A Rough Guide To Melodifestivalen Final

So, as any reader should have noticed by now Melodifestivalen, The Final takes place in Globen this week. So what is in store. Well after four semi-finals and Andra Chansen we have ten songs to go before eleven international juries and the Swedish televoting public.

The Contestants

1. David Lindgren - Shout It Out 
2. Thorsten Flinck Och Revolutionsorkestern - Jag Reser Mig Igen 
3. Dead By April - Mystery
4. Lisa Miskovsky - Why Start A Fire
5. Top Cats - Baby Doll
6. Loreen - Euphoria
7. Ulrik Munther - Soldiers
8. Bjorn Ranelid ft. Sara Li - Mirakel
9. Molly Sandén - Why Am I Crying
10. Danny Saucedo - Amazing

The Scene

In spite of what some fans have said this is shaping up to be a better Melodifestivalen final than the last two years. Nevertheless if your a Eurovision, Melodifestivalen or just someone with nothing to do between 8pm and 10pm CET you should be watching the Melodifestivalen Final. It is always exciting, particularly with the advent of the international juries (I don't have a clue who sits on them or how their picked and would love to know do get in touch if you know).

The Deciders

The winner is decided on by international juries in: Belgium, Bosnia & Herzegovia, UK, Estonia, France Cyprus, Ireland, Malta, Norway, Germany and Ukraine. They award 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 points to their favourite songs. according to Christer Bjorkman, Melodifestivalen producer, the international juries understand how seriously Swedes take Melodifestivalen. 

In terms of trivia France, Ireland and Norway have had juries in the voting for the last two years. Of these Ireland is the most accurate having given the eventual winner 10 points on both occasions. Norway averages 4 and France 6. Of the countries this year UK and Malta were the only ones to award 12 points to Popular last year.

473 points are then distributed to the 10 songs as a percentage proportionate to their percentage in the public televote. The winner is the song with the most points. Since 1999 televoting has been used continuously in Melodifestivalen. With the exception of 2005 and 2008, the winner of the televote has won the overall competition.

The Odds and the Polls

Every year a countless number of polls and odds come out. Eurovision fan poll results are broadly consistent with the results of Melodifestivalen (With the noteable exception of 2010). The leader of the polls (both Eurovision fan polls and internal Swedish polls) would suggest Loreen will win. Most people suggest that this is a straight two way fight between Loreen and Danny but Melodifestivalen is never that clear cut. I think that Molly Sandén or Thorsten Flinck could emerge as a dark horse. Bookies are largely in line with this view point.

So we will have more on Melodifestivalen this week, but in the mean time we have a little surprise for you which we will unveil during the week. We don't know if you will like it but hopefully you will.

P.S. Vote on our poll for Melodifestivalen on the top left of the blog.

News Wrap-Up: Saturday 3rd March

Firstly Spain, Estonia and Lithuania have selected their songs for this years Eurovision. Spain have selected Quédate Conmigo which is a very good song. I am a tiny, tiny bit uneasy about it I think there is a small bit of depth missing from the performance but we will have to wait until May to see whether it works on the Eurovision Stage.

Estonia selected Ott Lepland to represent them in Baku. His song for Baku "Kuula" is very deep and is fairly strong.  I do still maintain this was a poor choice and there was better in the competition. I really hope they keep it in Estonian. 

Lithuania have decided to send Donny Montel with his song Love is Blind to Baku. This was the favourite, though certainly not mine. Anyway we'll talk about these things later.

Anyhow in other news:

• In Melodifestivalen to most fans disappointment - including my own, Top Cats got through to the final with Thorsten Flinck. 
• Keeping with Melodifestivalen 2012 early odds and polls would suggest that Loreen should win. We will have full coverage of Melodifestivalen this week and will have a big post tomorrow night.
• A snippet of the Azeri song has appeared online. You can listen to it here, though from the snippet it does not exactly fill me with confidence of an amazing Azeri song at Eurovision. 
• Sean Banan did an excellent parody of Danny Saucedo's Melodifestivalen song which you can watch here.

I'll have a piece up on Melodifestivalen Final sometime tonight.

Despite rather controversial semi-finals Estonia have quite an excellent final lined up but hopefully some of these songs won't be at Eurovision.


Traffic - On the plus side to start at least the band's  name is easy to spell. The song however has a good accessible sound to it. Kind of the old style rock which should go down reasonably well. Grade: C+

Tenfold Rabbit - First prize for the group who could think of a more bonkers name than Malcolm Lincoln. This reminds me of the Gibert O'Sullivan classic "Nothing Rhymed". There was nothing wrong with that song and there is little wrong with this one.  It actually builds quite well. Grade: B

Birgit Oigemeel & Violina - For the first time since I started writing these reviews I think we actually could have the Estonian song for Eurovision on our hands. This is by no means perfect but in a sea of techno where each song sounds like the last one this stands out. Grade: A+

Lenna Kuurmaa - This is an innocent but fairly dull song and performance. But it really does go nowhere. If I heard this in the lift I'd be bored. Grade: E-

Teele Viira - Once again techno music, but this is a little better. While it is nice to know I still think that this is too much of the same again. Grade: C

Liis Lemsalu - Modern Jazz? Well this is interesting and pretty entertaining. The chorus is a little more straight forward that other songs in the semi-final but could do well. Grade: A-

Loss Paranoias - Starts off by sound a little the same as the song in the earlier part of this semi. The chorus is very good and that is a missing theme of the night here. Grade: B

Ott Lepland - A delicate and simple Estonian song, just for once I'd like to see them send this sort of song. His voice is good and clearly this will be good to hear live. It builds well to a nice cresendo. Grade: B+

August Hunt - That is what you'd call a sudden start but is the song actually going anywhere? No, unfortuately. It stays at the same pace the whole way through and that may not be the smartest idea as it makes the song a little boring. Grade: D+

POP Maniacs - Very odd starting song, but my instinct tells me that it is good but it does not give me a vast number of reasons to love it but I can live with it. Grade: C

I'm not sure what I'll be watching tonight so I shall have so reaction later tonight.

Andra Chansen: Football For Eurofans

Those of you who are not huge fans of Melodifestivalen will be glad to know that in eight days or so this wave of excitement will end. However also, very sadly as Melodifestivalen comes to an end so does the National Final season and with that comes a strange silence over the world of Eurovision fandom.

But enough pessimism on with Andra Chansen. If you have never been through Andra Chansen before Scandipop have an explaination of it here.

The first duel is between Dynasty and Top Cats. Dynasty have a fairly average sounding rock song helped by a lack of rock in Melodifestivalen this year. Top Cats have something that sounds like The Playtones last year but it is not anything monumental. My guess is that Dynasty should win this duel. However rock is often screened out of Andra Chansen.

The second duel is probably the most high profile for Eurovision/Melodifestivalen fans. Timoteij with their rather good song and Andreas Johnsson. Those who remember his MF 2006/2007 entries will see some parallels between Lovelight and those. However I think his song is just a little below those greats. I would love to say that Timoteij will get through but this is just to close to call.

The third duel contains Lotta Engberg and Christer Sjogren up against Thorsten Flinck once again this could go their way. I reckon that Lotta and Christer will do it their chessy but sweet song could appeal to a more wider vote. Nevertheless there is a certain "Caroline Af Ugglas" feel to this song. That has proven in the past as being a vote getter.

Finally duel four will consist of Sean Banan and Youngblood. Here you have a rather poorish song and another rather poorish song. However Youngblood probably will get through from here as there is little to take the young teen girl vote.

I'm not going to go into depth about the second round but it certainly looks like we will have an exciting and heartbreaking contest.

Sorry? Engelbert Humperdinck You're joking!. Oh your not...

It's finally official: BBC has lost their minds. Send Engelbert Humperdinck to Eurovision.

Time has come to give a reaction. I never have spent an hour after an announcement think about this one. This is a most strange move by the BBC and will divide people. Personally I think that it that he is a little to old for the contest. I'm not saying that in the sense of his age it's more his music style that is old. At the grand old age of 75 he will be one of the oldest performers ever on the Eurovision stage. While he may have the world's greatest songwriters behind [no seriously, they actually could be the world's greatest], he will come across as just a little has been.

I accept the arguements of both sides of the debate. I'm quite a fan of the old music myself. I think the Engelbert [full name to long to write] is quite a distinguished name from that era. However I am unsure that despite the great era of music it may not be fit for the Eurovision stage. I also am unsure whether or not juries will perceive him as being a little to yesterday or not. It is perfectly possible that they would not. But if they did it would really kill the UK. My guess on the whole issue is that BBC picked someone who the tabloids might actually treat humanely thus raising the basic public perception of Eurovision.

I have noted the many comments on Twitter in regards to his selection my favorite coming from Danny Lynch:  "If this was my laptop I'd probably have smashed it against the wall in sheer annoyance". However after the intitial shock most fans are now giving more logical reactions and less emotive reactions like Ian Howell who pointed out that "My objection is that he doesn't represent a popular strand of British music. No top 20 hit in UK in 40 years"  On a macro level I am noticing that the very young generation of ESC fans [i.e. 20 or less] are tending to be disgusted with the news. The mid range [20-30] seem to vary and older than 30 seem to support him. Of course this is just a rough outline and there are many in different categories.
Finally I accept the argument that people over 30 watch Eurovision [like my parents and grandparents]. I just believe that they don't vote very much compared to younger demographic groups. However over-30's won't be enough. Judging reactions I think that you would need to be over 67 to really like him.

As a Commerce [fancy word for Business Studies] student I would really love to know the long term BBC Eurovision strategy is and what they have identified as the core points of competition between entries to justify such a decision.

But anyway we leave the last word to Eddie Izzard [thanks to the EscInsider for reminding me of this one.]

The Balkan Problem

I meant to publish this last night but was so tired I could not judge my writing. The idea here is purely hypothetical but has been on my mind since the semi-final draw.

Since the running order draw many fans have pointed out that the toughest semi-final by far this year is semi-final 2. This is largely caused by the presence of FYR Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia and Slovenia all being together in the one semi-final. This has lead fans to believe that anything up to all five of these countries could make it through to the final.

But is that a true assumption? Let's just think about it and cast the critical eye over the Balkans so far in 2012. Serbia has successfully managed to convince Zeljko Joksimovic to go to Eurovision for them. Looking at the block of countries this will be one to beat, it's sure to be strong and will take a good chunk of the Balkan 12 points. So let's say that they take 46 of 48 points [i.e. 3 12's; 1 10]. This leaves them with in easy reach of the 62 points which is about what is needed to get you into the final. It is also very likely that Serbia will soak up a huge amount of Jury votes for Balkan songs.

But what about the next four songs. Well to start we have not heard B+H's song yet but I would bet we are dealing with a fairly normal Balkan ballad again sung by a female [Maya Saar]. The issue here is that far to many of these songs are being sung by females. The three picked so far are all sung by females. All of the are roughly of the same style and standard. This is where we hit the problems. This semi-final looks set to have a vast number of Balkan songs which is largely unprecedented in terms of the less than 20 songs semi-finals.

So within the Balkan block you will have some disagreement about which country to vote for. Serbia will soak up a huge amount of televotes. This in turn leaves very few to play with. There may not be very many people willing to back a balkan ballad. Which could lead to a disarray in the semi-final. So the result may not be very predictable. Combine this with jury votes which may further and scatter Balkan block votes [at least it cannot strengthen this] which could see countries not getting neighbourly votes.

So what if Balkan's don't win in the Balkan's? Well for the four other songs this is very likely. Assuming that Serbia soak up the amount described earlier and say one song picking up most of the higher places then we have another Balkan on 40 [a 12, two 10's and an 8] this leaves only about 62 points swirling around for the remaining three. On a Europe wide basis it is difficult though not impossible for to believe that with few points they could make it in. The trouble once again is that they will only have some jury and public voters who will vote for Balkan music. These votes will be split that it will be difficult for these rather difficult songs to make it through to ESC final. If the public and jury do not agree then the problems faced do not get smaller. The jury has considerable power to reduce the impact of neighbourly voting. So with two components it is likely that the number of points may fall. And if less points stay within the Balkans then we could be about to see a very interesting semi-final.

Does Anyone Watch Lithuania? Why?

Sometimes I wonder if anyone actually follows Lithuania, being sandwiched in the national season with other greats like Melodifestivalen or Eesti Laul, but having heard the songs it is not as dire as one might expect.

The Independent   What does try to be a reasonable punkish rock song but fails in the process. It is a bit generic and old fashioned sounding but I like a trier. Grade: D

Multiks - Reminds me of Compact Disco in Hungary but is missing something important. It has no tangible edge and could fail trying to get it. Grade: E-

Beissoul - No. Just no. Are they serious that this got 12 from the jury and public? Grade: F

Alive Way - Very nice song. This relaxed and gentle style might do well at the contest if the competition is high energy, which it looks set to be. But this is a bit heard-before but I like it. Grade: C+

Vytautas Matuzas - Send a rapping midget in a wheelchair to Eurovision? This is not strong enough to really stand out on stage. I know that the wheelchair will attract some attenion but the whole thing doesn't seem to work. Grade: E+

Katazina - This was a rather difficult song to find on YouTube but when you listen to it you start to wonder does anyone listen to this stuff. There is nothing per se wrong with the song but it just doesn’t seem strong enough but in the scheme of things that is not unusal.  Grade: E

VIG Roses - Good song  but based on the songs that went before that is hardly saying much. Standard r'n'b music. Good looking women. Grade: C-

Bekeso Vilkai - Time for some slow balladly/jazz not entirely certain as to how this could do. I do like this though. Grade: B-

Monika - Ah, yeah in a final of virtually shockingly poor song this shines through, if this went to ESC it would probably go nowhere. But for a while each day I like to think that one day this kind of song will. Grade: A-

Donny Montell - This is a very strong song but is missing something. Grade: B-

DAR - Very easy to spell by all accounts. However this is a good old-fashioned Eurovision song that should not be let near ESC unless Lithuania want to be laughed at. Grade: C

Simona Milinyte - Amazingly this did not top the public or juries in the semi-final. It is still excellent Grade: A