Eurovision 2019

Yes - it's important to remember that SVT have very few other big entertainment show successes other than Allsång på Skansen (which is a summer show). Melodifestivalen is effectively their 'Strictly'... They throw everything including two kitchen sinks at it every year.

I’m a member of the UK fan club and I can categorically say that the only people complaining about our NF not being a Melfest ripoff are around here. Of course we want the UK to do well but we also recognise how much effort the BBC are putting into the contest now. I totally agree with what was said upthread. If the UK has a strong song someday it will win. Every single time the UK has won Eurovision it has won big with landslide victories.

But are they really? I would tend to disagree with that. Over the last few years, no offence to the artists, but they've been absolute lack lustre and the songs aren't much better.

It's always the cutesy pop numbers that seem to win the BBC Selection, which in reality have no affect on the voters. 'A strong song someday'? That for me just sums it up really, we haven't won since 1997! Sweden have won it twice in the last 6 years alone, so apart from Melfest, what are they doing right that the BBC can't?

If you are a Swedish artist looking to break into a European audience then Eurovision provides a perfect opportunity. That’s why the Swedish record industry back it to the hilt. Harsh as it sounds British artists don’t ‘need’ Eurovision to help launch them into new markets, and neither do their record companies. They don’t view Europe with any interest.

The biggest issue is cultural compatibility. UK is separate from European culture and always will be. And despite all the hullabaloo about Sweden being a Eurovision powerhouse how many of their Eurovision songs/artists have broken away from the Swedish market? Very few. Even Loreen, best ever Eurovision winner, has struggled to establish a career outside of the Scandinavian bubble.

She's not even the best ever Swedish winner but I take your point. Celine Dion is probably the last person to make themself a household name since winning. Katrina and the Waves arguably had the already decade old Walking on Sunshine when they went to Dublin.

My frustration is that both the BBC and SVT run a closed shop with their national finals. Yet our Swedish colleagues get a much better and diverse set of songs than the by-numbers, by-committee vanilla material we get. All it would take is one killer song.

I would say stop using other popstars rejects (You're Not Alone was rejected by The Wanted) but incidentally, I learnt this week that Ariana Grande had turned down this year's JESC winner for Poland (presumably in a different form as the language rule remains for the kiddiewonks.)

Technically the UK selection is not a closed shop. There is an open submission process. It just happens that nothing suitable emerges from that process.


As regards the difference with Sweden “I refer my honourable friend to the reply I gave some moments ago”. The UK music industry does not need Eurovision but the Swedish record industry (for local acts, not the likes of Zara Larsson) absolutely need Eurovision to build profiles and sustain careers.

Precisely. Record labels push artists to Melodifestivalen because they know it will give them a huge boost in streams and download sales. Often artists will get an album deal off the back of the competition.

UK artists can become international stars without Eurovision. Other nations' artists can too - but it's far harder.

And you're right - a Eurovision win isn't a ticket to international chart stardom. It may boost your status nationally though. (And you'll always have a place on the Eurovision circuit...)

It's more a case of needing Melodifestivalen than Eurovision these days I suspect...

Yes - the SVT contest is an industry in and of itself though - and its tentacles spread widely across Eurovision (look at how many Mello composers and writers also enter songs to represent other countries, and how many Swedish backing singers and dancers are recruited by other countries).

I'm not sure the bulk of Mello songs in recent years have been that amazing have they? Take away some OTT camerawork and production and there haven't been that many memorable songs that are that amazing. They aren't even that representative of the wider Swedish music scene, any more than UK national final songs are of the UK industry? They are just quite good at creating a commercial sound and performance package that does well in Eurovision...

One of the advantages of Melodifestivalen is that the staging comes fully formed. Mans, Frans, Robin and Benjamin all had identical staging at the contest to their MF performances. Yet at EYD they don't think about this until after .

I don't know how you know what the thought processes of the people working on EYD are? I think rather than 'don't think about this' you may mean 'aren't able to commission this'...

The costs of staging Melodifestivalen are huge - and AIUI the staging costs for some of the more elaborate numbers are picked up by a record label rather than SVT (who also benefit from sponsorship for the event)

Well, indeed, and I would certainly suggest we could easily win next year, if the song is good. Doesn't matter if it comes from a public vote or an internal selection, as long as the song is good. When we won in 1997 the national final was half an hour on a Sunday afternoon.

I always compare it to Germany, who seem to treat the contest with a similar view as we do, in that they do emphasise the camp, party element of the evening (as can be seen when they announce the results in front of an audience of hundreds) and they often go for odd and "funny" songs, and you could hardly argue Germany are especially any more liked in the rest of Europe than the UK. If you look at the results from 2000 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germany_in_the_Eurovision_Song_Contest#Contestants - they look pretty much identical to the UK, spending most years bumping around the lower reaches of the table, including three times finishing last. But in 2010, they won it - the year after they came twentieth. If that can happen, the UK could win it next year no problem. It's not like it has to be a ten year process to win back credibility. The right song can turn it around in three minutes.



Well, indeed. At the time I thought my mum might enjoy the Greatest Hits show, because on the night of the Contest (after inevitably suggesting the UK entry is appalling the first time she hears it) she gets really into it, genuinely enjoying the songs and thinking carefully about who she's going to vote for. But she had no interest in it whatsoever. As you say, for the vast majority of the UK, it's something for one night only.

And I don't think that in itself is a bad thing, if that is the way the UK wants to approach it, that is a perfectly valid way to do it. If they're making the required financial contribution and people are watching it, it doesn't matter if they're watching it because they're genuinely interested in the musical aspect or because it's fun to laugh at half-pissed on a Saturday night.

It's like that Mitchell and Webb sketch about The Apprentice - "How do those ironic viewers show up in the ratings?" "They show up exactly the same!"