Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

We have spent the month of September with looking back the national selections and last but not least we have Spain. Once again they had a rather weird selection that surely didn't bring out the best songs nor singers, especially when you had to mix and match them together in the end. A match made in heaven never materialized this time either, when will they learn?  I never liked the winning song. Spain could do so much better. There is great music and fantastic artists and in Eurovision ... well, things could be so different! Anyways, the best offering was the boygroup Auryn - that still needed a lot of work but that could have been done - with Volver and El sol brillerà . In the end my choice is Volver . Nothing extraordinary but a rather catchy standard pop ballad by a boygroup that no one dislikes and most like at least a little. But would they have voted for it? Propably not. The sun will shine by it's writer Rafael de Alba is much better than Auryn's effort by the ...

Portugal's Setùbal hosts already for the third time Eurovision stars live in concert on September 10, 2011. The guest of honour is none other than Marie Myriam , the French winner of 1977 of Portuguese origin and this bloggers most significant ever Eurovision entry's performer. Other guests who have already had the taste of the Eurovision stage are Jari Sillanpää from Finland, Marcin Mrozinski from Poland, Igor Cukrov from Croatia,  Lucia Perez from Spain, Chiara from Malta and Andrea Demirovic from Montenegro. On top of that familiar names from various national finals: Chen Aharoni from Israel, Jenny Silver from Sweden besides local stars Filipa Ruas and Rui Andrade . I see there several names I'd love to see besides lovely Marie M but sigh, have to skip this time again..... :-(

Blue and United Kingdom on stage next, this time in casual outfits giving a strong rehearsal. I'm not sure about those outfits they are supposed to wear - they looked a bit too stiff or something, this looks better in casual stuff they have been wearing when doing this song around Europe and UK the past month, why make it so serious for the big night? All looked and sounded fine to me but then it all can look so different on TV. Still my main contender for the victory. But I'm still not convinced with this new version.... Lena for Germany did a solid good performance and was vocally better today me thinks. The condom dancers are fabulous and Lena is such a little teaser and actress this will look great on telly for sure. Not a winner but a decent ending for the host country. She's wearing a all black trouser dress this time without the colorful belts and shoes, what's it going to be in the final? Spain 's Lucia has changed to her final dress it seems, pink with co...

 Hmm, I used to dislike it but now when it's performed very good energy, simple but effective choreography, fire works in the right places and even in the back screen it all of sudden isn't that bad. Lucia dekivers well and one can't say they're not trying. Actually they made something pretty good from rather poor ingredients. This might do better than we ever thought until tonight. If Marie N won with that crap maybe Spain can pull a top-10 with this? Or then not... and if Lucia only didn't look like a rabbit in the flashlight most of the time. Here are the videos: AKOE , Official

Daniel Motiño Camúñez reports: Lucía Perez keeps on preparing her trip to Düsseldorf and the promotion of Que me quiten lo bailao . After a short trip to Zurich to make awarness among the Galizian population there, she has been in Granada before the football game Spain - Czech Republic, in the Moto GP in Jerez and in a couple or radio night shows, by night I mean 01:35AM and in a couple of morning TV-shows. However the impact in the media at this stage is below zero. Most of the Spanish people do not know about the song or the artist, and even some of them even think a ficticial duo called Lore y Macu from a Tele-5 TV Show, the same channel that tried to boicot Eurovision with Karmele and the Tsunami . Who to blame? TVE again; the national broadcaster's interest in the contest has been never lower, a situation that reminds the 80'. Lucia has not even moved to Madrid or Barcelona, she stays on Galicia and connects per telephone or via live conference when she is i...

Spain - Lucia Perez - Que me quiten lo bailao ** What to say about this? Clearly not the best offer in the Spanish final. This song could have been the Spanish entry in any year in the past 30 years. Does it make it timeless? Or simply one in a dozen? Is it too much carneval so it works only there and comes across as tired and boring late Saturday night? And the fact that Lucia looks like a rabbit in the flashlights doesn't help either. Time will tell but I don't have high hopes for Spain bothering the battle on top this year (either). Shame.  Poland - Magdalena Tul - Jestem **** This is a good entry, well sung, produced and performed. And at least the fans are pleased they chose to perform the original Polish version instead of the English one, First class ticket to heaven . In my books this competes with Hungary and unfortunately loses but I'd be happy if they both make the final, especially because of the Finnish touch in it. Qualifier: Hopefully .  Italy - Raphael G...

Daniel Motiño Camúñez reports: Lucia Perez is working hard to have everything ready to Düsseldorf. Last weekend Lucía recorded in Sabadell the new version of Que me quiten lo bailao in Universal Studios and she also signed a new contract with Warner Music. This weekend she filmed the video of Que me quiten lo bailao in the gaytown Sitges; Lucía invited all Eurofans to take part on her video. The theme was the Carnaval and plenty of people showed in disguise to support Lucía; we hope she does not show on disguise in Düsseldorf, but she also gave hints about her dress for the next Eurovision Song Contest. She will be wearing Galizian fashion that could go from Zara to Adolfo Dominguez, Purificación Garcia; or even just like Venus came on from the shell guarnished embellished with mussels and oysters... Let's go back to the new version which has been leaked on Youtube, the controversial parachuru is gone and some tropical rhytms and pipes have been incorporated. I still...

Daniel Motiño Camúñez reports:   TVE has officially presented Que me quiten lo bailao in a press conference held yesterday in Madrid. The Spanish broadcaster is proud and happy with the outcome of Destino Eurovisión Lola Molina stated -We have found a great singer and a great song that will help us going back to the top in Düsseldorf (was she high?). Lucía also expressed her happiness with the result - Que me quiten lo bailao is a positive song that help us forget all bad things around and invite us to dance. She expressed her hopes for the song -I wish this song will be a hit in Spain- (yeah keep on wishing...we might look for a genie in a bottle) and said she was quite surprised with the 68% of the votes as she knew she could win but not for a landmile (well, have you seen your concurrence sweetheart? The intensive work for Lucía starts now, first with recording of the video clip and also the new version of the song that will be made in Barcelona. Chema Purón, c...

Daniel Motiño Camúñez reports: The last show from Destino Eurovisión ended up with 1.6 million viewers and a share of 9%, it was the 4th option in a country with no more than 7 decents channels. 12 monhts ago 2.6 million viewers with a 15.2% of share watched Daniel Digés getting his ticket to Oslo. I seriously think TVE need to re-think (again) the format as nor the result neither the viewers seem satisfying. (Considering RAI got an average share of nearly 50% for the 5 Sanremo nights with the peak of over 19 million.... Ed.note ) Leaving behing the flop, Lucía came back to her house in O Inco, Galicia seized with emotions and wordless. She was received by hundreds of people, with fireworks and the Mayor screaming "We are going to Germany". Lucía is the first singer coming from Galicia representing Spain in Eurovision, but she wont be the first singing "Uouououo", aren't the opening lyrics of Que me quiten lo bailao exactly  the ones of  Algo Pe...

Daniel Motiño Camúñez reports: What's done it's done and I hope it will never done again; the last Eurovision show in Spain was even more chaotic and  pathetic than the previous ones, including discussions, change of rules, sound issues, cheap decorations and dull dancing. At the end, the only song with chances to end up in the top-20 of Eurovision, won the competition Que me quiten lo bailao which could be translated in English as What's done it's done composed by Rafael Artesero (Andorra 2005, 2006) will represent Spain in Düsseldorf. TVE announced that the nine songs will be sung entirely on stage, and not only a snippet as it was thought and previously published on channel’s site. Expectations where low for those than watched the pre-view videos on internet, only one of the songs was catchy, while the rest were unbearable. Was this the best of 1200 songs? Somehow this would be the worst Spanish National Final ever, even worst than Eurocanción 2000. Only on...

Spain has selected last night Lucia Perez (25) for Dusseldorf. She was one of the most experienced singers of the lot having released already four albums: Amores y amores (2003), El tempo dirá... (2006), Volar por los tejados (2009) and Digocho en galego last year. The jury first chose one song from each three artists and while the others, Melissa and Auryn were easy enough with Lucia's songs they had a little bit problem. Even Lucia herself prefered Abrazeme but the jury stick to Que me quiten lo bailao that eventually won with 68% of all televotes. Just imagine the scandal if she didn't win! On the other hand she may have won with any song... She has already experience from big festivals having represanted Spain twice in Viña del Mar in Chile : in 2005 with Que haria contigo (2nd) and in 2009 with Este amor es tuyo .

The endless karaoke show climaxes tonight in Spain. And finally we hear some new materail. Each of the acts that got that far perform three songs, or rather snippets of them and the jury will kick them out one by one. Unfortunately the chosen songs - 9 out of 20 preselected songs - sound rather toothless and bland mediocre but my hope it is just because of the rough making of videos published by RTVE here. But frankly I don't like any of the songs by the girls as we hear in the preview, Auryn has then two good ones, Volver and El sol brillerá . Auryn - Volver (Away), Evangeline, El sol brillerá Lucia Pérez - Abrázame, C'est la vie! It's alright!, Que me quiten lo bailao Melissa - Eos, Sueños rotos, Diamonds