[OFF TOPIC] Eurovision Song Contest 2021

[prso1000 662]

2 hours ago, Agger said:

Believe me, we joke about our voting as much as the Balkan voting and so on.

I'm not impressed by our songs (and I think it's terrible this year). I think I've liked 2 of the last 10 Danish entries (Rasmussen and Emmelie de Forest). Think it would be about the same number from Norway, Finland and Iceland. Sweden has had a slightly higher succes rate, but I'm personally not a big fan of the kind of songs that win Melodifestivalen at the moment (I liked the Mamas, but not really John Lundvik and the 2 before him. Tusse isn't terrible, but nothing close to the former greats of Sweden).
I'm by all means not voting for any Scandinavian songs, but I know that both the Swedish and Norwegian songs have an appeal to other Nordic people (possibly Iceland as well).
It's after all about more than just being neighbours. Denmark has a musical culture much closer to Sweden and Norway than Serbia or Croatia and vice versa. It's a matter of taste more than anything else.

 

That's quite a claim.

I think it is not a secret that in recent years changes were made based on requests of Sweden or better said Björkman and many rules were introduced as in the Swedish MF. 
 

Pure televote was given up (back then right decision) as it was favoring Eastern Europe. Jury vote was introduced which now starts to favor Scandinavia. If you look into the jury votings recently e.g Balkan juries dont award their neighbors while Scandinavian juries do every year and no one can tell me that they like those songs every year the most. Juries just create to much space for injustice. Also is known that eg Azerbaijan bribed juries in the past. they need to find a new voting system which is more transparent and fair. 
 

other aspect is the starting order, another Swedish innovation, which is very unfair in my opinion. Take this year Semi 2, Denmark a borderline qualifier gets the best starting place and probably just because of it will qualify.
usually favorites get the last starting place eg Malta in Semi 1, which is by the way unfair too. Who decides about it? Not really clear, but Scandinavian lobby plays an important role here. And is supposed to increase the quality of the show but it destroys the chances of some countries and very often those are non Scandinavian countries. 
 

Etc etc 
 

in the past we always had periods where certain blocks were dominating and that lead to some adjustments and now it’s time again for an  adjustment to reduce the Scandinavian dominating of the event. 

[Illya 513]

3 hours ago, Vektor said:

It looks like  gained the most out of the SF, they are 4th now at the bookies. I am still not sure if the jury will let them finish in the overall Top3/Top5, I think there's a good chance that they will hate it...

Very interesting 

[Vektor 3,326]

Just now, Illya said:

Very interesting 

I don't trust the jury when it comes to "unconventional" non-English songs. Same reason why I have doubts about Italy, but at least their entry isn't as weird, it's just rock. 

[Illya 513]

Just now, Vektor said:

I don't trust the jury when it comes to "unconventional" non-English songs. Same reason why I have doubts about Italy, but at least their entry isn't as weird, it's just rock. 

I also. But we probably have good entry. I would be so happy , if we are in top10

[Vektor 3,326]

Just now, Illya said:

I also. But we probably have good entry. I would be so happy , if we are in top10

I think most ESC fans would be shocked if you wouldn't be in the Top10, that should be an easy target even if the jury messes things up. 

[Vektor 3,326]

Sadly that's probably it for Iceland for the rest of the contest, hopefully their recorded performance will be sufficient enough. 

 

 

[Vektor 3,326]

A ranking of the SF1 performances based on the amount of YouTube likes.

 

  124,297

 

  93,320

 

  54,754

 

  36,378

 

  34,905

 

  27,855

 

  25,042

 

  18,304

 

  18,151

 

  10,862

 

  10,531

 

  9,972

 

  7,346

 

  7,292

 

  4,693

 

  4,359

 

  3,196

 

  2,947

 

  2,841

 

 

The ESC hype is still strong in Russia, many of those likes most be from their home country. Ukraine is also a country that always does well on YT because they care about the show, but that's still a promising number. I would say that this is looking good for Italy, not so much for Malta, they might have some big issues in the televote. 

[Werloc 3,164]

16 hours ago, OlympicIRL said:

 

Probably as expected, she is not the best vocalist

The song is ok and the staging is interesting but having watched it for first time, I think it wasn't good at all

 

Anyway, interesting to see on an Irish forum where most people hearing the song for first time and the performance are all laughing and saying it was even worse than the very bad stuff we have sent in recent times

 

I feel bad for Lesley though as she seems lovely.

Ryan O'Shaughnessy and Molly Sterling are easily the two best performers that Ireland have sent in the last decade. 

[Werloc 3,164]

Time to throw some shade and some praise:

 

 - Easily the best performance of the night, superb songwriting and atmosphere, stage presence is brilliant as well, you can feel their years of stage experience through the screen.

 

 - One of the small amount of performances where it seemed that nothing went wrong, not the biggest fan of the song, but the staging is really well done, vocals on point and they didn't give me a reason to doubt them.

 

 - One of the best songwriting in this year's competition, but there's still a lot of work to be done before the final, vocals slightly off, whistle notes were a huge gamble and they didn't pay-off yesterday. Hitting them is cool, but if the notes slip away from you, then it's pointless.

 

 - The staging feels thought out, but some of the camera angles could be a little bit better planned, not many places where you can slip up vocally, because it's not a very technical song. I don't think it's a winner, because when the drop hits, it just doesn't have the magic of 2020 both musically and choreographically. Also, agreed with @dcro, it's not aging well, I've been exposed to this song far too much.

 

 - Low ceiling, high floor type of performance. Nothing went wrong, the singing is on point, but the whole thing just has filler vibes, but in this very weak edition of Eurovision, this is still one of the better things out there. 

 

 - Really good vocals, but a really annoying song. I'm done with "men are stupid idiots" type of lyrics and the fact that it is celebrated in today's culture. No, you're not too good to be true, Destiny, you're just a person. Also, it seems like she avoided some of notes she was trying to hit for the jury show. Perhaps she's saving it for the final or she thought it was too high of a risk. 

 

 - I don't think that I like this song, but the energy and charisma of Manizha really lifts this up.

 

 - Can't really separate these three. The three tits and asses out performances of the night. Cyprus with the best staging, Azerbaijan with the best vocals, Croatia with the best songwriting, all three with lyrics that aren't in any way meaningful or captivating. 

 

 - One of the best songs from semifinal 1, but the performer couldn't handle moving around on the stage and there were a lot of issues leading up to the performance for her, so she went in with zero confidence and you could feel it. 

 

 - Ireland tried to go for a cool stage aesthetic, but I don't know if it worked for me. I guess she tried to make the performance cute. If she did a better job with vocals, could have been a qualifier for me. 

 

 - Very bland song, the performer is pretty pitchy throughout, this only qualified because it's Sweden. 

 

 - Doomed by not being there, vocals really on point, but the song really gets lost amongst the others, because it lacks the special factor to make it stand out. Also, I always thought she was trying to make me strip, but the lyrics are actually 'time to take off your cloaks' and not clothes. 

 

 - Disney could use this for their Tarzan remake, when they eventually decide to make one. 

 

 - Sadly one of those songs where you have to look at the list of participants to remember that she was even there. Also, my producer said that you can sing Adele's "Hello" on top of it, so there's that. But in Slovenia's defence, you can sing a lot of pop songs on the Cyprus entry, ranging from Lady Gaga to Rita Ora.

[rybak 3,217]

I'm sad that Dadi and his band wont be able perform live, second year when they will miss the chance. I hope that if they will qualify to final, which is almost sure, then they will be able to be in the stage.

 

delegation is released from quarantine and will be able to perform tonight in jury show and tomorrow at main show.