Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

  The artists are leaving their home countries and arriving to Turin from all corners of Europe and nicely keep up with the tradition of posting in their social media channels farewell or arrival photos with flags!  From Green room to the greenery of Eurovision village Photos by Paolo Bocca

The Eurovision song contest 2022 has begun in Turin this morning with the first rehearsals of Albania, Latvia, Lithuania, Switzerland, Slovenia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, The Netherlands and Moldova. And with rehearsals come problems as everything isn't (yet) perfect despite stand-in rehearsals and all that, which is very normal and adjustable. Apparently The Netherlands weren't happy with their stand-in for example but the bigger problem is the malfunction of the sun on stage that may have caused Lithuania to alter their staging. It looks like there's a problem with its motor that causes problems with the LED wall as the sun doesn't rotate all the way as it  should and it may not be fixable.... We'll see. Ukraine has had different kind of problems as they have had to change their staging several times as Ebu has considered their ideas too political until they have come to an agreement what is acceptable and suitable for Eurovision. And yes, the Green room is Green. There ...

Once again Blogilkar's home jury has sat through the songs and videos and voted from 1 to 10. This year the jury consisted of pre-teens, 20somethings, 30somethngs, 40somethings and 50somethings. Even a dog participated and went nuts for Romania but was not allowed to vote. Most of the jury members had not heard any of the songs beforehand, some not even the Finnish one.And yes, this jury didn't care for betting odds, fan favorites or wanks but only their own taste and first impression! In the end it was a very close run and as many favorites had very divided opinions and votes those that were liked a lot or at least fairly well ended up on top instead of The Netherlands and Portugal (and Iceland and Italy, too) that may have scored most tens and nines. And UK and Norway had to be cut into pieces to find a minor preference. Sharing the same number of 10s, 9s and 8s it was down to 7s in favor of UK for the win! 1. UNITED KINGDOM - SAM RYDER - SPACE MAN (Average score 7,72) Excell...

All is good that ends well also in Portugal when MARO won Festival da Canção 2022 with her saudade.saudade. Now that was a perfect way to end this national final season and her win was very clear: full marks from both jury and televoters with 24 points, ten more than the runner up... as they seemed to disagree on most everyone else except FF but that wasn't enough, and Pepperoni Passion at the bottom. Syro deserved so much more though. Festival da Canção 2022 results: 1. MARO - saudade.saudade (jury 12 + televoters 12) 24 2. Os Quatro e Mela -  Amanhã (4 + 10) 14 3. FF - Como é bom esperar alguém (6 + 8) 14 4. Diana Castro - Ginger Ale (10 + 4) 14 5. Aurea - Why? (6 + 5) 11 6. Pongo & Tristany -  Dégrá.dê (7 + 3) 10 7. Milhanas - Corpo de mulher (8 + 2) 10 8. Inés Homem de Melo - Fome de viagem (2 + 7) 9 9. Syro - Áinda nos temos (3 + 6) 9 10. Pepperoni Passion - Código 30 (1 + 1) 2

Ok, I did this already. Portugal deserves the privilege of being the first ( here ) and the last review of the season. I did them all with the studio versions but now let's see how things have developed since when on stage and live. Of my favorites they all made it except Blacci  (but quite frankly she wasn't that greta live) and of those I didn't really care for Pepperoni Passion and Pongo e Tristany made it, also Diana Castro.  But now let's forget all that what I said the first time around and judge again based on the live performances in the semi-finals.  Pongo & Tristany – Dégrá.dê * I was quite harsh in the first hearing and I still dislike this with passion. This is noise, nothing else. Should Portugal send this they're nuts. Certain bit of fandom likes this sort of a thing but juries and televoters will award this a flat zero. Syro – Ainda Nos Temos **** I still think he's no Diogo Piçarra but as I can't have Diogo Syro will do. Who's idea ...