Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

Now as Slovenia has withdrawn from Eurovision song contest at least in 2026, let's have a look of some Slovenian favorites of mine over the year. I have always had a soft spot for their debut entry in 1993.  Enjoy! 2011 Maja Keuc - No one (13th) 1997 Tanja Ribič - Zbudi se (10th) 2001 Nuša Derenda - Energy (7th) 2006 Anžej Dežan - Mr Nobody (sf 16th) 2015 Maraaya - Here for you (14th) 1993 IX Band - Tih deževen dan (22nd) 2008 Rebeka Dremelj - Vrag naz vzame (sf 11th) 2019 Zalagasper - Sebi (15th) 2012 Eva Boto - Verjamem (sf 17th) There would have been quite a few to pick up as well but these sounded the ones at this time and space.  Special mentions go to: 1996 Regina - Dan najlepših sanj (21st) 2002 Sestre - Samo ljubezen (13th) 2023 Joker Out - Carpe diem (21st) 2018 Lea Sirk - Hvala, ne! (22nd) 2025 Klemen - How much time do we have left (sf 13)

Serbia returns to Eurovision in Vienna and they have put Vladimir Graić is charge. He's the man behind Serbian winning entry Molitva in Helsinki 2007 and less fortunate Verjamem for Slovenia in 2012. He will write the songs and select the artists. However, besides wellknown big names the unknown and lesser known ones had a chance as well. Ten of them competed last night performing covers and jury was ment to choose one wildcard for the line up. Instead they picked up two but it remains to be seen if they will perform in duo or soloist and bring the number of songs to four in the final as the information on this seems rather varied dependng on source. Anyways, the lucky ones are  Goga Stanić , a model and  Danica Krstić , more traditional singer.  Serbian final will take place in February

Serbia returns to Eurovision and brings in big guns. Eurovision song contest winning composer Vladimir Graic is put in charge to compose three songs and one of them will be the Serbian entry in Vienna 2015. The artists will be revealed later. Serbia used this system already in the past when Goran Bregovic composed all songs in 2010 for diffrent acts. Vladimir Graic is of course the composer of Molitva , Serbia's winning song in Helsinki 2007, and he also wrote Verjamem , that represented Slovenia in 2012 but had a different fate (17th in the semifinal). He has composed also othe national final songs, like Beauty Queen's Zavet in 2008.  Recently he has been working with Milica Pavlovic , Nemanja Andjelovic , Zeljko Sasic , Milena Novakovic , Maja Nikolic , Tanja Savic and Ivana Pavkovic . Will some of them be among the possible entrants? Time will tell.... 

Day seven. Today the Big5 and Azerbaijan will take the stage for the first time but before that we still have five semifinal 2 songs to go through. First Slovenia. Slovenia sounds and looks good. I'm liking this more and more, and I like it a lot to start with. It's a bit dreamlike and the shots in blue with the ladies lighten up from the behind in their nearly transparent dresses looks fantastic. It's dramatic, melancholy, she sings well. it really pulls all the right strings in my head but will televoters be convinced? Are they scared by the lamenting lady that appears every now and then? Maybe so. More here .  Croatia  bring in another Balcan drama in a blue lit stage. Nina and the boys are in black while the girls are in short white things. Also the boys have rather interesting outfits looking like they didn't know if they were going to a disco or to a butcher's shop to work. As nice as it looks along with the rather confusing choreograhy it may take t...

Slovenia kicked of the fay four rehearsals and they have the youngest singer this year, 16-year-old Eva Boto. The whole affair is a bit dreamlike with a clever use of lightning and wavy fabric in the backdrop at first. Gone are the strange head pieces and the whole choreography has been redone which is only a good thing!  It's kinda renaissance with those flowers in the dress and all. Why am I thinking Feminnem (as in Lako je sve )? Hard to say if this will qualify. I like it, mind you but is it typically finishing 10th-12th everywhere = not many points. But I hope they do, they deserve it! More here . Croatia follow and Nina has brought three female backing singers and two male dancers with her. There's no doubt she has a fantastic voice. I also like the song even if it may not be the most immediate to appreciate. The backdrop is clouds like in her video and time will tell if the dancing guys will be dressed up - or down - like in the video as well? They all stay close...

After Amsterdam it's all about London this weekend, where the 5th annual meeting and greeting of the Eurovision artists takes place. Nine of the 2012 acts have confirmed their presence so far and also Slovenian Omar Naber (2005), Kati Wolf (Hungary 2011) will be there with maybe some other surprises. Also you can win tickets to fly to Baku for the real thing. So, Anggun from France, Compact Disco from Hungary, Donny Montell from Lithuania, Eva Boto from Slovenia, Kaliopi from Macedonia, Sabina Babayeva from Azerbaijan and Valentina Monetta from San Marino and Filipa Sousa from Portugal will meet again.  The Shadow Lounge in Soho will be the location and the doors open at 7pm on Sunday April 29, 2012.. Nikki French (UK 2000) and Paddy O'Connell are hosting. More information here . 

As there is Scandipop there is Big Balcan Ballad in Eurovision. This year we have two prime examples of the latter, when Slovenia tries it for the first time and Serbia, the master of the game tries it once again. But while Slovenia sends a 16-year-old debutant, who despite making a good job might still get a bit lost with the song penned by the very man who wrote the only BBB winner, 2007's Molitva , Serbia sends the very man who wrote the mother of all BBB, 2004's Lane moje , also for Serbia. And while Serbia has been a real success story in Eurovision, Slovenia has been struggling with only three top-10 finishes since 1993. This is 4-6 for Serbia for me. Slovenia - Eva Boto - Verjamem **** The song echoes Molitva , that is clear. But despite being very beautiful and with a certain hook it misses the boombastic climax that made Molitva a winner. The song goes forward but never really gets going but that's not Eva's fault, she does her best. Apparently this ...

Vladimir Graić revealed in an interview that the song Verjamem , that won the Slovenian national selection sung by Eva Boto was actually the song intended as the Bosnia-Herzegovina's entry and Hari Mata Hari before they changed their mind. And then we have learned the Irish entry Waterline sung by  Jedward is a Melodifestivalen reject, apparently the demo was sung by Eric Saade. (Oh the irony when last year the media tried to make a war between them but now it looks like it's 2-0 for Saade) And we also know the Danish entry  In a moment like this that took Denmark to 4th place two years ago was also a Melodifestivalen reject. One might like to point out the Swedish entry failed to make the final that year. Also, the Finnish Movetron failed to make the UMK top-40 so they sent the song to Lithuania instead - and failed to pass the semifinal there. And how many there are we don't know? What's the point with this all? Is it fair? I miss the days when the Eurovisio...

Slovenia's national final EMA was once again totally stolen my the crazy cool preenter Klemen Slakonja but the winner in the end is Eva Boto with Verjamem , a song that could be described as very similar to Moltiva which can't be but positive. The Prusnik sisters turned out to be rather entertaining and insane in a Jedward kind of way but their Konitchiwa that made the superfinal just wasn't good enough to beat Verjamem's beauty and Eva's brilliant vocals. Maja Keuc can be proud of her follow up.

Slovenia had a very long selection for the artists and we are down to the final two, or three actually as sisters Eva & Nika Prusnik are battling it out against Eva Boto . The sisters will sing Konichiwa , a weird mix of Japanese clichees and Jesus Christ,  Malo screce , a retro schlager and Love hurts , a pop song flirting with hard rock. Eva Boto also has three songs: Verjamem , an atmospheric ballad, Run , an American style ballad (or is it Disney-esque?) and A si sanjal me , a light uptempo pop song that is proprbaly the most classic Eurovision song here. And rather catchy as that. In short the sisters are much more riskier and more fun perhaps but Eva sings each song beautifully and could go to Baku with any of them and propably do a decent job. Listen all the songs here . And read Marco Mosca's excellent post here . You can watch ti on eurovision.tv startting at 20.00 CET or on www.rtvslo.si (choose audio/video and then TV1)