The return of Syksyn Sävel tonight

After ten years, The Other Finnish music competition makes a comeback. When Euroviisut was serious and Finns were trying to find a song to please the Europeans jurors - and failed badly most of the times - Syksyn Sävel aka Autumn Melody was shamelessly commercial. (And even created a sister competition Kevään Sävel aka Spring Melody in the early 1980's) Everyone wanted to take part. Big names participated to score a new hit and sell a lot of records. Most of the big singers careers started or got a new boost from the contest. A sort of thing that Melodifestivalen is in Sweden today in Finland of the late 1960's-early 1980's.

When Metsämökin tonttu by Jussi Raittinen & The Boys won in 1974 the contest took a turn into humour music and many several followed when Mikko Alatalo and Erkki Liikanen took home the victories in 1975-76, 1978, 1980-81. But, many evergreens were born at the same time with "real" songs. Those songs may have reached the final, or simply were sent in and with the boost of "Syksyn Sävel reject" made it big in the charts. Some personal favourites are Katri Helena's Syysunelma and Mun sydämeni tänne jää. Both evergreens that failed to win. Scandals, accusation of plagiations and TV favouring certain artists were the norm of the day. Finnish music scene would have such a bore without Syksyn Sävel at the time when we only had two TV-channels and only two contests.

Come 1990's, changes in rules, changes in music business changed it all and slowly the contest died away until the last one was held in 2001. Tonight with an excelent line up it makes a welcome return. But as in the good old days there are the big pre-contest favourites and if Juha Tapio don't win tonight this blogger is mighty surprised.... (Or Kaija Koo?)

And like in the good old days there's a compilation CD released as well!

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ESC 2016 WISH LIST: MARGARET FOR POLAND

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Krista Siegfrids is delivering nice pop tunes one after another and this one is particularly catchy and soon you will be singing along..... Hopefully her Melodifestivalen entry will be equally good!

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Today's funniest Eurovision related story comes from Belarus. Some sources claim Ivan wants to perform on stage naked and with live wolf or wolves. It surely would be a first on Eurovision stage! We have seen some forgotten underwear over the years, and some cardbox animals though..... Is it time to take things a bit further? No, according the rules live animals are not allowed, and Eurovision being a family show nudity won't do either. (It seems to be ok to be half naked if you are a dancer though..... )

CAROLA'S BOOBS STEAL THE SHOW, SVT APOLOGIES

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Russia recycles the video

Here is the video for Alexey's previous hit Бам Бам! and here is the video for his Eurovision 2011 entry Get you as Alex Sparrow as he likes to be called now abraod. Looks like he potreys the new rich Russia well.... The only problem is that he can't play the bad part convincingly not even a second. And did I say the song is crap? And of course as he is a Russian star he must have nude fotos of him flotaing around internet trying to be sexy and he fails there, too, big time. If you are not bad nor sexy you shouldn't push it. Maybe he should stick to singing jolly little numbers like the Kalinka rip off instead....

Regina Lund - naked and censored

Regina Lund's new video Jag är osynlig was censored by Youtube only minutes after it had been uploaded. In the video she was playing a female Jesus who gets crusified in the end. "I was shocked!" she says. "There's nothing more naked in it as in every church! It's ok to have naked man hanging on the wall but my nakedness is too much on internet? ". Oh well, no comment. She's prepairing a new album Dare Regina Lund and we of course remember her from her Melodifestivalen 2007 adventure with Rainbow star .

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Eurovision song contest 2005 winner Helena Paparizou has been enjoying Top-5 hits every year since 2003 with the exception of 2010 and 2014, this latest one being already her 27th! And Haide is charting also in Bulgaria and Finland, of all places. The catchiness of her hits has changed less over the years than her face.... Here's the English version , below the Greek version.

TIM SCHOU AND HIS NAKED GRAVITY

Tim Schou has a pretty good solo career going since he left his friends in London. He's travelling the world and relesing songs and videos. The latest one is a great track and comes with a steamy video that kinda takes away from the song really. But who's complaining. If you got it, flaunt it. Enjoy the video below. This post coming after the other Dane, Rasmus Seebach as wishlist for Eurovision. To think about it, Tim would do nicely, too. Maybe he should give it another go?

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Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

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