EUROVISION 2026: BANGARANGA! BULGARIA WON

Oh dear, that was a bit unexpected even if Bulgaria rose to the Top-3 in odds the day of final and had its momemtum rising after the rehearsals. Bangaranga everyone indeed. She was fuegoed. And it won both jury and tele , that didn't happen since 2017! Israel was beaten, maybe that's what matters in a way. Next thought is can they afford to host next year? Weren't they away for financial reasons mostly anyways until this sudden return just when other countries stayed home?

Another returnee Romania finished third - who would have thought? Makes one wonder how come these two returnees did so well all of sudden and if they were too broke to participate before how they ended up in 2026? Just saying.

Australia and Finland and most of all Greece as well as Denmark bombed a bit. Is it the time of the odds being right is over? Last year the clear #1 favorite finished 4th, now 6th. But then again Finland 6th place is our 4th best placing ever (compared to number of participants)

The juries voting was worse than the usual televoting, can't we just call it neighboring voting? Greece/Cyprus anyone? But then again Finland got its 12's from Estonia and Sweden.

I expected Moldova and Albania doing better, while Norway doing better with juries than televoters is quite curious. And yes, I did say already back in February Italy will be Top-5. And stays in Top-10 for 9th year in a row. And yes, in the end 6th place is one of Finland's bests and 3rd Top-10 in the 2020's. And we were the best Nordic country. Sweden did its worse result since 2010's NQ or 2009's Malena Eernman.

The jury 12s were all over the place: Bulgaria (4), Poland (4), Malta (3), France (3), Australia (3), Finland (2), Italy (2), Greece (2), Serbia (2), Denmark (2), Ukraine (1), Romania (1), Albania (1), Israel (1), Cyprus (1), Czechia (1), Belgium (1), Norway (1) - that's 18 countries considered the best of them all. Then again, at least the juries didn't go back up only one song like in 2023 or 2024....

Televotes:

Bulgaria 312

Romania 232

Israel 220

Moldova 183

Ukraine 167

Italy 147

Greece 147

Finland 138

Australia 122

Albania 85

Denmark 78

Croatia 71

Serbia 52

Cyprus 34

Norway 19

Poland 17

Sweden 16

France 14

Lithuania 12

Czechia 9

Malta 8

Austria 5

Belgium 0

UK 0

Germany 0

Finland got in the end points from the juries as follows:

12 Estonia, Sweden

8 Germany, Belgium, Denmark, Norway

7 Israel, Portugal, Georgia, Montenegro, Czechia

6 Ukraine, Croatia, Austria

5 Malta, Lithuania

4 Australia, Cyprus

3 Luxemburg, Latvia

2 San Marino, Armenia, France, UK

0 Switzerland, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Albania, Poland, Greece, Serbia

Finland got in the end televotes from:

12 Estonia, Sweden

10 Norway, Australia, Latvia

8 Denmark, Armenia, Azerbaijan

6 Poland

5 Portugal, Luxemburg

4 Malta, Lithuania, San Marino, Moldova

3 Belgium, Czechia, ROTF, Italy, Switzerland

2 Ukraine, Croatia, France, Serbia

1 Georgia, Austria, Cyprus, UK, Albania

0 Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Germany, Israel, Montenegro

Finland gave televotes as follows:

12 Israel

10 Romania

8 Denmark

7 Bulgaria

6 Sweden

5 Italy

4 Ukraine

3 Serbia

2 Croatia

1 Moildova

Not going to comment on Israels 12 but Romania was expected as well as Serbia and most everything really. Very pleased for Italy being there, too.

Finland's Jury votes were as follows:

(the jury was Erno Kulmala, Ilkka Wirtanen, Kari-Jukka Hynninen, Anni Lerche, Goldielocks, Marja Kokko and Sofia Ruija)=

12 France

10 Denamrk

8 Lithuania

7 Australia

6 Poland

5 Croatia

4 Belgium

3 Italy

2 Czechia

1 Moldova

The Marcel Bezencon awards were handed out to Australia (Media award), Bulgaria (Artistic award) and Denmark (Composer award)

Comments

SONGS OF THE YEAR 2015: #5 KRISTA SIEGFRIDS - ON & OFF

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!

ESC 2016 WISH LIST: MARGARET FOR POLAND

Małgorzata Jamroży aka Margaret has also been tipped for Eurovision and apparently she did turn it down but she'd be perfect. She's got a look and persona you can't unnotice nor forget, she's got hit songs, she has been voted or nominated for everything from Trendy artist to the Hope of the Year, Fashion Icon and Glamour Woman of the year besides the usual best video, song, album, debut..... Oh she's also a fashion designer! She's very clever with social medias and would surely use it to her advantage if selected for Stockholm 2016. Her debut album is titled Add the blonde , do we need to say more? Except it includes mostly Swedish written pop tunes like Tell me how are ya , Wasted , Start a fire and Heartbeat . And of course her debut single and internationally noticed Thank you very much that you can enjoy below with all its anti-textil feel. I think she's Eurovision perfection, she's cheeky and fun, can we have her?

NETHERLANDS: HOW LUCKY WE ARE WITH DOUWE BOB

Douwe Bob has released a follow up for his fortunate Eurovision entry off the Fool Bar album, How lucky we are . And indeed, we are lucky there's Douwe doing these laid back pop country tracks that give such good vibes.... Sadly I can't say the same about the video (or maybe I just miss the humour in it?) but I can slow down, keep listening the song and not watch the video.....

Boobs for summer: Samantha vs Sabrina!

The old rivals have put their bras (or the lack of them) in peace and entered the studios together to record Blondie's boombastic Call me . Life could be worse.....

TWO POINTS, THREE SOCKS AND TWIN TWIN NUDE

The French Twin Twin may have scored France's first ever last place in the Eurovision with their only two points in the final, but the guys didn't seem to worry that much. They appeared in the French talk show on Sunday night wearing only their socks hiding their privates with the slogan taken from a Celine Dion song: Les derniers seront les premieres . Now that's a good spirit! (Watch it here from 2:33) Having had a bus ride from the Arena back to hotel with these guys I'm not surprised. Oh Yeah!

MALTA: CHIARA AND LUDWIG SHINE AT QORMI WINE FESTIVAL, WITH EYE IN KIEV

I had a pleasure to visit Qormi wine festival and spend a fabulous night. The food was great, the music was great, the wine was great.... and the people were amazing. In between enjoying the music by a duo Gianni & Papps first, and then by Spiteri Lucas Band with singers Kaya, Neville Refalo, Ivan and Eurovision veterans Ludwig Galea and Chiara taking leads (on again.... off again so to speak) and supporting each other through rock and pop classics to today's hits. Highly entertaining evening in every sense of the word. I was lucky enough to have a chat with Chiara and greet also Ludwig, who I saw last in Istanbul 2004. Chiara turned out to be the most lovable and wonderful person - check out the video of Grande amore below to see her blowing kisses just for you! She also sung her very own Angel , but also Euphoria and Waterloo , Dancing queen .... Sadly by dear old Lumia decided not to cooperate at that point anymore :-( But after the jump yo...

SWEDEN: MEDS MAKES MÅNS ZELMERLÖW HARD AND NAKED

Earlier this year Måns Zelmerlöw invested some of his money into web pharmacy MEDS and now he's ready to bare it all for its advertising film, which is.... how to put it? The corniest thing I have seen for a long, long time perhaps? Supposed to be funny the way his Eurovision presenting stunts were I presume, but this falls somewhere between embarassing and uncool. Well, we get to admire some over acrting and a lot of naked Måns riding a horse and sporting a hard on at one point. Maybe that's enough to make MEDS a success.... Where's Edward af Sillen when you need him?

CZECH REPUBLIC: MARTINA BÁRTA PRESENTS MY TURN

Czech Republic's internally chosen Martina Bárta has released her entry My turn for the Eurovision as well today. Not sure if I managed to keep my attention level very high for very long when listening to it.... Shame.

Nina Badrić for Croatia

Croatian TV went for internal selection in the end and chose Nina Badrić. She has been around for almost 20 years and has released ten albums between 1995 and 2011. She has also treid to get to Eurovision four times already without a win (1993, 1994, 1995 and 2003). She is popular also in the other ex-Yogoslavian countries so let those 12s run in.... Listen her here: Moje oci pune ljubavi , Dat ce nam Bog , Nebo and Mama . And lovely Carobno jutro .

SAN MARINO IS READY TO BREAK THE CHRYSALIS

Valentina Monetta's song Crisalide/Chrysalis will have its worldwide debut at March 15 , 2013 at 20.25 CET on SMRTV San Marino. This will be the event that flips the cards and changes the rules of the Eurovision game, you can't afford to miss it! A live stream of the event will be provided on the TV's web site www.smtvsanmarino.sm , on eurovision.tv and esctoday.com. Just one week remain until San Marino's entry to the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest 2013 in Malmö, Sweden is released! Crisalide will be sung by no other than Valentina Monetta who we all remember from last year's Contest in Baku. The song is composed by Ralph Siegel with lyrics written by Mauro Balestri. This will be Mr. Siegel's 21st entry at the Eurovision Song Contest, and the second one in a row for San Marino. Also watch out for Valentina's brand new website www.valentinamonetta.com , which will come online upon release of the song. The song will be made availa...

Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

Search This Blog