Eurovision 2008

[Test2]

Yes I know almost all songs are the same and boring. I liked Spain because they were different and funny. They ended in 16th place so they are not on the poll

Poll is maximum 15 items so I included best 15 songs (by points).

 

[Afraid2]

only 2 of my favourite are in those 15, too bad.

 

[elaj2]

All of them sucked. Seriously.

 

[Gytaz2]

I liked Bosnia. Russia was probably the worst.

 

[re5pectas2]

France for me ganja man DD

 

[qiangdade2]

This year's version of the eurovision sucked...
Russian song was crap and even more so was the ukranian and greek one.
I was rooting for armenia, azerbaijan, bosnia, bulgaria, lithuania (last 2 didn't even advance!!).
The latvian song is the worst thing i've heard and seen in my entire life and it wasn't even funny. It reminded me of this, but a gazillion times worse. Yet it was prefered to bulgaria or lithuania!!!

Like the austrians say, eurovision has taken a complete political turn: The soviet bloc votes each other, the former yugoslavians do the same, as well as the scandinavians. Just look at the recent winners: Latvia, Russia, Ukraine, Serbia, Greece (participating with a girl that grew up in sweden and is very popular among scandinavians) and the exceptions Turkey, and Finland. I doubt we will ever see a western european country winning.

PS: The russian and the ukranian participations were managed by the same greek guy Psinakis, lol

 

[goga782]

Guys, if you don't like the music you can her in the Eurovision contest, don't watch it. It is not a contest for rock titles or indy music. Originally, it's about chansons but right now you can find different styles there. Just not what you like. Thus, there is no need to proclaim this contest as boring. The songs are different and yesterday we had a chance to witness different good songs and several very interesting performances. What Idon't like though is the voting procedure. In a very seldom case a song has a chance to win because of its quality. Folks vote due to geographical or ethnical reasons. Stil, you can see that lots of people like certain musical styles. Israel doesn't have any European neighbors, it was probably the only country without a show this time. Pure singing. And it still got votes from nearly everybody and landed with lots of points on a very good 9th place.

 

[Marius1232]

Russian song was crap and even more so was the ukranian and greek one.

I actually liked Kalomira's song (from Greece) the most - I know it's totally within "within the frame of the format" or whatever they say, but the chorus is absolutely catchy, there's real melody there. It's got that certain hook. (Melody-wise, it reminds me of Ruslana's Eurovision-winning piece a few years back, which was really great.)

After that - France, Serbia and Israel.

Absolutely didn't like Dima Bilan (along with many others).

 

[Marius1232]

Russian song was crap and even more so was the ukranian and greek one.

I actually liked Kalomira's song (from Greece) - for its catchy refrain.

After that - France, Serbia and Israel.

Absolutely didn't like Dima Bilan.

 

[fasoulaki2]

My favorites were Armenia and Spain. I am wondering why Spain got so less points.

Regarding the assumed influence of "politics" in the voting procedure I have the following opinion.

It is obvious that you need to have your lobby i.e. several countries that would support your country's song independent of quality just because of sympathy.

Greece gets support from Cyprus, Bulgaria, some times from Serbia, Albania, Rumania and Turkey. Armenia is a natural greek ally, too.

In addition it is very helpful if your country has a lot of expatriates that are living in neutral countries and can influence the televoting like Turks and Greeks in Germany do, or like greek Cypriots and greek students in the UK do.

From these countries you can get the big points to have a higher ranking but these kind of votes are not enough to win the contest. To win the competition you need to get points from every country. The small points ranging from 1-7 points are very crucial if you want to have a chance to be the winner.

The problem with Germany for example is that nor do they have a lobby either a lot of expatriots and It seems that there were not a lot of german tourist in Spain that were interested in the Song contest this year. But in addition the songs that have been sent to the contest the last years were all of them to egocentric. They Germans did not even try to please the european "taste of music" that is connected to this kind of event.

 

[quince2]

Guys, if you don't like the music you can her in the Eurovision contest, don't watch it. It is not a contest for rock titles or indy music. Originally, it's about chansons but right now you can find different styles there. Just not what you like. Thus, there is no need to proclaim this contest as boring. The songs are different and yesterday we had a chance to witness different good songs and several very interesting performances. What Idon't like though is the voting procedure. In a very seldom case a song has a chance to win because of its quality. Folks vote due to geographical or ethnical reasons. Stil, you can see that lots of people like certain musical styles. Israel doesn't have any European neighbors, it was probably the only country without a show this time. Pure singing. And it still got votes from nearly everybody and landed with lots of points on a very good 9th place.

do you know why isreal did get those FEW VOTES?, because there is quite big communities of Jews in every country like , United Kingdom about half million. there's loads in every country .


For me the best song was from Sebastien Teller from France, this guys rocks just chilling music, also his producer is guy manuel from Daft Punks Whom i Love.

 

[EugeneUkraine2]

Second time in a row second place. What a pity

Belan victory has politycal background. Just look - almost all ex-USSR nations give Russia 12 points

 

[rusher2]

For me the best song was from Sebastien Teller from France, this guys rocks just chilling music, also his producer is guy manuel from Daft Punks Whom i Love.

+1 man, France had such a beautiful song. It's a pity that people simply don't vote for big EBU "donor'' countries.

Belan victory has politycal background. Just look - almost all ex-USSR nations give Russia 12 points

I would say it's also Bilan factor. If it wouldn't be Dima, all countries wouldn't give Russia 12 pts in my opinion. Especially, I don't think Lithuania would give if it wouldn't be Bilan who is very popular in Russian minority (and not only in this minority) in all these countries.

But really, I'm scared by how much Russia won it. Even if they would send some drunk guy from Chelyabinsk they would end up in top 3 because of Russians in ex-Soviet territory voting for Russia mostly to only make a point that "we are still here and strong". It's the same as after the Bronze riots Russians got 12 points from Estonia because the minority only wanted to make a point. This year too- 12 Montenegro points go to Serbia,and if Kosovo participates next year then Serbia will have another 12 points.
Of course some countries are only very good neighbors and with common historical experience like Denmark and Iceland exchanging 12 points for each other, Lithuania and Estonia- both 10 points for Latvia. Ireland giving 12 points to Latvia (I think with a help of Lithuanians because with this kind of song we had this year it would be a miracle to collect 12 points there with only our own people) and what was the most shocking- Great Britain 10 points ? With this kind of a song? How many Latvians are there and how hard they voted or this was also common effort with Lithuanians? Or Brits just liked the song about their glorious ''pirate'' past

Our tv commentator suggested having independent music experts (from the USA, Japan, Australia etc.) having 50 % of the vote. Maybe this would be a solution because now it seems this starts to become a private club of Russia, Ukraine, Serbia and Greece.

btw Estonia's and Latvia's wins had nothing to do with ex-Soviet co-operation. Firstly because Russia would never vote for Latvia or Estonia (at least they wouldn't give many points to us) because Putin has made us very unwelcome countries in the eyes of Russians. Secondly at that time only Russia participated there from these countries.

 

[qiangdade2]

+1 man, France had such a beautiful song. It's a pity that people simply don't vote for big EBU "donor'' countries.

I would say it's also Bilan factor. If it wouldn't be Dima, all countries wouldn't give Russia 12 pts in my opinion. Especially, I don't think Lithuania would give if it wouldn't be Bilan who is very popular in Russian minority (and not only in this minority) in all these countries.

But really, I'm scared by how much Russia won it. Even if they would send some drunk guy from Chelyabinsk they would end up in top 3 because of Russians in ex-Soviet territory voting for Russia mostly to only make a point that "we are still here and strong". It's the same as after the Bronze riots Russians got 12 points from Estonia because the minority only wanted to make a point. This year too- 12 Montenegro points go to Serbia,and if Kosovo participates next year then Serbia will have another 12 points.
Of course some countries are only very good neighbors and with common historical experience like Denmark and Iceland exchanging 12 points for each other, Lithuania and Estonia- both 10 points for Latvia. Ireland giving 12 points to Latvia (I think with a help of Lithuanians because with this kind of song we had this year it would be a miracle to collect 12 points there with only our own people) and what was the most shocking- Great Britain 10 points ? With this kind of a song? How many Latvians are there and how hard they voted or this was also common effort with Lithuanians? Or Brits just liked the song about their glorious ''pirate'' past

Our tv commentator suggested having independent music experts (from the USA, Japan, Australia etc.) having 50 % of the vote. Maybe this would be a solution because now it seems this starts to become a private club of Russia, Ukraine, Serbia and Greece.

btw Estonia's and Latvia's wins had nothing to do with ex-Soviet co-operation. Firstly because Russia would never vote for Latvia or Estonia (at least they wouldn't give many points to us) because Putin has made us very unwelcome countries in the eyes of Russians. Secondly at that time only Russia participated there from these countries.

Yet greece has only one "ally" to get the 12 points from: Cyprus
Unlike Russia, Ukraine, Serbia.
Imo in the next years it will always be ukraine and russia competing with some annual surprise maybe (like this year's greece).
I would suggest to the EBU donor countries to split in many smaller countries if they ever wanna have a chance.

 

[fasoulaki2]

Yet greece has only one "ally" to get the 12 points from: Cyprus

In the old times it was like that but nowadays a lot more countries give Greece the 12 points out of pure sympathy or greek expatriates.

I would suggest to the EBU donor countries to split in many smaller countries if they ever wanna have a chance.

I would suggest them to really try to win the contest. Germany should send Rammstein or Tokio Hotel to Russia next year.

 

[goga782]

do you know why isreal did get those FEW VOTES?, because there is quite big communities of Jews in every country like , United Kingdom about half million. there's loads in every country .


For me the best song was from Sebastien Teller from France, this guys rocks just chilling music, also his producer is guy manuel from Daft Punks Whom i Love.

Actually, only 250.000 Jews do live in the UK. Jews can be found in many European countries but rather in small numbers. The only notable exceptions are France, UK, Germany and Russia. Bigger communities (five-figures) exist in _the Ukraine and to a certain extent in the Czech Republic. Everthing else is not much. The Israeli song this time around was simply up to the taste of many South-Eastern Europeans.

France had a funny performance that would rathe beliong some decades back in time. The song was also performed in English!!! Otherwise, nothing special. I don't know why people are talking that much about the Spanish song. Probably the worst stuff of the whole event. Well, wait. The German song was probably the worst song ever performed by No Angels. Bad song, badly sung.

 

[goga782]

Second time in a row second place. What a pity

Belan victory has politycal background. Just look - almost all ex-USSR nations give Russia 12 points

Well, Dima Bilan is very popular among Russian speaking people. The USD 10.000.000 promotion campaign before the Eurovision Song Contest didn't hurt either. They could also count on Hungarian votes and votes of all figure skating fans as Evgeniy Plushchenko is one of the most reknowned and brilliant male skaters ever.

Imho, the Ukrainian song was better. A beautiful singer with a great voice and a fiery performance.

I would suggest them to really try to win the contest. Germany should send Rammstein or Tokio Hotel to Russia next year.

I suggested the same thing, while talking to a friend today. Send Rammstein to the contest and you have a real chance to win. Their music has nothing to do with the ESC but the Fins are coming with hard rock, too. Hey, great minds think alike

 

[qiangdade2]

I found a link about the russian diaspora numbers here

Israel gave russia 12 points. 1mil people of russian origin live in israel
Estonia 12 points. 350k russians in estonia
Latvia 12 points. 650k russians in latvia
Lithuania 12 points. 220k russians in lithuania
Ukraine 12 points. 8,3 mil russians in ukraine
Belarus 12 points. 1,1 mil russians in belarus
Finland 10 points. Insignificant minority there, bout 33k. They probs liked the song
Hungary 10 points. They probably just liked the ice skater like goga said
Romania 10 points. Probably also a fair vote since only 30k russians live there
Moldova 10 points. 200k russians in moldova
Armenia 10 points. Probsdue to being ex soviet
Serbia 10 points. Probably due to all the support they've getting from russia in the kosovo matter
Germany 8 points. 180k russians live there and even more are russia germans
Azerbaijan 8 points. 150k russians in azerbaijan
Malta 8 points. Probably malta just liked the song
Georgia 8 points. About 70k russians there, but it sounds fair anyway
Montenegro 8 points. Lots of serbs live in montenegro, plus montenegrins and serbs are really close, thus same reasons as for serbia.

Add to that the devotion of expatriates voting and that in many countries russians comprise 10-20% of the total population (besides dima maybe being popular in some of these countries) and i thibk we get a clear picture how political this result was.

PS. While watching the contest i also said to my girlfriend that germany should send rammstein They are extremelly popular in many countries

 

[kestas2]

Guys, if you don't like the music you can her in the Eurovision contest, don't watch it. It is not a contest for rock titles or indy music. Originally, it's about chansons but right now you can find different styles there. Just not what you like. Thus, there is no need to proclaim this contest as boring. The songs are different and yesterday we had a chance to witness different good songs and several very interesting performances.

well, it's not a contest of pop song either, coz none of those singers will ever make it to the global stage with what they performed.. why? because they suck. and Westerners will not win not due to the voting flaws, but only because they always manage to send the most ridiculous camp sh*t they can find (like Spain did). and there's no wonder - no respectable performer wants to go (unless his/her respectability is the thing of the past and the desperation creeps in..).
on the other hand, everyone's got the right to judge things and I'm sure there are lots of people who are more quallified to judge Eurovision material than all of its fans put together. btw, I didn't notice anyone calling it boring (unless Test did it - he's blocked ). It's as boring as Jackass or some retarded reality show about five teenagers. it's just cheap, low quality, no added value entertainment, simple as that, imho.

 

[re5pectas2]

.... Lithuania and Estonia- both 10 points for Latvia. Ireland giving 12 points to Latvia (I think with a help of Lithuanians because with this kind of song we had this year it would be a miracle to collect 12 points there with only our own people) and what was the most shocking- Great Britain 10 points ? With this kind of a song? How many Latvians are there and how hard they voted or this was also common effort with Lithuanians? ...

after ireland voting 12 to Latvia, comentator said: "saunuoliai broliukai, darbuojas" - "well done brothers" (or smth very like this, don't remember exact ) anyway, during semifinal Lith and Lat exchanged 12 pts
and somehow, we got the new "ESC friendly country" in Georgia face
again politics?

it's allways about neiberhoods and emigration