Rock Me Daddy: Oldies But Goodies from Ex-Yu

As the 2012 selection season ups a gear, many Balkan states have been markedly quick off the blocks to select their artists for Baku. At the time of writing five of the six ex-Yugoslavian republics have chosen their artist internally, the Slovenes being odd ones out with a televised multi-artist national final. Four of them have gone for seasoned performers, for whom the vast audience in Baku and beyond will hold few fears.

Serbia set the trend by unveiling the return of one Zeljko Joksimovic, who co-hosted the 2008 contest in Belgrade. He also composed the home entry that year but did not appear on stage. Four years earlier, in the brief period when Serbia & Montenegro entered as a nation, he was runner-up in the contest with a ditty so popular with fans that it recently topped ESC Radio's Top 250 all time Eurosongs!. He thus follows Israel's Yardena Arazi and Greece's Sakis Rouvas in returning to the contest as an artist after being a compere. Here's the fan favourite.



After four consecutive DNQs, FYR Macedonia have resorted for services of their very first entrant. Kaliopi (billed back then as Kaliopi Gril) were chosen as the republics entrant for the 1996 Oslo contest. Uniquely that year's way of whittling down the entries for the contest final involved national juries voting on studio versions of the songs on tape, and Macedonia were one of the seven to miss out.



Croatia are giving a go to Nina Badric, who has tried four times to represent her land in the multi-artist "Dora" festival, the last time in 2003 when she was runner-up with this.



Our fourth evergreen is the curveball of the quartet. Montenegro has yet to make a contest final as an independent nation, and after appearing to give up the ghost they return to Baku after missing the last two events. Rambo Amadeus is a renaissance man: musician, composer, social commentator and former award-winning yachtsman. Here a sample of his work.



So there we have it, four performers with a combined age of a hundred and seventy-two.. While our favourite pan-continental annual event remains a "song" contest, there is ample evidence from both televoters and juries that a solid performance on the big night can make all the difference. Chances are at least one of our vets will be in contention come May.

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Europe's Living A Celebration. Happy New Year from Nul Points!

Howdee doodee and very best wishes from Nul Points Net.

2011.. what a year... Italy came back, Germany staged the contest in a soccer stadium without the unfortunate staging implications of Parken 2001, Azerbaijan sneaked a victory in the closest result in the current format, the jury/televote split results were announced, prompting a surge of outrage from the fanboys as the juries dared to vote for the odd ballad, the Azeri winner sank without trace and became the most forgettable Eurovision winner since .... well, we forget....

To end the year and fanfare 2012 we give you a Eurovision celebration. Happy New Year from Nul Points and here's to a tuneful 2012 ;o))





We are utterly thrilled to include here the very first entry to score "Nul Points" in a semi!.



And finally one from 2011



What's Another Year? Greetings from Nul Points Net

Coming Back For More: The Returning Winners

At roughly the mid point between contests, time to revive the blog and take a look back this time at how former winners have fared when returning to the contest. A full table comparing results is on the main site here. 2011 marked the first contest with two returning winners (Lena Meyer-Landrut defending her crown from 2010 and Dana International returning after thirteen years) since 1958. As that was only the third contest, all previous Eurovision winners were present (ie Lys Assia and Corry Brokken), something that we can be sure will never be repeated!. Corry was actually following Lys example of defending her title, as the 1956 winner also sang in 1957. Both ladies found that returning the very next year after victory was not a great idea as they each finished in the bottom three. While that was it for Corry on the contest stage (at least as a singer, she was presenter of the 1976 contest), Lys came back for a third go and almost pulled off a second win in three attempts. The rather memorable "Giorgio" may well have won under later scoring systems.



Into the sixties and one Jean-Claude Pascal who claimed the first of five titles for Luxembourg. He went on to set another record as the winner returning longest after his triumph, in this case a whole twenty years!. Despite finishing mid-table, his return result in terms of finish position vs number of entrants was actually significantly better than our two girls from the fifties. But all of them were about to be eclipsed by some singers who pulled off a great result second time around. Isabelle Aubret, 1962 winner, came third in 1968 with an arguably better song, Gigliola Cinquetti (who still holds the record for the most emphatic victory ever - a record that may stand forever under current scoring methods) was only bested by Abba a decade after her 1964 win, and Anne-Marie David, 1973 winner, claimed third place six years later, the only returnee to represent a diferent nation (Luxembourg in 1973, France in 1979).



As any casual Eurofan can probably guess, we are reaching the zenith of this trend. Just before that, let's give credit to Izhar Cohen, returning in 1985 sans Alpha-Beta and achieving a creditable fifth place. But roll the drums and sound the fanfare for Mister Johnny Logan! The Irish singer won more emphatically than first time round, a statistical curiosity being that in both his triumphal years the German entry was runner-up. Now, rather than this encouraging other winner back, it had quite the opposite effect, with only one further 1980s winning act returning, and not in the form it won. Bobbysocks (pictured above) gave Norway it's long-awaited first triumph in 1985, comprised of Hanne Krogh and Elisabeth Andreassen, both of whom had actually performed at Eurovision BEFORE their victory. Krogh returned to little effect in 1991 as part of a manufactured group but Andreassen, capturing the early 90s ballad love, was much more successful, scoring a sixth place in duet (literally)in 1994 and runners-up spot two years later.



In the quarter century that has elapsed since Bobbysocks triumph Eurovision has undergone huge changes, prompted of course by the vast expansion of eligible entrants, tackled by the European Broadcasting Union firstly with a promotion/relegation system and then with the advent of the semi-final system in 2004. This constant state of flux seemed to deter contest winners from having another go, but since the semi-final inauguration we have seen four 1990s winners, all female soloists, returning with, shall we be kind, mixed outcomes. You can't go far wrong in Eurofan territory with a Swedish entrant, so the web was agog when 1991 winner Carola returned in 2006. To be fair she acquitted herself very well with a top five result (although the fan pandemonium in the build-up almost rendered that a failure!). Sweden's other 90s winner Charlotte Nilssen (now Ms Perelli) gave it a go two years later, but despite another huge fan-fare, trailed home in a miserable 18th place. Two years later the 1993 winner Niamh Kavanagh fared even worse, ending up in the bottom three. So to 2011. Defending champ Lena fared OK finishing mid-table, but had the enormous help of course of loads of media coverage in the contest build-up and was on-stage as part of the opening presentation. That leaves us to end of course with the sad story of Ms International, who trumped even the very earliest and very latest returning winners by failing to even make the contest final. Ding-Dong indeed.



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ESC 2011 - Two Months On

Two months ago today the fifty-sixth edition of the Eurovision Song Contest was staged, a contest that started in Nineteen Fifty-Six. Spooky or what?. Nul Points has been somewhat in hibernation since post contest week, but now a long overdue review of the fallout from Dusseldorf:

The winning song from Azerbaijan did not go on to emulate the chart successes of the last two winners, in fact apart from a few brief appearances on I-Tunes it pretty much sank without trace. A big let down after the commercial success of Alexander Rybak and Lena. Whilst it may be argued that the latter two, winners in 2009 and 2010, were from Western European countries with hefty record industries, who can forget the shedloads on money lavished on last years Azeri entry, so maybe the fizzling out of "Running Scared" just tells us it's a very average song.

We were blessed with the closest voting for several years and sadly the EBU and many fans still seem under the delusion that it was all down to the decision of the EBU to attempt to "engineer" the voting order based on the results of the jury votes, cast on the dress rehearsal. In actuality, this was effected in such a ham fisted and unsubtle way that all it did was tell us which country won the jury vote. Newsflash: 43 sets of votes will still end up with the same result in whatever order they are announced. The close result in 2011 was down to there being no runaway winner and nothing else.

That jury winner was of course Italy, and more fanboy uproar was to come when the EBU announced the "split" 50/50 votes. Italy won the jury vote by a landslide, in the televote Azerbaijan edged Sweden by not much. Cue a torrent of forum comments about "moral winners". Probably the funniest part of post-2011 reaction. Rabid comment posted that if the contest winner hadn't won the televote, or (heaven forbid) won neither televote or jury, it wasn't a "moral" winner. What part of THE RULES don't these people get LOL ??

As for the muted commercial reponse to Dusseldorf, we have to bow our twin hats to Jedward. For all the kerfuffle, they undoubtably had the commercial hit (such as it was) of Eurovision 2011 with "Lipstick" topping download charts in Germany, Austria and Sweden.

So after such a short post season, thoughts turn to 2012. The Baku venue, the Armenia participation issue and assorted national niggles. Normal service resumed after the heights of the last two years.

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2011: A Bookies Bonanza

As the dust settles after the 2011 contest and attention turns to cogitating over the scores, pondering who the juries voted for and who the public voted for (blythely ignoring the fact that every single countries votes were a combo of both), and scanning the download charts, time to wind the clock back, do a system restore, and see where we stood a couple of weeks ago.

And what a spectacular success for the bookmakers. Random bookies favourites have fallen to grief before many times, most memorably the dancey diva duo of Linda Wagenmakers/Nicki French in 2000, Corinna May in 2002 and the more unlikely combo of Anna Vissi and Kate Ryan in 2006.

2011 however saw virtually all the lowest price songs come to grief, and we can lay the blame squarely at the (no doubt adequately manicured) feet of the "fans", and not just the foaming forums but also the repetitive polls of OGAE, the pan-European fan-club whose members flood the press conferences masquerading as "journalists". Most years their choices bear a respectable enough result but 2011 was a disaster as their polling kept throwing up the same suspects: France, Estonia, UK, Hungary and Sweden.

What's more remarkable in retrospect is that the bookies took this as an effective guide to the result. Final outcome: France 15th, Estonia 24th, UK 11th, Hungary 22nd and Sweden 3rd. This last crumb of comfort has predictibly seen the fans on the offensive (claiming that Sweden was "robbed" by the juries) like a lemming clinging on to that last shaky bit of cliff after he has jumped off.

So the moral of this story is, do your own research, make your own mind up, and pop a fiver on to go with your own instinct.


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Reflections The Morning After

So the 2011 Eurovision has come and gone. A few random reflections as we clear up:

Great to see a relatively close scoring (quite a feat in this day and age). Not sure about the "voting order algorithm", guess it wasn't really needed this year.

Fair do to the Azeris, they wanted it so much and it was a very slick package despite Nikki looking like Ell's mum.

Fantastic result for Italy. Please stay!

Shame that the Swedish gimmick (and all those extra rehearsals) paid off.

Ukraine and Greece ridiculous results shows that 50/50 has only partly tackled the issues that still cloud the contest.

We knew that France would fail the moment he opened his mouth. Maybe the pressure got to him as he sounded a bag of nerves and off-key. Great result for the bookies.

Jedward fair play, probably about the right result.

Lena too. We hold our hands up here, thinking that opening act appearance would be more than advantageous. Happy to be proved wrong, but sure we shall hear from her again (outside the contest hopefully).

Ah, Blue .... was never going to be strong enough as a song but they did us proud and Lee Ryan, dissed all over by the bloggers, sang well. Picked up loads of ones, twos and threes in the voting. A great result in the context of recent UK history.

Austria... we got that sooo wrong. Was it the fringe?. After the joy of seeing middle Europe all qualify they all (bar Slovenia) went a bit pear-shape last night.

Spain... you must be wondering what you have to do... stick with it and maybe a sharper selection process. What's Salome doing these days?.

Russia.. saw this as a contender, quite amazed to see it bring their worst result since Philipp Kirkirov.

Finally the old chestnut of draw order. Bosnia and Denmark made the top six from positions 2 and 3. Now whether that means that draw order means nothing, or that they would have been winners from a late draw... mmmmm.....

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2011: Our Final Call

Hopefully Google Blogger is now stabilized so these won't vanish:

01 Azerbaijan - cheesy and bland but all those dollars may finally pay off
02 Germany - with all this advantage how can it finish much lower?
03 Austria - romping back with a show stopper ballad
04 France - not a winner but a solid result
05 Russia - they want it again but clearly not as much as when Dima won
06 Bosnia - draw has ruined its chances of winning
07 Finland - despite the draw, this will be remembered
08 Iceland - forget the emotion, this is an Olsens singalong for the over 40s
09 Romania - our Marmite song that we think is safe top ten
10 Ukraine - solid predictable result but no sandie shaw
11 Greece - old fashioned diaspora will see this safe, but surely no higher?
12 Ireland - lets get loud, but hampered by the songs coming right after
13 Georgia - best draw in the world won't save a mishmash but usual neighbour votes
14 Denmark - another killed by the draw but loads of votes from Our Friends
15 Moldova - will get votes from people who like rock and the neighbours
16 Spain - simple singalong that deserves better
17 Italy - enough votes from the oldies to keep them interested
18 Sweden - manages to be annoying, desperate and tedious in three minutes flat
19 Serbia - pleasant but who is going to pick up the phone apart from ex-pats?
20 United Kingdom - live performance is key (or off it), we worry
21 Hungary - fan favourite swallowed up by songs with wider appeal
22 Slovenia - fantastic singer but not memorable enough a tune
23 Estonia - one-time bookies favorite sounds clunky and discordant in Germany
24 Lithuania - lucked into the final by draw, now lucked out of it by same. That's life
25 Switzerland - Grand to see this in the final, don't see where the votes will come from

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