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Best Eurovision songs

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    #26
    I absolutely remember that Door in My Face song, no idea of the group's name though, well done. Last iirc.

    I will defend Bardo, if required.
    Last edited by KGR; 22-04-2018, 22:39.

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      #27
      Originally posted by The Awesome Berbaslug!!! View Post
      [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL06SqEhsok]I'm not saying that Ireland benefited from Being the country allowed sing in English that wasn't called the UK, but It's worth noting that we've barely made the top 50 since everyone else was allowed sing in english too.
      When did that change? By 1974 ABBA were performing in English, as did Holland's Teach-In with their "Ding-A-Dong".

      Which reminds me of the Spitting Image Heineken ad that made fun of the phonetic nonsense lyrics (something that Britain itself succeeded with themselves, via Lulu).

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        #28
        There was no restriction on language from the start of the contest up to 1965, when a rule was introduced that songs had to be in a national language of the country. This rule was briefly dropped from 1973 to 1976 (so allowing Waterloo) before being dropped permanently in 1999.

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          #29
          Originally posted by The Awesome Berbaslug!!! View Post
          Johnny Logan seems to be quite good craic.
          He was/is, somewhat - we had him as a guest on the NMTB Eurovision special (c 2002) and he talked and drank a lot, pre-show. As I've recounted before, when I was first introduced to him, he did that 'dude' handshake thing - which rather took me by surprise.

          I'll give a small nod to Teach-In: rottenly-translated lyrics, but a good pop melody.

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            #30
            Yeah, I rather enjoy it, though I'm not sure whether it is a question of quality or nostalgia.

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              #31
              I have a vivid memory of seeing Edwyn Collins covering Ding-a Dong on Eurotrash, in a great safari-suit outfit

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                #32
                "Hold me now " is the club song of Bohemian fc and gets played before every home game, Johnny has helped out with fundraising gigs on a couple of occasions, he's an honorary member and drops in for games when he's in town (he lives in Denmark)
                "

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                  #33
                  A friend of mine used to date Niamh Kavanagh and she sang at his sister's wedding so I'll give a vote for "in your eyes " particularly since she beat Sonia for the Uk in one of the tightest finishes ever

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                    #34
                    Niamh Kavanagh really could sing. Like strip tiles off a wall with raw power kind of singing. Much like What's another year, I don't know if there's anything particularly Eurovision about that song though. You could see it appearing on a whitney Houston album as a seventh or eighth track.

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                      #35
                      Originally posted by Southport Zeb View Post
                      There was no restriction on language from the start of the contest up to 1965, when a rule was introduced that songs had to be in a national language of the country. This rule was briefly dropped from 1973 to 1976 (so allowing Waterloo) before being dropped permanently in 1999.
                      That's amazing, it had never struck me in so many words before that that rule had to have been in abeyance when Waterloo happened, so to speak.

                      So can we reasonably extrapolate that Abba, had they not luckily coincided with that one brief window when it was possible, would've represented Sweden in Swedish – or else not appeared full stop? They wouldn't have had an instant international smash on their hands, and who knows what would or wouldn't have happened to the rest of their colossally successful career. Amazing to think the whole enduring Abba phenomenon is a lucky side-effect of the whims of a few European television apparatchiks in the early/mid-'70s.
                      Last edited by Various Artist; 23-04-2018, 21:08.

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                        #36
                        ABBA would probably still have won -- singing in English was not a guarantee of success -- and released Waterloo in different languages. They had already recorded the German version of it for release in the Schlager market there, which seems to have been an initial target, as the Schlager sound of songs like "Hasta Manana" and "I Do I Do I Do" suggest. In fact, I think they already had had some chart action in Germany before the Eurovision, and with the English versions of their songs. "Waterloo" probably would have been a hit in English, even in Germany.

                        "Waterloo" might have become a less major hit in Britain, but there ABBA's career stalled anyway after that hit, until "SOS" a year and a half later. They were doing much better in Europe and, somehow, in Australia. In fact, it was their success in Australia that kick-started ABBA's comeback in Britain. Though it's also very plausible that "SOS", or "Mama Mia" afterwards, would have become a hit on the back of success in Europe, and on strength of its superior quality, setting in motion that incredible run of great hit singles.
                        Last edited by G-Man; 24-04-2018, 04:00.

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                          #37
                          That's a relief, I was getting sort of meta-worried for this alternative timeline for a minute there. Would be terrible to have a world without Abba.

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                            #38
                            Well, here's my Top 25. Well, sort of. For public consumption I included some of better latter tracks in place of more '60s and '70s contenders. Still no Eastern Europeans for ad hoc though.

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                              #39
                              Originally posted by G-Man View Post
                              4. Gildo Horn - Gildo hat Euch lieb (Germany, 1996)
                              Without checking, I know that's at least two years out. In late 1997, the woman I'd just started going out with made me go and see "this bloke called Guildo Horn. It's Schlager and shit, but he's fantastic to watch."

                              And he was. He played in the Prinzenbar, which is full of stairs and banisters and what have you. It was like watching Spiderman trying to be Olga Korbut after drinking a gallon of Holsten.

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                                #40
                                Originally posted by G-Man View Post
                                Well, here's my Top 25. Well, sort of. For public consumption I included some of better latter tracks in place of more '60s and '70s contenders. Still no Eastern Europeans for ad hoc though.
                                Don't think we didn't check, and didn't notice, cabbage guzzler

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                                  #41
                                  Originally posted by G-Man View Post
                                  "Waterloo" might have become a less major hit in Britain, but there ABBA's career stalled anyway after that hit, until "SOS" a year and a half later. They were doing much better in Europe and, somehow, in Australia. In fact, it was their success in Australia that kick-started ABBA's comeback in Britain. Though it's also very plausible that "SOS", or "Mama Mia" afterwards, would have become a hit on the back of success in Europe, and on strength of its superior quality, setting in motion that incredible run of great hit singles.
                                  The initial choice of singles was completely wrong for the UK market - Ring Ring was received as merely generic Europop in the wake of its all-conquering predecessor, Waterloo - which as has been documented before, owed a fair bit to the work of (then- very popular) Roy Wood in its arrangement/production. I Do (x3) was, as you rightly say, way too 'Schlager' for the British charts - even amid the pop-culture slop of summer 1975.

                                  When SOS hit the airwaves that autumn, Abba were effectively a 'new group' to the ears of the UK market: its near-mournful sound fitted far better to a post-glam time of soul-searching ballads and AOR-pop. The song was never off Radio 1/Luxembourg, as I recall, receiving even more airplay than some of the group's subsequent number ones.
                                  Last edited by Jah Womble; 26-04-2018, 08:48.

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                                    #42
                                    In fairness, what else could they have released in 1974 to follow "Waterloo"? With "SOS" they sort of were a "new group", having left behind the heavy nodding towards Schlager.

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                                      #43
                                      I've no idea, but they must've had some kind of catalogue by then, surely? I can recall thinking even at the time that Ring Ring was p*ss-weak compared to Waterloo - and wasn't remotely surprised when it failed to make the Top 30 here.

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                                        #44
                                        The record buying public obviously agreed with you Jah but I thought (and still think) the opposite. To me "Waterloo" was bog standard clunky Eurovision. "Ring Ring" was a pop classic. When it failed to hit big though I assumed that was the last we'd ever hear of them...

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                                          #45
                                          "Ring Ring" was a hit in Europe before "Waterloo", so they must have thought it was a good follow-up. Of course, it doesn't compare well to "Waterloo", though it's a decent song on its own merit.

                                          The alternative options to Ring Ring and I Dox3, choosing from the single releases in Germany before the "SOS" comeback, would have been in descending order of quality:

                                          "Honey Honey": The follow-up to "Waterloo" in Germany. Catchy enough but no "Ring Ring"
                                          "So Long": Another glam kind of number and a hit in Germany after "Waterloo", but inferior to "Ring Ring". I think it was released in Britain a failed to chart.
                                          "I've Been Waiting For You": A not unpleasant ballad in the mode of the ballads on 1977's Arrival, but not hit material.
                                          "Hasta Manana": an even more Schlager-type number
                                          "Bang-A-Boomerang": A mid-70s Eurovision type of song which is mildly catchy. If "Ring Ring" and "So Long" failed to cut it, this wouldn't either. It flopped in Germany.
                                          "Nina Pretty Ballerina": an even more Schlager-type number than "Hasta Manana"
                                          "People Need Love" (performed on German TV with a fake Agnetha): another Eurovision type of song, though a 12th place finisher.
                                          "He Is Your Brother": from 1972, begins like a Wings number and descends into a clap-along Schlager number. Notable for a brief musical phrase which would reappear in "SOS"
                                          "Another Town, Another Train": an even more etc
                                          "Love Isn't Easy (But It Sure Is Hard Enough)": From 1973, a total mess of a song with an awful arrangement with Bjorn on lead vocals and shrill backing vocals

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                                            #46
                                            re. Live Report. Here's the TOTP appearance. I think it's a decent power ballad of the era, with some genuine emotion in the vocal (Michael Bolton ish):

                                            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8ileXLhv7s

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                                              #47
                                              Honey, Honey did indeed give Benny and Bjorn another 1974 hit in Britain, but only via the version recorded by Sweet Dreams - a hastily-assembled studio act featuring former Pickettywitch chanteuse Polly Brown as lead vocalist.

                                              Their cover surprisingly made UK #10 that summer, which then saw Polly B appear on Top of the Pops in blackface. Yep. Somehow this act survived to compete the 1976 Song for Europe contest.

                                              (So Long was indeed issued in the UK in late 1974. It failed even to make the Top 50.)

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                                                #48
                                                Vicky Leandros - L'amour Est Bleu
                                                France Gall - Poupée De Cire Poupée De Son


                                                The best two (to my knowledge) by far.

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                                                  #49
                                                  I liked Alexander Rybak's Fairytale so much I downloaded his album. There were a couple of other ok songs on it, but Fairytale was fantastic.

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                                                    #50
                                                    I quite liked the Michael Flatley thing. (He don't half move his fucking arms tho.)

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