Eurovision Song Contest 2011

[Bore]

That time of the year is approaching again and this years' contest is nearly here. On the 10th and 12th the semifinals will be held, while the big finale on the 14th. This year the contest has a huge amount of countries with 43 participants and amongst the returning countries is our lovely Italy after a 14 year hiatus.

This year around there are plenty of interesting entries and some really catchy tunes available. My current favorites found below. Some of these tracks sound really good as recorded versions, but the live versions sadly sound pretty horrific. But at least I found a lot of entertaining titles for me, though as usual there's plenty of really campy and just bad entries. Finland amongst all of these. Interesting to see a few old winners again, most recently last year's winner Lena appearing again with yet an another interesting and fun song. Also the legendary Eurovision winner from 1998, Dana International is back with an insanely catchy pop tune.

Top 10

Ireland :: Jedward - Lipstick
Belarus :: Anastasia Vinnikova - I Love Belarus
Israel :: Dana International - Ding Dong
The United Kingdom :: Blue - I Can
Sweden :: Eric Saade - Popular
Hungary :: Kati Wolf - What About My Dreams
Estonia :: Getter Jaani - Rockefeller Street
Azerbaijan :: Eldar & Nigar - Running Scared
Armenia :: Emmy - Boom Boom
Slovakia :: TWiiNS - I'm Still Alive

Follow up favorites

Ukraine :: Mika Newton - Angel
Norway :: Stella Mangwi - Haba Haba

Turkey :: Yüksek Sadakat - Live It Up
Germany :: Lena - Taken By A Stranger
Romania :: Hotel FM - Change
Macedonia :: Vlatko Ilievski - Rusinka
Poland :: Magdalena Tul - Jestem

I had a hard time picking out my favorites this year with many really good songs. Although I can right off the bat name Blue and Jedward as the titles that light my fire the strongest. My top 10 isn't in a spefied order though.

How about you? Which songs do you favor above others? I'm really looking forward to the semifinals and while I am not a fan of my own country's track, there's always the excitement factor if we can get to the finals and achieve yet an another last place in the competition! I intentionally left out even more tracks I liked, since there's surely people who have different preferences than me and want to bring them up

[Bore]

So first semifinal is over and it yielded some quite interesting and surprising results. A few of the early favorites like Norway and Turkey didn't qualify for the finals. And some surprising ones made it through like Iceland, Switzerland and... *shudder* Finland.

The 10 qualifying countries from the first semifinal were:

1. Serbia (Hunh?)
2. Lithuania (Not too shabby, a bit on the dull side imo)
3. Greece (Would be a lot better without the horrid rapper)
4. Azerbaijan (Yay, sounded nice on stage)
5. Georgia (Very distinctive and not at all bad)
6. Switzerland (Quite harmless, though very forgettable)
7. Hungary (The only really big YAY from the first semifinal)
8. Finland (Ew)
9. Russia (Warmed up to this in the semi performance, quite nice!)
10. Iceland (Pity points for the dead writer?)

[the_ditz]

One of the most random results from a semi-final that I can remember! Norway was a certainty to get in to the final I thought, whereas Georgia and Lithuania are just horrible and shouldn't even feature. Greece is also a complete mess, but they always get the votes.

I'm worried for Eric and Getter on Thursday night now - really hope they pull off killer performances as they both deserve to make it to the finals and rule the show over these random choices (only Hungary being the big winner for me tonight, with Switzerland surprising with a simple yet effective performance )

[Bore]

Agreed totally bout Norway. Stella pulled off a really energetic and bubbly performance, would have gladly heard her in the final. Although the biggest WTF out of the qualified countries was Serbia imo. The 50's style just didn't do it for me. Lithuania's song was pretty but sounded so very hollow.

Russia sounded boring as a recorded track but the live performance was really well handled, plus the singer is kind of cute which earns extra points.

With some countries out of the equation my new top 10 would be something like

1. Ireland
2. Israel
3. The United Kingdom
4. Belarus
5. Hungary
6. Russia
7. Sweden
8. Estonia
9. Slovakia
10. Germany

[the_ditz]

Just FYI, I'm going to be working on a Eurobeat remake of the Belarus entry (kinda like I did with Paula & Ovi last year), so look out for that in the future

[Bore]

This 2nd semi-final was on a totally different level than the first one. I practically liked everything except The Netherlands, Cyprus, Slovenia and Latvia.

Hard to choose 10 favorites with 15 good ones in the competition

[the_ditz]

The 10 songs advancing to the final from the second semi-final are:

Bosnia & Herzegovina (made me laugh for some reason - nice beat)
Austria (good vocal performance)
Ukraine (a bit too full of herself - didn't like it!)
Moldova (just insane - words cannot describe this!)
Sweden (woooooooo!!! My fave from tonight)
Slovenia (Best epic ballad of the contest)
Romania (a fantastic feel-good pop tune)
Estonia (Selena Gomez meets Rachel from Glee - cute performance, loved it!)
Denmark (trying to be a bit too serious - good chorus though)
Ireland (Europe doesn't know what they've let themselves in for... )

A far superior semi-final to the first one tonight - was really nervous that Eric Saade for Sweden wouldn't qualify - soooo glad that he did! Dana International is on the first flight home to Israel - I predict Lena will be another disappointment as a "returning competitor" on Saturday.

Can't wait for the final!!!

[Bore]

Without Israel and Belarus in the finales the number of favorites goes down a tad. Although can still work out a top 10 easily. Just a shame though, Ding Dong was one of my favorites

[the_ditz]

Without Israel and Belarus in the finales the number of favorites goes down a tad. Although can still work out a top 10 easily. Just a shame though, Ding Dong was one of my favorites

That was the biggest surprise of the night for me. And as much as I loved the Belarus song, her vocal tone when singing live is just horrible! Great pyrotechnic show - but that doesn't make a finalist!

My top 10 would now be (in no order at the moment - need time to consider that!):

SWEDEN
ESTONIA
ROMANIA
SLOVENIA
HUNGARY
IRELAND
UNITED KINGDOM
SPAIN
SWITZERLAND
RUSSIA or BOSNIA & HERZEGOVINA

[the_ditz]

3 hours till showtime, so it's time for my FINAL top 10. I doubt that this will be the actual result but I can dream...

12 points - SWEDEN - Eric Saade / Popular
10 points - UNITED KINGDOM - Blue / I Can
8 points - HUNGARY - Kati Wolf / What About My Dreams?
7 points - ESTONIA - Getter Jaani / Rockefeller Street
6 points - IRELAND - Jedward / Lipstick
5 points - FRANCE - Amaury Vassili / Sognu
4 points - ROMANIA - Hotel FM / Change
3 points - SLOVENIA - Maja Keuc / No One
2 points - SWITZERLAND - Anna Rossellini / In Love For A While
1 point - ICELAND - Sjonni's Friends / Coming Home

[Bore]

With same format:

12 points - IRELAND - Jedward - Lipstick
10 points - HUNGARY - Kati Wolf - What About My Dreams
8 points - SWEDEN - Eric Saade - Popular
7 points - ESTONIA - Getter Jaani - Rockefeller Street
6 points - AUSTRIA - Nadine Beiler - The Secret Is Love
5 points - GERMANY - Lena - Taken By A Stranger
4 points - THE UNITED KINGDOM - Blue - I Can
3 points - DENMARK - A Friend In London - New Tomorrow
2 points - RUSSIA - Alexej Vorobjov - Get You
1 point - AZERBAIJAN - Ell & Nikki - Running Scared

[Bore]

After the quite... horrible... performance by Blue, I wouldn't really put them as high as I did previously :p but I'll just keep the list as it is since there aren't a lot of other good options to replace the song with. Maybe Ukraine or Slovenia....and I didn't enjoy Slovenia before but this performance somehow brought out the best in it!

[the_ditz]

Poor Eric I don't know whether I'm more sad that he was beaten by a pair of singers who found it impossible to put any life into their vocals (Azerbaijan) or that he was pipped to 2nd place on the final vote since Latvia decided that the snoozefest from Italy deserved 12 points.

Oh well, at least my favourite came third which is better than they normally do. Surprised that Estonia, Switzerland and Spain (who had an extremely infectious performance) all finished up so low down the table though.

And I guess United Kingdom can at least be proud that we reached triple figures with our score - that's a real achievement!!

[UFOPOLI]

I'll throw in my top 10 for the whole year (with school grades included). It wasn't the best of years, I must say, the weakest since 2005, but fortunately there were a few bright spots, including the best entry since Hero back in 2008.

• 12: HUNGARY Kati Wolf — What About My Dreams 10
  10: CROATIA Daria Kinzer — Celebrate 10
  8: UK Blue — I Can 10-
  7: MALTA Glen Vella — One Life 10-
  6: ESTONIA Getter Jaani — Rockefeller Street 9½
  5: SLOVENIA Maja Keuc — Vanilija 9½
  4: ISRAEL Dana International — Ding Dong 9½
  3: POLAND Magdalena Tul — Jestem 9+
  2: ROMANIA Hotel FM — Change 9+
  1: SWITZERLAND Anna Rossinelli — In Love for a While 9

The winner was hardly a surprise but an unfortunate one. In my predictions, I got 10 out of 10 in the second semi but like you noted, the first one was quite a shock, so only 7 there. However, if you've checked out the scoreboards, there were even bigger surprises that almost happened, including Malta and Belgium both missing out by only one point...

Just FYI, I'm going to be working on a Eurobeat remake of the Belarus entry (kinda like I did with Paula & Ovi last year), so look out for that in the future

Looking forward to that!

[starry]

It was one of the best contests for a long time I thought.

I agree with some of those mentioned as being among the best.

The Swedish one would have been a good winner, their performance in the semi was probably better. I wasn't convinced until I heard this one live but then I really liked it. So much better than the Russian song.

Hungary was actually my favourite going into the contest for quite a long time. Great song but looked a bit static on stage.

Slovenia nice moody song but the twirling of the finger on stage seemed a bit cliched, great song though.

Belarus I liked from the cd version, great disco stomper. The lyics are too nationalistic perhaps but it deserved to quality based on the music.

Romania was a very catchy song and I thought he gave a great performance in the semi. Deserved to do better.

Iceland old fashioned swing style song, had charm in performance and it improved in the English version.

Georgia not a bad rock song, nice energy in the chorus and catchy.

Serbia early 60s styled song, nice performance in semi.

Germany won me over with the performance, much better than the one they won with last year.

Azerbaijan was the best winner for a while compared to winners over the last several years. Catchy song. Though I did prefer others to win there could have been a worse result.

Italy. I hated San Remo this year, it seems to be getting worse all the time. His performance in the final did win me over a bit though and it was better than I expected.

Belgium I thought deserved to qualify, nice acappela song.

The Netherlands didn't have the best performance but didn't deserve to finish last at all. The song is decent as I think an earlier performance shows.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALacV33oZ_0