The West Iberian tragedy

I'm just back from my first-ever trip to "Portugal".  I don't think I've ever been so moved by a visit to any "country".  As I was travelling around, I kept thinking back to Councillor Alex Gallagher's words of wisdom about the tragedy of one island being split into two political states.  How much more tragic, then, for the mere peninsula of Iberia to be split into three political entities, one of which is a British colony.  And this unnatural state of affairs has been going on for bloody centuries.  Everywhere I looked, I could detect on the faces of the West Iberian people the pain of partition, the heartache of separation, and the terror of unnecessarily high levels of representation at the Olympic Games.  I asked a young boy if he was proud of his country's silver medal in the London 2012 canoe sprint, and he gave me a vacant look.  Some might think that was because he couldn't understand my language, but in my heart I knew it was because a "Portuguese" silver means very little to these people - it would have meant so much more to have seen West Iberian athletes contribute to a Greater Spanish gold medal.  I asked a local woman if, as I expected, the European economic crisis had hit West Iberia harder due to the insanity of separation.  She replied no, that although times were hard "Portugal" was still coping better than its larger neighbour Spain.  And I could see how much this shamed her.  She longed for the intra-peninsula solidarity of shared pain.

And yet, and yet.  In spite of the fact that there is no living memory of anything but Iberian partition, the fortitude and irrational optimism of the "Portuguese" people is nothing short of extraordinary, and a shining example to us all.  We can only hope that a better, brighter, and above all Spanish future lies ahead of them (by God they deserve it), and in the meantime I'm sure they remain in the thoughts and prayers of us all.

Eurovision 2011 prediction : Tuesday's semi-final

I've been so wrapped up in the Holyrood election and its aftermath that I've barely paid any attention at all to the Eurovision rehearsals this year. Anyway, I thought it was high time I got my priorities straight, so I've put myself through a bit of a crash-course over the last hour or two. In no particular order, these are the ten countries I think might qualify from the first semi-final...

Greece
Switzerland
Norway
Albania
Turkey
Serbia
Finland
Azerbaijan
Russia
Iceland

I'm more than a touch surprised to find myself including Albania in that list, and with a fair bit of confidence at that - I didn't hold out much hope for them after I first heard the song back in December, but the traditional Cinderella effect has kicked in yet again. Compared to other predictions I've seen, the song I seem to be going out on a limb with is Switzerland - but I'm guessing its simplicity and charm might just see it through. Strictly on merit, Hungary really should be on the list and Russia shouldn't, but I've learnt from long experience that you don't get anywhere from a) betting on dance tracks at Eurovision, or b) betting against Russia at Eurovision. Hungary seem to have had problems in the rehearsals in any case.

This is the semi that UK viewers are allowed to vote in. I of course have my long-standing personal rule of only voting for songs performed entirely in a language other than English, but depressingly that doesn't leave me with many options on this occasion. Although Portugal are sticking with their usual practice of singing in their native tongue, I'm afraid I won't be able to vote for them for a fourth successive year - the song is unspeakably dreadful. So that only leaves Poland and Serbia. I'll need to have a think...

Twelve hours to save Portugal from itself

In the past, it's been quite rare for countries to allow non-residents to vote in their Eurovision pre-selections. I think the only time I managed to vote in a selection other than the UK's was Greece a couple of years ago, which was a slightly interminable experience, because I had to sit through a mammoth show waiting for the very narrow voting window. Ireland allowed votes from the UK last year (presumably to encourage participation from Northern Ireland) but a similar problem applied and I gave up in despair! So I'm delighted to say Portugal have made it really easy this year, and are holding an online-only preliminary vote to decide the twelve songs that will go through to the final of Festival da Canção 2011. The poll seems to close at noon today, the 27th (although it might be midnight - the Google translation is a bit ambiguous).

But...a mystery. I defy anyone to listen to the snippets of those songs and not conclude that Carla Moreno's dance track Sobrevivo is the best choice by some distance. So why on earth is it trailing so badly behind the cringeworthy A luta é alegria? Perhaps the only thing that can be said in favour of the latter song is that it's vaguely reminiscent of the quirky O meu coração não tem cor, the song that took Portugal to its best ever placing in the contest in 1996 (a mere 6th). But it doesn't have anything like the same charm, and in any case 1996 might as well be a million years ago in Eurovision terms.

In spite of the title of this post, there's no way of actually preventing the offending song from going through at this stage - with twelve qualifiers, it's bound to make it. So instead of fretting over the "top of the table clash", I decided I might as well use my vote more effectively by looking at the two songs that are effectively battling it out to secure the twelfth and last place in the final. Irritatingly, I found I liked them both more or less equally (which can't be said for several further up the leaderboard). But as Margaret Beckett once sarcastically told Neil Kinnock, "you have to choose...you have to choose all the time". So I've plumped for Esta Noite Vamos Curtir by Pop Pins. May God forgive me.

A cut out and keep guide to navigating through the voting process in Portuguese :

1. You have three votes.

2. You can cast all three votes for the same song, or spread them around.

3. After clicking on the song you want to vote for, click on 'Vote Nesta Música'.

4. Enter your email address and the verification code provided.

5. Click the activation link you are sent by email.

6. Do NOT vote for A luta é alegria. Please. I'm begging you.

A Cinderella Eurovision

What is it about Albania and the Eurovision? Every December they unveil their entry for the following year's contest far earlier than other countries, and with few exceptions it usually sounds pretty ropey. But at some point between then and May, magic dust is sprinkled, the fairy godmother waves her wand, and it transpires that the Cinderella of the Balkans shall be going to the ball after all. You hear their entry again, and it's hard to believe it's the exact same song as the disaster area you first encountered before Christmas.

But Albania wasn't alone in exhibiting a Cinderella effect in last night's first semi-final - which is just as well, as on the basis of the national selections this had been shaping up to be one of the lowest-quality contests in a good few years. If Thursday's semi follows a similar pattern, it looks like it might just be all right on the night come Saturday. In particular, Norway are doing themselves proud as hosts - pulling off the ingenious masterstroke of using presenters who look like they might actually have hosted television programmes once or twice before.

As for the results, I'm pleased that my prediction for the ten qualifiers was almost spot-on - the one blemish was that I had Finland pencilled in instead of Moldova. I'm particularly delighted to have been right about Portugal, as I feared my heart might have been ruling my head on that one. My biggest disappointments were seeing Slovakia and Malta fail to progress - I hadn't rated Malta previously, but it was a strong performance on the night. It's slightly galling to see Russia (as usual) go through in the place of those superior entries, but I'm not remotely surprised - 50% jury voting was never going to make more than a small dent in the traditional political voting from Estonia, Latvia, Moldova and Belarus.

Performance of the night - Iceland, by a country mile. I'm beginning to toy with the possibility they might just have a chance of winning - but then I have a feeling I probably did the same with the song's alter ego two years ago (ultimately it finished well down the leaderboard in the final).

Eurovision 2010 prediction : Tuesday's semi-final

Well, what with all the excitement of the general election (for 'excitement' read 'unremitting gloom') I've shamefully neglected the Eurovision season this year. But I couldn't let the contest go by without at least pitting my wits against other bloggers in the prediction stakes. At this stage two years ago, I correctly predicted all ten qualifiers from the first semi-final (I may possibly have mentioned this once or twice before). Not so hot last year, but seven out of ten was respectable enough. Let's see how I get on this time - in no particular order, these are the ten countries I think will make it through tonight...

Bosnia-Herzegovina
Russia
Portugal
Finland
Iceland
Greece
Belgium
Albania
Serbia
Belarus

I wouldn't have given Finland a prayer when I first heard the song, but I'm guessing the vibrant visual performance and the song's distinctiveness might well be enough. Iceland deserves to fall flat on its face after entering a near carbon-copy of their 2008 effort This Is My Life, but of course almost by definition it has a similar appeal to that song, so I suspect we'll be seeing it again on Saturday night.

As for me - well, for a third year in a row, my heart seems to be with Portugal. I've never even been to Portugal...

Eurovision reflections

I think at this time last year I managed a decent-length post on this topic, but I'm in one of those frames of mind where I think I'd struggle to string together a decent sentence, let alone seven proper paragraphs. Perhaps a numbered list of the main points will do to be getting on with!

1) Still don't quite get Norway, but it was obvious even to me it was going to win. The 'most points ever' thing I do find slightly odd.

2) I'm surprised and thrilled that Iceland finished second - when I predicted fourth place for them last night I actually worried that might be a touch on the high side. It genuinely is one of my all-time favourite Eurovision songs, so I'm glad Europe went for it (unlike some of my other favourites down the years!).

3) On second thoughts, maybe I wasn't so foolish in voting for Out of Control in the Greek national final!

4) The notion that Graham Norton and Andrew Lloyd-Webber were putting about that 'this is a music contest again'...well, any UK Eurovision fan will always be grateful for some positive spin at last, but it might be a touch premature in this case. The result tonight was actually remarkably similar to 2006 - a worthy runaway winner from western Europe masking the huge amount of political voting that was still going on. Romania and Moldova swapped votes, Andorra voted for Spain, Cyprus voted for Greece, Finland voted for Estonia (their neighbours and linguistic cousins), and it was pretty close to business as usual in the Balkans. I'm sure there were plenty of other examples I can't think of off the top of my head.

5) I wanted Paddy O'Connell to succeed Terry Wogan - but I was wrong. Graham Norton was excellent tonight, with exactly the right blend of cynicism, absurdity and positivity where it was warranted. It was only on the latter element that Terry Wogan has been found wanting in recent years.

6) The one area in which Norton was inferior to Wogan was in his failure to anticipate the most predictable political voting. Wogan would have predicted the destination of Andorra and Cyprus' douze points several seconds in advance - whereas Norton was seriously wondering if Andorra might be Patricia Kaas fans!

7) Norton also tried to maintain the tension for the last half-hour of voting on the question of whether the UK would stay in the top five, even though that was never in doubt. What was very close was the race for fourth place between Turkey and the UK, but he seemed totally oblivious to that!

8) As a UK supporter, I thought we had a genuine chance for all of about twenty seconds. When the first set of votes gave us ten points and Norway twelve it looked possible - but as soon as we got zero from the second set of votes I knew it was going to be a patchy night.

9) Why, oh why, oh why didn't I take Keith Mills seriously to task this year rather than last year over his anti-UK agenda? His initial prediction for It's My Time yesterday was 16th-20th, which he very generously hardened up to 16th in his final call. And what do you know? He's brazenly glossing over the fact that he got it so spectacularly wrong. Now there's a surprise.

10) Talking of Mr Mills, he does have this tendency to utterly convince himself that something very improbable is true and then flog the point to death in spite of a mass of contradictory evidence. A good example this year was his assumption that Lloyd-Webber was on the stage solely to impress the juries - from which he concluded it was likely to 'backfire' because the voting public would dislike it. But where is the slightest evidence that was ever the UK's thinking? For my money Lloyd-Webber was on stage to impress both the juries and the public with his celebrity - whether it worked or not I don't know, but I've little doubt that was always the idea.

11) Alsou was a good choice as host (pity she didn't get a chance to sing in place of the unfunny interludes), and I actually quite liked the intervention from space. Wasn't that done when the contest was in Latvia as well?

12) I actually made two slightly different predictions last night (one on Politicalbetting.com and one here), and I should have stuck with the first one because it was more accurate! I got last-minute cold feet about the UK's potential for a top five placing.

13) I'm surprised how poorly both Portugal and Malta did.

14) In the end I simply couldn't decide - so I voted for both Portugal and Estonia! At least Estonia received the decent placing they richly deserved.

So here's to Oslo 2010. As I hinted above, I hope the EBU look at tweaking the voting system a little further. For one thing, what's the point of having ordinary members of the public (ie. potential political voters) on the national juries when the public can vote by televote anyway?

Ah ah ah I, I knew I was right

Except in the case of Andorra, who in spite of me wishing as hard as I could failed to make it through. Quite simply, the live performance didn't match the quality of the song (almost the exact reverse could be said of Malta). I also seem to have had something of a blind spot with Sweden, which most people were expecting would qualify but I thought would fall short. Probably it was distinctiveness that won the day there. But the qualifier that completely flabbergasted me was Finland - the song is OK but the performance was as uninspiring as in the rehearsals. It can't be put down to political voting so it will remain a mystery (unless it transpires it was the song saved by the juries). So in the end I only correctly predicted seven out of the ten qualifiers, although in my defence I did say that Israel were the next most likely qualifiers (on the subject of which, what has Mira Awad done with her hair?).

I said last night I would be voting for Bosnia, unless there was some sort of revelation in the live performances. As it turned out, there was a revelation, and ironically it came from a song I already rated highly - Portugal. As much as I loved the song, I couldn't imagine it translating well to the Eurovision stage, but I couldn't have been more wrong. So, for the second year in a row, I voted for Portugal!

Thoughts on the show itself - well, I'm not sure 'magic buttons' are really much of an improvement on envelopes. It's still not too late for a drastic rethink before Thursday night, though. How about a 'magic tree', from which a 'magic apple' falls off every time you give it a good shake. And then the apple 'magically' splits open to reveal the name of a qualifier for the final. No? Oh well, just a thought.

My prediction for first Eurovision semi-final (Tuesday)

Before I begin, I'll just modestly point out that I correctly predicted all ten of the qualifiers at this stage last year (and I'll conveniently gloss over my prediction for the second semi!). Anyway, in no particular order, here are the ten countries I think will qualify for the final tonight -

Turkey
Switzerland
Bosnia-Herzegovina
Andorra
Romania
Malta
Armenia
Iceland
Portugal
Belarus

As with last year, I'm basing this partly on my opinion of the songs, partly on what I've seen of the rehearsals via YouTube, and partly on the familiar political voting patterns (although of course the fact that the juries choose one qualifier complicates matters). I have to admit there may be a danger of my heart ruling my head here - as regular readers will know Iceland and Andorra are my two favourite songs in the contest by miles, and I've also got something of a soft spot for Portugal. I think I'm on fairly safe ground with Portugal and also with Iceland (whatever Keith Mills might think) but Andorra is a borderline call after their particularly ropey first rehearsal. Things have improved somewhat since then, but not enough for me to be fully confident. If they fail to make it, I think Israel might be the next most likely qualifier.

And you might be wondering - which will I be plumping for in the public vote, Iceland or Andorra? Answer (bizarrely) - neither! As I mentioned last year, I have my own long-standing personal rule that I only vote for songs sung entirely in a language other than English, so I just choose the best one that fits into that category. In this case (barring a revelation in the live performances) that will be Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Solutions to the Eurovision political voting problem

I went out of my way to defend Terry Wogan on the All Kinds of Everything blog yesterday (I know, I've got an unhealthy fixation with that place), so it was a bit disappointing to hear him make such fatalistic remarks about the future of the Eurovision Song Contest in his commentary tonight. If he's ready to call it a day, that's his prerogative, but the idea that the entirety of western Europe is going to join him in doing so is a bit melodramatic. I wouldn't deny for a moment there's a serious problem with political voting, but the irony is that this is the year a significant first step was made towards addressing that issue. The new rules that applied at the semi-final stage successfully produced a fair balance between western and eastern qualifiers for the first time in years, so now all that's needed is a similar innovation to sort out the problem in the final. Off the top of my head, I can think of four possibilities that would provide at least a partial solution.

1) Allow each country to award points to fifteen different entries, instead of the current ten. This wouldn't have been feasible in the past, but now that only the top marks are read out, it would no longer slow proceedings down at all. Of course, under this system the top points would still be awarded on a neighbourly basis, but it's reasonable to assume the lower set of points would be distributed more on merit, leading to a fairer overall outcome. An example to illustrate - if a country happened to finish twelfth out of twenty-five in every single televote, under the current system it would finish last with no points at all. That simply can't be considered a fair reflection of the result people are actually voting for.

2) Allow each country to award points to five eastern countries, and five western countries. This would have the advantage of still allowing viewers to decide the result, and still to vote for whichever country they like - indeed it would be a strong incentive to cast two votes - but it would also, at a stroke, neutralise the in-built advantage eastern countries currently enjoy.

3) The BBC could surrender its 'Big Four' status in exchange for something more worthwhile - separate representation in the contest for Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It would be the right thing to do on its own merits, but it would also produce a new British Isles voting bloc that could balance out its counterparts in the Balkans, the Baltic, Scandinavia, and the ex-Soviet Union. And if anyone tells you Scotland would never award high marks to England, I can tell you for certain they're wrong. Apart from anything else, about 8% of the population is English-born.

4) Revert to a 50/50 weighting for the jury and televote. Probably the simplest solution, in that it's been done before, at least in some countries.

On the contest itself, I was a bit disappointed to see Russia run away with it - as I said before Serbia, Portugal and Albania were my favourites, but I would still have been much happier to see Greece, Ukraine or Armenia take the crown than Russia. Ah well, it's all a matter of personal taste at the end of the day. At least I had the satisfaction of seeing my prediction turn out to be close to the money, although it wasn't exactly a tough one to call this year! And at least the song that was 'clearly the worst in the whole contest' (© Keith Mills 2008) somehow managed to finish 5th out of 43 entries. Wonder how it managed that?

Prediction for Eurovision final (Saturday)

There's an episode of the 1980s sitcom Just Good Friends where Jan Francis' character repeatedly tells Paul Nicholas there's "something missing" in their relationship without specifying what, which eventually results in an exasperated Nicholas screaming "WHAT IS THIS THING?". I felt a bit like that today when trying to make sense of the reports of Jelena Tomašević's performance in the final round of rehearsals. The most frequent comment was that she was in good voice, but that there was "something" missing. WHAT IS THIS THING?

Even leaving aside this missing thing that everyone seems utterly incapable of articulating (maybe Andy Abraham's nightmare vision has already come to pass), I was always a bit sceptical that Serbia could quite pull it off. In my view, it's definitely the class song of the field, but then I thought the same about Serbia & Montenegro in 2004 (they came second) and Bosnia-Herzegovina in 2006 (they came third). So my prediction for Serbia is top three, but without any embarrassing need for Zeljko Joksimovic to present the trophy to himself. ("Great song, Zelkjo." "Thanks, Zeljko, you did a great job presenting too. And I love what you've done with your hair.")

But if not Serbia, then who? The bookies seem to agree (although they've been spectacularly wrong before) that the only other countries in serious contention are Russia, Ukraine, Greece, Sweden, and possibly Armenia. Personally, I just can't see Sweden winning - Hero is slightly higher quality than their usual fare, but it's still sticking to the same basic formula that frequently delivers them fifth or sixth place but no higher. I think Greece and Armenia will similarly come up short, so that leaves a battle between Ukraine and Russia. If that's the case, I feel Russia might just sneak it, if only because it cunningly draws the ice skating and violin-loving demographic into the pool of potential televoters (I'm being flippant).

So my prediction is :

Winners - Russia
2nd - Ukraine
3rd - Serbia

Potential dark horses :

Portugal
Norway (aka 'clearly the worst song in the contest', © Keith Mills 2008)

Mr Mills' musings also lead me to have an even greater interest in the fate of the UK this year. He confidently stated at a ridiculously early stage (when many songs had yet to even be selected) that Andy Abraham was 'certain' to finish in the bottom five, and was highly likely to finish last. I responded that I felt he could achieve the UK's best result since Jessica Garlick, which would mean a top fifteen placing. Unfortunately, I made that prediction before the UK received its lousy place in the draw, so I'm less confident than I was, but to be honest I'd settle for top twenty - since that would be sufficient to show up Mr Mills' "certainty" for the closed-minded nonsense it always was. Here's hoping.

Por-tu-gal!

Do you know, I actually found myself punching the air when Portugal were named as the final qualifier. I had to remind myself I've never even been to Portugal, but it was my second-favourite song of the night, and I would have been heartbroken if it hadn't made it through. When there was only one spot in the final remaining, I honestly believed it was going to Malta.

And as for my favourite Albania - well I'm obviously rubbish at predictions, but on the plus side there is some justice in this world after all! My dream result for Saturday would now be a Serbian victory, with Portugal and Albania also in the top ten. And a top fifteen finish for Andy Abraham and the UK, if only for the pleasure of watching the sainted Keith Mills being forced to eat his words - again.