Oolite Bulletins

Well you have to remember where it came from, after WWII both the european union, and the Eurovision where concieved for a way for all of west-europe, to have relations together, in order to stand against the sovjet union, and also not ever again wage war on eachother...

I agree on the fact that it is more an excuse to watch it together with freinds and have a laugh, but somewhere deep in you are wishing your country(if the song is any good at all), will win the competition. I think there is a bit of national pride in us all..

So now it has become a sort of tradition, that i can remember as far back as i have watched television, yes ladies and gents, thats back before the internet. no youtube, and i do think the songs where better back then. ofcourse they where reflecting the time they came from... one the all time best selling bands "ABBA" won the eurovision in the 70s, and theire carrer just took off from there, until they split ofcourse.

When Denmark won back in i think 2003, with "fly on the wings of love". the lead singer wrote that song as a tribute for his wife: very nice.. good song to i think too, back then it was better.. in the ladder years, however, i agree that the quality of the songs has become worse.

as i stated, i´m starting to not get why certain songs score so high.. an so does alot of other people, blaming political affiliations, is just an excuse for having a song that is basicly bad. i thought Denmarks Contribution was a good one, but didnt see it in the lower half the table... where it ended up.

also with this many countries, i think it would be far better to split the eurovision into east and west divisions, since our musical liking appearently is very different...



i just like to watch it, cause i have allways done that..

Heh heh, Eurovision. Bugger all to do with singing and more to do with getting drunk in the green room.

Russia's song was over the top, overblown cheese with a side order of cheese and possibly the ugliest man in the world on skates on a very small ice rink. What the hell was he doing with his arms!? If he had connected with anyone they would have gone flying through the air!

I liked Greece's entry. My wife says that's only because the singer was cute, but she was SOOOOO annoying during the voting that I just wanted to cut her eyebrows off. Stop thanking everyone as if they just donated a kidney!!! It reminded me of every phoney reality show in existence, just with more cheese. I likes Sweden's entry too, primarily because I like busty women wearing low-cut blue dresses.

I feel sorry for Andy Abrahams. His song was pretty good on the whole, and definitely didn't deserve to come last. I think the big problem is that the UK isn't "European" enough to put a song in there that will win over a European crowd. The UK has no friends in Europe. I would have expected at least a few points from Malta (being a former principality and all) and Sweden (for buying all thier flat pack furniture). Thing is that our entry last year was more European (i.e. camp and funny) but still did crap.

Political voting is a bit of a bone of contention. How can it be political if it's a public vote? Easy. All this public vote crap is fixed. Always has been. I've said it for years, ever since I managed to predict the pattern of winners for Pop Idol. I even worked out that Michelle McManus would win it - simply because a fat person needed to win it once to prove that "anyone can win these competitions". Simply put, whichever contestant will make the producers the most money will be the winner.

So as far as political voting is concerned, I think it is more than likely. What's the point though? Are the leaders of these countries SOOO petty that they feel the need to win points (hah) from a SINGING competition? Were the Russian troops poised at the borders of Lithuania, Georgia and Belarus with orders to "go if they give us less than douze pwah"? Did Spetznaz forces infiltrate the Western European capitals and threaten to cut off supplies of vodka if anyone voted for the UK?

I'm not that bright, right? So how come I managed to predict the majority of the voting based on the way the voting went last year? My guesses were based on geography rather than quality of song. Portugal and Spain scratched each other's backs. All the Scandinavian countries bent over and took it gleefully from behind. Baltic countries all danced naked in the snow with each other. I mean, Spain's entry was DIRE! So was that angel one (Azerbaijan?)!

One theory that springs to mind is that since the UK joined in with all that Iraq/Afghanistan thing, no-one likes us any more, so they'll get back at us through Eurovision. He he. Crap music sanctions.

Terry called it right even before the voting began. Russia for the win. I only really watch it nowadays to listen to Terry get more and more pissed off as the voting proves his "political conspiracy theory" right once more. I do feel sorry for him though - he has been a supporter of the ideals of Eurovision for decades, and now it seems that there's nothing left of that.

Next year, how about a group of us all dress up as Elite ships, put some words to the Elite Theme that wossname wrote (or maybe even NoSleep's Oolite theme) and run around the stage in a mock battle to music? We'd have as much chance of winning as any other UK entry.

Turning it into yet another "live public vote" thing has killed any originality it might have had anyway. The fundamental flaw is that the UK can't vote for itself in the competition anyway, so what's the point in basing the entry on (allegedly, given my opinions of voting shows being fixed) what the British people think? A far better idea is to let the Scandinavian countries vote to choose our entry. Then it might have a chance of winning.

Let's face it, the biggest scandal about Eurovision was that it bumped Dr Who off the schedules...

I've never understood the appeal, to be honest, and the last winning song I can remember thinking anything positive about was the Israeli winner from 19whenever whose lyrics sounded a bit like "I want to be a polar bear". I'm all for fostering pan-European friendship but what was wrong with Jeux Sans Frontiers? Dress up a bunch of people from various towns across Europe in comedy costumes and make them run about on slippery and/or moving surfaces, where they can fall down and hurt themselves in the name of public entertainment in some dubious game with a tenuous thematic connection to the hosting country (e.g., huge sans-culottes mice on a treadmill have to catch enough buckets of water to raise their team's guillotine blade high enough to chop off the head of a gigantic foam-rubber Marie Antoinette, say, for the French event). It's unlikely to put a dent in anyone's national pride even if they come last. Plus it would be a direct and open test of ability, and not prone to vote rigging. All we'd have to do is keep the royal family well out of it.

Let's face it, the biggest scandal about Eurovision was that it bumped Dr Who off the schedules...

You say it!

Disembodied wrote:

All we'd have to do is keep the royal family well out of it.

Which one? There's so many of them all over Europe (although, in the end most of them turn out to be German ; like these folks who, in order to hide that descent, changed their family name from Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha to some random English castle ).

And if you spend a few more thoughts on it, why keep them out at all? I mean, the whole format is screaming for a big Royals Special, isn't it?

Imagine the set-up you envisioned in your post, but with Margrethe of Denmark, Albert of Belgium, Beatrix of the Netherlands and Carl Gustav of Sweden as the "bunch of people" (you notice that for now I've spared the British folks the comedy costumes, they are going to be featured in the upcoming second Special against - of course - the Spanish guys).

EDIT: Misspelling of the Danish Queen corrected. No offense meant.

Hmmm.... I was concerned to keep them out of the organisation, but I like the idea of making them enter. I'd prefer to have them chased through tangled, spiky woodland by packs of ravenous mink, myself, but I'd settle for seeing them knocked into great ponds of dirty water by comedy obstacles. You used to be able to get that sort of thing on The Horse of the Year Show, but sadly, no more.

Commander McLane wrote:

[Margarete of Denmark

Who ?`is that... Remember, i´m from Denmark..

Its Margrethe II of Denmark, if you want her full name

Margrethe Alexandrine Thorhildur Ingrid

now dont let that become a habbit of having me correcting you

just kidding hehe..

Frame wrote:

Commander McLane wrote:

[Margarete of Denmark

Its Margrethe II of Denmark, if you want her full name

I stand corrected for the spelling.

Although I deliberately left out the numbers. Also of Albert II and, of course, Carl XVI Gustav (in that order, IIRC).

Disembodied wrote:

Hmmm.... I was concerned to keep them out of the organisation, but I like the idea of making them enter. I'd prefer to have them chased through tangled, spiky woodland by packs of ravenous mink, myself, but I'd settle for seeing them knocked into great ponds of dirty water by comedy obstacles.

Myself I would vote for recreating memorable moments in European history. So let the Spanish, Swedish, and what little is left of the Austrians, go through a comedy re-interpretation of the 30 Years' War.

And then, like indicated before, do the same with the Armada (lots of water to dump Royals in)...

I think you might be on to something here! it would be educational as well as entertaining. The Reformation would make for an excellent pan-European game. I can see it now: people dressed in jumbo padded Luther suits, with bungee cords tied around their waists, trying to see how many Theses they can nail to the door of the plywood cathedral before they get twanged back into the lavatory, while giant rubber popes hurl water-filled excommunications at them. (I'm sorry, I've just finished reading Q by "Luther Blisset" and I've got the Reformation on the brain).

Commander McLane wrote:

And then, like indicated before, do the same with the Armada (lots of water to dump Royals in)...

Good luck in having the Spanish show up for that one...
especially since the largest part of the fleet was wrecked after a navigation error...

not their proudest moment.

Disembodied wrote:

I'm all for fostering pan-European friendship but what was wrong with Jeux Sans Frontiers? Dress up a bunch of people from various towns across Europe in comedy costumes and make them run about on slippery and/or moving surfaces, where they can fall down and hurt themselves in the name of public entertainment...

Like this?

That's the stuff! So much better than plastic pop chosen by committee!

Disembodied wrote:

That's the stuff! So much better than plastic pop chosen by committee!

Aren't the music pieces to be sent to the Eurovision voted by the public as well? At least in Finland the viewers decide which piece is sent to the contest... Which leads to some pretty awful selections...

I honestly don't know. It maybe varies from country to country. I'm not sure if the BBC was allowed to do any more phone "voting" after various recent fiascos (up to and including fiddling the result of a viewer vote on what to name a kitten on a children's programme). People vote, results happen, but there may not be a direct connection between the two events... sinister forces may be at work, manipulating cats' names and national choices in cheesy music for their own terrifying purposes...