with the blandest, most vanilla person winning the thing.  Nul points.

Sporky

Or they'd bring in a ringer like they did with Jade, who couldn't hold a note on the night. 

Sporky

I didn't think the performance was camp at all. Camp, to me, implies fun.

And the song was a tubeless dirge. 

Shrews

Philly_Q said:

Shrews said:

We could do more to find a better song. As one of the big 5 (?) we seem to do it all a bit half-hearted and yet we have shown over the years that as a whole we like song contests with Popstars, X Factor. The Voice etc all being popular.

We used to have a very weak Song for Europe competition, but at least it was something. There's surely scope there to not only find talented performers, but talented songwriters too, and it could all be done so much better.

Maybe a whole series with phone voting culminating in our song and performer. This would also garner more interest and viewing numbers for Eurovision night. 

But you know what would happen... all the contestants would be carefully hand-picked, they'd have a panel of celebrity judges, Ant and Dec would present it, there'd be a massive reality-show element bringing in all the contestants' life stories... and we'd end up with the blandest, most vanilla person winning the thing.  Nul points.

But we get that anyway.

And it's not just about the singer, it's about the song.Maybe the show finds the singer then finds the song right for them. A panel chooses say ten songs. The new 'winning' singer sings the 10 songs in a separate show.

Could be done in many ways, but ultimately just doing the same shit and getting nowhere each year, shouldn't be the case for one of the big five. There's surely scope for a better artist and song to be chosen. 

euan

You’re all pretending like Sam Ryder didn’t almost win Eurovision two years ago. 

Sporky

euan said:

You’re all pretending like Sam Ryder didn’t almost win Eurovision two years ago. 

I'm not, though I'd not commented on it to be fair. 

It was a good song and a great performance, though I think "we" could have made more of all the lights and LED walks and so on. 

Philly_Q

euan said:

You’re all pretending like Sam Ryder didn’t almost win Eurovision two years ago. 

I commented on that on the other Eurovision thread.  I was kind of hoping the eagle-eyed Modmins would spot them and merge the two.

Philly_Q

Shrews said:

Philly_Q said:

Shrews said:

We could do more to find a better song. As one of the big 5 (?) we seem to do it all a bit half-hearted and yet we have shown over the years that as a whole we like song contests with Popstars, X Factor. The Voice etc all being popular.

We used to have a very weak Song for Europe competition, but at least it was something. There's surely scope there to not only find talented performers, but talented songwriters too, and it could all be done so much better.

Maybe a whole series with phone voting culminating in our song and performer. This would also garner more interest and viewing numbers for Eurovision night. 

But you know what would happen... all the contestants would be carefully hand-picked, they'd have a panel of celebrity judges, Ant and Dec would present it, there'd be a massive reality-show element bringing in all the contestants' life stories... and we'd end up with the blandest, most vanilla person winning the thing.  Nul points.

But we get that anyway.

And it's not just about the singer, it's about the song.Maybe the show finds the singer then finds the song right for them. A panel chooses say ten songs. The new 'winning' singer sings the 10 songs in a separate show.

Could be done in many ways, but ultimately just doing the same shit and getting nowhere each year, shouldn't be the case for one of the big five. There's surely scope for a better artist and song to be chosen. 

I remember many, many years ago, when Lulu was the UK representative, she sang one song per week, for six weeks, on her Saturday evening show, then they had some kind of vote to pick the winning song.  They did a similar thing with Mary Hopkin, Clodagh Rogers and the New Seekers on Cliff Richard's show the next few years, and then the year after that Cliff himself was the singer.

And - fucking hell, I did not remember this - in 1974 the singer was Olivia Newton-John, who performed all the prospective Eurovision songs on Jimmy Savile's show Clunk, Click... As It Happens. 

I still think we'd end up with blando nonsense though.  The UK thinks it's amazing at pop music but it's just not amazing at Eurovision pop music.

sev112

Mid 70s Cliff Richard sand all the songs that one was chosen from , I think it was “Power to all our friends”

darthed1981

Sam Ryder is a good lesson.

I can't remember anything about Ollys song, I remember it's called Dizzy but it's totally generic.  It's not BAD by any measure, nor is it particularly good, it's just there.

Sam Ryders song is still memorable 2 years later, and indeed it was just massive public sympathy for Ukraine that had it beat.

Shame Sam Ryder has done nothing else memorable since, we could have sent him again.

maltingsaudio

Philly_Q said:I

Shrews said:

Philly_Q said:

Shrews said:

We could do more to find a better song. As one of the big 5 (?) we seem to do it all a bit half-hearted and yet we have shown over the years that as a whole we like song contests with Popstars, X Factor. The Voice etc all being popular.

We used to have a very weak Song for Europe competition, but at least it was something. There's surely scope there to not only find talented performers, but talented songwriters too, and it could all be done so much better.

Maybe a whole series with phone voting culminating in our song and performer. This would also garner more interest and viewing numbers for Eurovision night. 

But you know what would happen... all the contestants would be carefully hand-picked, they'd have a panel of celebrity judges, Ant and Dec would present it, there'd be a massive reality-show element bringing in all the contestants' life stories... and we'd end up with the blandest, most vanilla person winning the thing.  Nul points.

But we get that anyway.

And it's not just about the singer, it's about the song.Maybe the show finds the singer then finds the song right for them. A panel chooses say ten songs. The new 'winning' singer sings the 10 songs in a separate show.

Could be done in many ways, but ultimately just doing the same shit and getting nowhere each year, shouldn't be the case for one of the big five. There's surely scope for a better artist and song to be chosen. 

I remember many, many years ago, when Lulu was the UK representative, she sang one song per week, for six weeks, on her Saturday evening show, then they had some kind of vote to pick the winning song.  They did a similar thing with Mary Hopkin, Clodagh Rogers and the New Seekers on Cliff Richard's show the next few years, and then the year after that Cliff himself was the singer.

And - fucking hell, I did not remember this - in 1974 the singer was Olivia Newton-John, who performed all the prospective Eurovision songs on Jimmy Savile's show Clunk, Click... As It Happens. 

I still think we'd end up with blando nonsense though.  The UK thinks it's amazing at pop music but it's just not amazing at Eurovision pop music.

How could you forget Oivia Newton John….  Log live love!