You'd be mad to suggest that Sweden is not going to win the OGAE pre-Eurovision vote, thats why I have not paid to much attention to the recent results. However the OGAE Ireland - the Irish branch have released theur votes. So I think that it is a very important to have a look at these as they are somewhat surprising votes.
12 - Sweden - No surprise there. 10 - Spain - It is a surprise to see Spain so far ahead in the vote but it is not surprising to see Spain in the Top 10. 8 - Germany - Definately the biggest surprise of this vote. I don't fully understand how they even got so high but anyhow, thats the result. 7 - France - Its surprising to see France so far up. However Augguns song is well liked in some regions. 6 - Iceland - I'm surprised to see this so far down the list as I thought that Iceland had a very appealing song for Irish listeners. 5 - Italy - Once again no big surprise but I expected the song to be ranked higher. 4 - Estonia - A surprise in the list but not shocking. 3 - Serbia - No surprise there. 2 - Norway - Still not shocking. 1 - Romania - A mild surprise, but not completely so. Irish fans do seem to like this song.
The big and almost shocking absence from the list is the UK. If Engender wants to score well, he will have to score well in Ireland.
I don't have time to write up a review this evening (again) I am sorry about this but please understand things are busy for me at the moment. It is unlikely that they will remain that way when the contest gets going in May but until then reviews cannot be guaranteed to appear, sorry. In the meantime today we will take a look at the OGAE Rest of World who have declared their results being third club to do so. There were no huge surprises there, other than Albania actually receiving two points. Iceland and Sweden came first and second respectively and therefore receive 12 and 10 points.
The worldwide OGAE usually votes very differently to the other 38 clubs but this seems broadly in line with predictions. However it is still to early to look for real trends in the results.
Sweden are continuing to lead the field on 29 points. Iceland are now on 22 points.
In other news the schedule for Eurovision rehearsals has been released. Looking at it covering ESC rehearsals from Ireland will be rather easy given the tie difference. You can see the schedule here.
Before any of the OGAE results come in, before everyone completes their reviews we take a look at who might be doing well across the amazing world of Eurovision Fandom.
This year there is no shortage of songs for die hard fans. I think that there is quite a number of strong songs in Eurovision this year and recently EscToday launched their polls of fans. This a good gauge because the readership of the website is so huge that they give a fairly accurate view of fans thoughts on the songs. So I took a look at the results coming through, and then twisted them around in a simple but bizarre formula to get the fan favourite.
So aside from the limitations of the model so lets have a look at the bottom two on the list.
10 Cyprus
11 Netherlands
12 Romania
So this is a interesting batch of songs. Romania are probably correctly gauged and Netherlands look about right in 11th but as you will see as we go up the list there are surprises. Netherlands don't hold a commanding number of 12's in the poll but as we look at 10's they have quite a few. For me Netherlands song as gotten a surprising reaction from fans. Cyrus being in tenth is a surprise as I had assumed that it would come out in the top 5 of this. I firstly thought that the mathematical model might be wrong but no, it only has around 26% 12's. We now move on to the next couple of songs.
7 Norway
8 UK
9 Germany
I guess the only surprise here Germany, whose song is slightly too inoffensive, in my opinion. I was surprised to see it do so well as it is not being heavily talked about. Norway and the UK is expected, the UK has been gaining as a fan favourite country over the last number of years. Norway, well, is Norway.
4 Spain
5 Italy
6 Serbia
On these figures Serbia might seem a little low but it got more 12's than Italy but a lot less 10's therefore Italy is a bit higher. Spain is a bit surprising to see up that far, with no disrespect to Pastora I still think that it isn't a strong enough song to do as well on the night.
1 Sweden
2 Iceland
3 Slovenia
Sweden is certainly no surprise, the only surprise is the amount of 12's they have received. Sweden scored about 56% of the 12's. Iceland also surprised me by scoring just over 50% of 12's, while I had expected them to do well and indeed in second, but the scale of the 12's really surprised me. Really and truly Slovenia is a shock to see it do so well.
In comparison to last year fans appear to be a lot happier with the songs. Last year in EscToday's polls few songs broke 25% of 12's. This year many songs are breaking 25% (about 12 of them). Last year France and Estonia both were touching 40% however this year the top 2 are breaking 50%.
So this might not be the OGAE, but this is a first look at fan votes. The OGAE usually delivers a highly conservative vote, so it will be interesting to see how it shapes up. Of course I will be keeping a close eye on how these countries vote. Until then we will keep the reviews flowing.
So this morning we had a slightly delayed draw for the running order having previously been sorted into their semi-finals in January. However while the first draw is useful now that we know all the songs, today's draw allows for much deeper analysis. Before we begin our analysis is based on our running order research.
In the final the only important story was the UK getting the first slot. This is broadly not a good thing but if there was a lot of up tempo songs after it it might have a fair shot at the top 10. Italy won't be over happy with their draw given that they are serious contenders. Like last year though we really can't judge the final without knowing all the songs so we move to the semi-finals.
So in semi-final 1 we have..
Montenegro - Really no one seems to have a clue how this will do but it is in a slot that rarely gathers enough to qualify.
Iceland - Not a good draw for Jonsi and Greta. Second is not as bad a place as in the final.
Greece - recent history suggests that third is one of the worst places to be draw, maybe Greece will change this.
Latvia
Albania
Romania - a surprisingly good position mathematically, and being sandwiched between two very different songs will help.
Switzerland
Belgium
Finland - Logical wildcard choice, but not helped by having Belgium just before.
Israel
San Marino
Cyprus - 12 is a great placing, statistically the third highest average score in a semi-final.
Denmark - Nicely sandwiched between Cyprus and Russia.
Russia
Hungary
Austria
Moldova
Ireland - Great placing for Ireland, the average score for the last placed song in a semi-final since 2008 was around 105 points. Being after Moldova also should help Ireland's chances.
Semi Final 2
Serbia - Not a great draw for them, as there are many other Balkan ballads in this semi-final.
FYR Macedonia
Netherlands - Bad draw for them really.
Malta
Belarus
Portugal
Ukraine - Wildcard, nice enough slot.
Bulgaria
Slovenia
Croatia
Sweden - I don't think the running order will impact this song.
Georgia
Turkey
Estonia
Slovakia
Norway - Well positioned overall and nicely between a rock song and piano ballad. Great draw for them
Bosnia and Herzegovia
Lithuania - Not sure if this is a strong closer. Might be the second song not to qualify from last place.
Last night Melodifestivalen was on. Despite the fairly vast amount of criticism of the final this year, very few people actually put their money where their mouth was and watch Romania.
So what happened? Well, all songs were performed and voted on. Loreen won with her great song Euphoria. So let's take a look at how Sweden voted and what the pattern might tell us about Melodifestivalen.
Songs and Success
While the winner of Melodifestivalen was pretty much certain and Danny came in second as expected. However the next few placings were surprising. David and Ulrik tied for third place. They were a bit ahead of where they were expected to be. The big surprise in my view was the poor showing by Molly Sanden and Lisa Miskovsky.
How does Sweden vote?
Sweden use the same method to calculate the winner as Denmark. Juries around Europe award points to their favourite songs using a standard set of points (1,2,4,6,8,10,12). This means that one jury will award 1+2+4+6+8+10+12= 43 points. Eleven Juries award 11 x 43 = 473 points. The Public then award their own set of points 473 points. This is broken down based on the percentage of televotes it receives. So a song that gets 10% of the televotes gets 10% x 473 = 47.3 points. This then rounded to the nearest whole number.
This method was used last year but last year the juries did not have a clear winner. (Sanna, Eric and Danny were within five points of one another.) However as Eric was the winner of the televoting by a good margin (8.8%) he received 42 points more than Danny.
Voting Patterns
An interesting pattern emerged in the televoting. The table shows how much of the televote the top two songs took. The table beside them shows the top two in last years scoring. The top two this year took an unprecedented amount of the votes.
How did the juries vote in percentage terms? Well we converted the jury vote i.e. expressed it as a percentage of 473 points. Comparing it with the public percentages with jury percentages also helps to understand how voting worked. N.B. - Series 1 is jury votes, series 2 is public votes. (I'm not an amzing Excel wizard, sorry).
The other notable thing is that Loreen won the contest with a record number of votes in absolute terms. She pulled in a massive 670,551 votes which according to this SVT article is a record. The article is well worth a read.
Reactions
Eurovision fans are broadly happy with Swedens result and there is widespread recognition of Loreen as an exceptional artist even if she was not everyone's favourite. A number of older fans think that this is a bad choice for Sweden comparing Loreen with Kati Wolf last year who did well on fan polls but came 22nd in the final. I think people who argue that may be slightly out of touch with Eurovision Music - but that's just an opinion. However: Let the record show I believed on the 11th March 2012 I believed that Loreen was the most likely to win the Eurovision Song Contest 2012
In Sweden the fact that Loreen won seems to be rather popular but there is a couple of juicy stories from Melodifestivalen for those of us who like to take a peak at the Daily Mail.
Bjorn Ranelid has stated that only one Swedish writer wished him good luck in Melodifestivalen. Bjorn states that he now knows who his friends are and that Swedish writers have show their true colours (That's pretty cold - Ed.)
Danny has decided to be a sore loser and ran from the "green room/space" before Loreen could do a reprise. He also didn't take part in the after parties. He just went home to his girlfriends house. Today he said that Sweden had made a bad decision to send a schlager entry with Loreen. (And sorry Danny could you clarify What was your song then?) Anyway a couple of artists in Sweden have come out to say that they feel sorry for him and that they understand how much he wanted it. We just think that the better song won. Hard Lucj Danny. Well Done Loreen.
And Finally....
Of all the surprising things to come Melodifestivalen the amazing Sarah Dawn Finer Lynda Woodruff went down a storm with fans (while also poking the Brits, which we welcome.) Huge well done to Sarah for her hilarious piece.
