Eurovision 2009 Preview Reviews: Part 1

It is Preview Review time!

Now Eurovision.tv has decided to embrace YouTube and put all the previews on there, so there's no external player this year.

As always the rule here is give it 60 seconds unless the video is extremely good. Given the selection this year, I don't think I'll be going past the 60 second mark often.

On with the show!

Slovenia : Frequent visitors here during Eurovision season might notice that I tend to preface every Slovenian entry with the statement, "Alya would've done better." I still hold true to that belief this year, even though her EMA entry was one of her weakest musically (performance-wise it was excellent). Anyway, it's the EMA performance of Quartissimo & Martina--given the economic climate I won't be that hard on the broadcasters for not doing original videos. It's absurdly simple in some respects. Quartissimo plays behind 4 screens, then they step through them. Martina (wearing a cloak) sways and tries to look for want of a better term...fierce. Since I've seen the whole thing previously, I know she eventually comes out from the screen and sings the scant few lyrics of the song. I don't really comprehend how this won, but I will say that Quartissimo are quite handsome and Martina does do a lot with very little. It could go either way in Moscow, but unlike the other infamous nearly all instrumental Eurovision entry, this doesn't sound like a funeral dirge.

Russia : National final performance. Anastasia does her best Greek tragedy impression. (I'm thinking Cassandra.) It's hard to tell whether she is nervous or tripping off of some substance. She keeps on swinging back and forth mumbling until the chorus. Kudos to the Russians for sparing us further butchering of the English language this year, but usch, should a song praising one's mother sound like something sung in a beer hall? Goodwill as hosts or intimidation might be the only source of Russian points this year.

Armenia: First original video!!!! Inga & Anush start out in very stylised (and I'm assuming national folk) outfits with lots of fur in front of a banner, and then things get very trippy: flashing lights, men in fur hats playing instruments, mandalas. We like very much. When the singing starts, the sisters are superimposed onto ever changing scenes that look very much like the sets from traditional Japanese drama. Interspersed between shots are a group of disembodied hands clapping around a stylised Sun. Then we get a bit of modernity as sped-up shots of people running into a studio and a highway are shown during the lyric "so just dance, sister." (Well, the title does translate to "a new dance.") And dance they do. It looks very Bollywood, and it does work. Good job. I think they're a dark horse for top 5, and qualification should be easy.

Macedonia: And we go from sublime to subpar. National final performance. Imagine it's 1984 or 85, you're at a fairground, and you're watching a B or C-grade mainstream rock band. There's lots of poodle hair and flashing lights. Now imagine they are singing in Macedonian. Voila, you have this year's Macedonian entry. The main thing that's a problem here is that they are coming across as being serious, which makes it very campy. Not quite Billy Squire campy, but close. I don't think this will be seen on the 16th. It also makes me miss the Makedonski Reggaeton of the past few years.

Finland: Original video! A man (possibly homeless) is lying on the street while cars pass him by. Oh, it's the group's rapper. And apparently the singers are homeless as well, and singing around a garbage fire. It's rather interesting juxtaposing very static imagery with driving house music. I gather the idea here is to illustrate that someone has "lost control" of one's life, due to something (drugs? alcohol? overdosing on bpm?). Deep, and a good effort. I reckon Finland makes it to the final again, with a very good placing to boot.

Germany: Alex Swings, Oscar Sings is the daft name for a duo, so I'll just call them AsOs. Original video! Os tries to look swarthy in "Europe, 2009," while standing beside a wall--some might say given the fact that his shirt is unbuttoned to his sternum that he's basically plying his wares. Meanwhile, As (I'm assuming) is driving around in a vintage convertible looking a bit like he's keen on those Os wares. Realising an opportunity when he sees one, Os gladly jumps in the car and apparently drive from Catalunya to Marseille. (As must be flush with Euros, because I don't think Os "comes" cheap.) Next thing you know, Os is performing in some theatre (shirt now completely open) while As plays the piano, accompanied by the standard jazz background musicians. Then it's on the road again to Italy, which looks suspiciously similar to Catalunya. Sadly, that's the minute mark and the ambiguously gay adventures of AsOs come to an end for me. The song? I don't know. It's a bit bland and twee, but that is not a bad thing for a family-friendly show like Eurovision where the middle always rises to the top. I'll say they'll do better than No Angels and leave it at that.

Iceland: National final performance. (I'm even shocked that they're even participating with all the economic woes they've gone through.) This year's Icelandic entry totally passed me by, and now I know why. Yohanna sings a bland ballad while a cellist moodily plays in the background. It is very clear that Yohanna is too composed and contained to bring the crazy like Anastasia does. She is very pretty and has a pleasant voice, and were this 1993 and the Irish entry, I'd say put your money on this. Since it is 2009, I'd say only being picked as the jury favourite might save Iceland from fading away this year.

Lithuania: National final "performance." I'm putting that in quotation marks because he certainly sang in Lithuanian at the final, but the English version has been dubbed over that, and the close-ups and quick cuts show that some new footage has been spliced in. Here's another one that nearly didn't make it to Pooty-poot's Springtime sing-a-long due to monetary constraints. (Although I would truly like to know how a broadcaster can do a nearly two month long selection, but find it hard to foot the bill to send the winner to the country right next door?) Anyway, Sasha plays patiently at the piano and sings about being a child. Cut in between close ups are images of a mother or mother figure and a child, and the adult is being rather abusive, or at least short with the child. More Sasha, and then an image with a sad looking child with the words "Stop The Violence" superimposed on top of him. Meanwhile, during the chorus Sasha seems to repeat the word "love," while going completely incomprehensible with the other lyrics. Huh? This is an anti-child abuse song? It certainly is being very vague in the lyric department if that's the case. I get that meaning from the Lithuanian version, but this message is totally lost in what I'm assuming is the final version. Perhaps the jury might save it, but the message is totally lost. It's a shame since Sasha is relatively good as a performer.

Hungary: Original video. The Hungarians are very wise these days in respect to picking their entry. They look at a selection from the local charts, pick one that meets the Eurovision entry criteria, and ask the artist if they want to do it. It just so happened that this year it took them three times to get it right, but it was worth the wait. Apparently the swarthy man doing the honours this year is called Zoli Adok and not Adok Zoli, which to the non-Magyar majority watching the show means very little, but it's a funny little thing since the fan world had been calling him Adok Zoli since he was selected. I'll just call him ZA. It's a very sleek and futuristic video ZA has. He starts out floating in some future city while a serene-looking blonde pushes him somewhere. Meanwhile, blue and white clad dancers do their impression of You Can't Win from The Wiz. ZA looks steamily at the camera while the dancers continue to flail all over the place. And all of a sudden we're in some sort of underground 1950s dance club, where a woman in a poodle skirt bounces around happily while surrounded by a bunch of men in tank tops and doo rags. Clearly this video and the song are not taking themselves seriously. Thank god for that. This becomes extremely apparent when ZA & company dance around in sailor outfits. I have to say if they can bring this sort of fun and fluff atmosphere onstage, then Hungary is going to be a dark horse for the win this year. I'm talking Black Beauty in cave at Midnight dark. I'd put money on it.

Denmark : Original video. I feel for Denmark, I truly do. They manage to throw together a national selection that is fun without filler, and no one gives them much credit because of they're all watching the Norwegians and Swedes. Perhaps part of the reason is that the Danes keep picking daft entries. This year it's [Niels] Brinck with a song by Ronan Keating. Brinck happens to look shockingly like Il Keating. He also sings like him too. The latter is not a good thing in my book as I think Ronan Keating's singing voice sounds like cow slowly dying, but that's just my personal view. Anyway, the video is rather simple in concept: close up of Brinck/pretty field of flowers/Brinck singing and playing guitar/waves crashing/close up of Brinck, and so on and so forth with a pretty girl and Brinck's band added in to shake things up. Well, neither the video nor the song grab me and I can't really see people (jury and non) voting for it. It's just bland platitudes about love sung in a nasal voice.

Belgium: Original video, mostly because the Walloons haven't had a national final in aeons. I do not know much about the Walloon music scene, but surely they can do better than Copycat, which apparently is now the name of the group and the song. It's Elvis pastiche as imagined by David Lynch. Now that would be a great concept to explore, but not for 3 minutes on a stage in Russia. The video however is rather intriguing: Patrick looks like a pale 1950's Elvis gone to seed, the backing singers are dressed in day-glo red with garish makeup, and the men on bass and guitar look like they'd rather be traveling around on AsOs's Ambiguously Gay European Tour. To make matters even more bizarre, there is an animated cat. This cat is not as mangy as 1990's Eurocat, in fact he looks like he ate Eurocat and several other entries from 1990. This cat spends the first 30 seconds of the song adjusting his pompadour, while Patrick & Co. are shuffled off to the side of the screen. Then we get something that I was afraid we'd see: an extreme close up of Patrick. Good god, they made him look like death warmed over. Fortunately it's brief as we get to see Patrick's dance moves. (The lyric "he's too fat to rock and roll," does elicit a chuckle out of me after seeing Patrick dance. Not that Patrick is overweight, but because what he's doing is not "rocking and rolling" to my eyes.) This is not going to make it at all. I am continually amazed that RTBF doesn't do the smart thing and just revive Technotronic for a few months to do their entry.

Azerbaijan: Original video, which makes sense since there was no Azeri final. How's this for alliteration? AySel & Arash sing the Azeri song "Always." We see two flames of fire and then proceed to watch Madonna's video for Human Nature being liberally ripped off sans bondage imagery. I'm sorry, but that's what this video pretty much is, AySel & Arash singing happily along while black-clad dancers do a G-rated version of the choreography and imagery from Human Nature. Sure, there's a bit of a running theme of AA being able breathe and shoot fire from their hands, but it's basically Human Nature. The song on the other hand is Azeri Reggaeton with really generic lyrics. Quite frankly the only original thing here is the fact that this is that this is Azerbaijan's entry for Eurovision, and since they already debuted last year, the whole "let's vote for the debutant" factor is gone. They might make it, but given the line up of their semi-final (they are smack dab between ZA and Il Rouvas to boot), I doubt it.

Next post: Bosnia & Herzegovina manage to mash Franz Ferdinand with Lejla, Spain struts and shakes, there's a Cypriot entry?, Estonia goes for redemption after Leto Svet, Malta sends the most successful Maltese entrant ever, that song which beat out Stay the Night for Sweden, medivial acid trips with a Bulgarian falsetto, Belarus inflicts their version of symphonic rock upon an unsuspecting public, Albania thinks a young girl singing about her potential psychological disorder is cute, the UK goes OTT with ALW, while The Netherlands is Simply Wet Wet Wet Camp, and France sends a singer with a song that is very descriptive and yet completely metaphorical at the same time, and I'm not talking about children going bird watching.

Sunday Jukebox Bonus Says You Can Have Too Many Dancers

I have never really mentioned the group EXILE here, which is odd since I do like them for the most part. It's just--well--they seem a bit daft to me. You have a group composed of 2 singers, and 5 dancers, which pretty much makes them the male Pussycat Dolls, except that 5 of them have no pretense that they are singers in the group. That said, they do have some good hits, even if the performances are a bit too OTT.



Now I read that HIRO, EXILE's leader and uberboss/manager of several other groups is now merging EXILE with his similar project J Soul Brothers (which did just have a #1 debut album not but a month ago). J Soul Brothers pretty much EXILE with a bit more edge, and with the 2 vocalists joining in the dancing. (Maybe they are more like the Pussycat Dolls more than the mothership, because Nicole does dance her butt off as well.)






Now that you've seen the two groups on their own, prepare yourself to watch the strangeness that is the new 14-person EXILE where there are effectively 12 dancers and 2 vocalists that do. not. move.





It looks like some sort of comedy sketch with The Rockettes, except with grown men--some of whom are pushing 40. The new supersized EXILE's first release is the EP The Monster (no kidding) coming next month.

Sunday Jukebox Gets Twee

It's the first Sunday of Spring so why not have something twee, cheerful, with a bit of soul, church dancing, and possibly too much bronzer. Here is Shigeru Brown aka Shigeru Matsuzaki (who seems to be a bit of Tom Jones for Nippon, and somewhat succeeding in my view, since he's been around since at least the 1970s) and the video for his song Oyako no March*.

I always envisioned a Japanese Eurovision entry being something along these lines, so it's a good way to get ready for the Preview Reviews later on.

*The title translates as "parent and child March," hence all the happy family imagery.





Coming up later today (cross your fingers) is the first round of Preview Reviews.

Not the Best Foot Forward

I'm very glad that Anna Bligh won, but the picture (courtesy of ABC) doesn't exactly put the best face on the Queensland's new leader and her family, who seem to have a more mixed reaction. (Click the picture for the full effect.)

Good luck though.

More Tales of Two or Three Newspapers

As much of a moral dilemma that reading Newscorp newspapers give me, I must say that at least they can be entertaining.

None moreso than the New York Post. Here is a selection of headlines from today & yesterday.

• "Pussy" Whipped: A Project Runway finalist assaults her ex-fiance with their pet cat. (The online version has a noticeably tamer title than the print edition.)
  
• Not So Fast, You Greedy Bastards: A NYP take on the government's plan to take back the AIG bonuses.

Alas, some of the original Newscorp papers, The Daily Telegraph and The Herald Sun just don't quite match up in moxie, although the content is quite similar in terms of sensation.

And one for the referral obsessives (since this is a Newscorp post).

Mike Woods
Mike Woods
Mike Woods

(You'd be surprised how a bland weatherman can apparently get people google-crazy all the way from New Jersey to Mississippi.)

No Time for Ivory Castles...

...Or Palm-shaped islands in this particular case.

I've already mentioned that the annoyance of economic reality was creeping into Dubai, well now it looks like it's not even making any pretence of trying to slip in announced. It's just coming in like an elephant on crack, although The Daily News uses more polite terms than I.:

• The Palm-shaped islands real estate scheme/project has plummeted in terms of value.
• There are--gasp--layoffs.
• The local government banks are on "credit watch."
• And the government is trying desperately to avoid a fire sale.

On my journeys throughout this world-wide internet, I stumble across the occasional Dubai-advocate (mostly they seem to be tied to Emirates--the local ultra high-service airline), who seems to express complete and total shock that anyone could wish ill-will towards Dubai.

The easy answer is to say that it's schadenfreunde, but it's not quite.

In the race to build the biggest, most ornate, and over-the-top, Dubai Inc. seemed to forget to have a Plan B in place, whereas most other organisations have had to consult their Plan B, C, D, sometimes all the way down to ZZ.

That plus the old saying that "Pride goeth before a fall."

TMI, People, TMI

The Twitter phenomenon has passed me by, and it's unlikely that I'm going to try to catch up unless it is imperative to do so.

I do have a Facebook account, which really serves no purpose save for the fact that I'm quite surprised to see how many people I did go to school with...and to annoy the living daylights out of me with inane events.

So when it comes to kicking cases out because jurors thought the whole sodding world (or at least their internet friends) needed to know every last tidbit, I'm all for it.

Eight damn messages to Twitter? Did this person forget to take their Ritalin? Is it really that hard to sit your bored state-subsided behind down and listen to the trial?

Granted, my opinion of being a juror is heavily influenced by Designing Women and Julia Sugarbaker's infamous rant.

ESC 2009: Just When I Think It Might Slow Down

It is late March, the big sing-a-long with Pooty-poot (tm George W Bush) shebang isn't until mid-May.

I like this time, because after a nonstop flood of Eurovision news for pretty much the past 3 months, it gets relatively slow, so we can all sit back and contemplate the entries for a bit.

Again, it is late March, the contest is not until 12-16 May.

Apparently the Eurosong bosses don't like this time to meditative on what will be thrust upon us in 2 months, because now they are dropping the previews on us starting now.

Why? I don't know, because it is late March and the show is not until halfway through May.

I will tackle them starting this Sunday.

Oddly enough, I did not notice the strangeness of previews nearly 2 months ahead of time last year.

Of course, I was also taking painkillers at the time, so it was all sunshine in my world.

Wednesday Jukebox is a Super Junior

Aka the boyband that keeps on growing and growing and growing until we all are members of it.

Put simply, Super Junior is a Korean boyband whose current lineup has 13 members.

13 members, people.

That is not a boyband, that is an all-singing, all-dancing, all-male version of The Polyphonic Spree.

Now, Super Junior (I'm not calling them Suju, because that's just too twee and I'm too old), has recently released their latest album (their 3rd) called Sorry Sorry, and honestly, the title song is pretty catchy--even if the attending dance looks like an attack of sciatica.



I will give the SM choreography geniuses (or basically Shindong in Super Junior's case) credit because those 13 guys (hey, some of them are over 21, they aren't quite "boys") do fly around the stage with ease.

Now when you have such a huge amount of members, it makes sense to go and split them off into little subgroups to go conquer the wallets of young girls across Asia. The most recent spinoff is Super Junior-Happy, and happy they are...incessantly. Seriously, this is some of the most perkiest music you will come across this side of Sesame Street.

A prime example: Cooking? Cooking!




Personally, I prefer the absurd comedy of Super Junior-T, which was the Trot inspired subgroup that yielded the absurdist hit Rokuko, and more back pain inducing choreography.




But back (no pun intended) to the mothership. Super Junior's 2nd album was entitled Don't Don, with a title song that (to quote the publicity via Wikipedia) "send a message about how money, hypocrisy, and the change of society has made the world into a twisted and greedy place to live."

With liberal dance breaks.



Not that I disagree with the message, but is a manufactured boyband seemingly bent on regional domination the best choice of messenger? I don't quite think so.

Since this Super Junior retrospective is in reverse chronological order, it is only appropriate that it concludes (conveniently skipping the obsessive tone of U), with their debut single TWINS (Knock Out). TWINS is a rather interesting song and video, because the idea seems to be to turn the many members of Super Junior as the 12-part super-ego of a man in the midst of a mental breakdown brought on by relationship trouble.

And the back-breaking choreography, of course.




Deep stuff for a debut single, don't you think?

From the house of NUTS

NUTS is the former acronym for NBC Universal Television Studio (now known as Universal Media Studios), which I think would aptly describe the mindset of those working high up in the land of the Universal Peacock.

Their latest decision, to rename the SciFi channel, Syfy. The spin? The new name embraces more of the fantasy element as opposed to the science fiction.

The real reason, as mentioned in the article on TV Tonight (via the Hollywood Reporter), trademark concerns.

InBeeSee, anyone?

ESC 2009: This is crazy -- bom

I had given this year's Ukrainian entry a bit of a pass in terms of grammar, because I thought the unintelligible lyrics were mostly due to Svetlana's heavy accent.

Well, apparently not. This song really is rather incomprehensible to anyone with a strong familiarity with the English language. A brief selection of the lyrics, courtesy of The Diggiloo Thrush:

You are so sexy – bom

Gon' make me crazy – bom

We're gonna do the bom bom

Ain't that amazing – bom

I'm very busy – bom

It's not so easy – bom

I'm gonna tease you – bom bom

Without a reason – bom

I should point out to those who have yet to hear the song, that Svetlana pronounces "bom" the way most Commonwealth, Americans, and Irish pronounce the word "bum."

Later on, the lyricist becomes obsessed with the phrase "anti-crisis."

Yeah, aha...

You are sexy – bom

You are sexy – bom

Really crazy – bom

You and you and you

Anti-crisis – bom

Baby, I can save your world

I'm your anti-crisis girl

Baby, I can save your world

I'm your anti-crisis girl

Perhaps the point of the song is to illustrate co-dependency?

Ouch! Australian commentary on Australian television

Helen Razer, commentator extrodinaire in my book, takes Australian networks to task on the quality of their own original programming in an article for the Sydney Morning Herald.

Meanwhile, Nine has ordered another season of Underbelly, which should bring everything to a close. (I bet they are truly worried that a fourth season is now highly unlikely).

ESC 2009: We Don't Wanna Put In With All of These Winners (just a few)

It's pretty much all decided now who is (nearly every country in Europe + Israel) and who isn't going to the big shindig in Moscow (Georgia, who probably were not keen on going to anything celebrating Russian success this year).

I must admit that this crop of national final winners and "winners" are kind of weak. Sweden's highly obsessed-over and mostly high quality MF-in' Melodifestivalen was won by trained operatic singer Malena Ernman and her English/French opera meets trance song La Voix.




Now, I'm not saying that La Voix is a bad song, because it certainly isn't. Is it good enough to get out of whatever Qualifier Hell Sweden is put in this year?* I don't think so. It's not as easily "accessible but different" as most Swedish songs are in odd years (Sweden seems to get "experimental" in odd years recently: Steinmarck's Vegas kitsch ode in 2005, The Ark being themselves in 2007, and now Malena Ernman singing beautiful nonsense in 2009), but if the juries are still giving out wildcard places to the final then Sweden might very well be saved again.
*Apparently they are in the first one with Israel, Andorra, Montenegro (one of the few good "new Europe" entries this year), Bulgaria, Switzerland, Turkey, Malta, and others. Yikes.


What I find shocking is that Alcazar came in 5th (with the best song of the entire festival!), the Janis Joplin-wannabe came in 2nd, and the acronym boys in top hats with their catchy foolishness came in 3rd! Seriously, how could they not pick this?



The Czechs also decided on what Gypsy.cz song would represent them: The rap about being a Gypsy with the English title, or the rap about being a Gypsy with a (Gypsy Latin?) title. Turns out that the Czech SMS voting public likes the one with the non-English title.



This is really turning out to be a...well...crap year. Walloon Belgium has remembered that it is the land that spawned Magritte and decided to send a Elvis impersonator singing a song called Copycat.



Slovakia chose the most overwrought ballad of all the overwrought ballads they had at their aeons long selection process. (Believe it or not, the most upbeat Slovakian Eurovision entry was their official proper debut in 1994.)



We've got Chiara representing Malta again with another inoffensive midtempo anthem full of milquetoast sentiment. (I'd put some money on her, she's already finished 3rd and 2nd.) Cyprus sent something relatively similar but more anonymous. Israel went for symbolism with an Israeli Arab singer & Israeli Jewish singer singing in Hebrew, Arabic, and English, but it's not as sickly sweet as you'd think. Serbia went for a comedy entry assuming that the rest of the non-Serbian world would get the joke (and dissing Ana Nikolic royally).

Iceland gives us yet another well-performed, but lyrically dull ballad, that sounds more like it escaped from an Irish final. Meanwhile, Belgian Turk/Turkish Belgian Hadise thinks we all want her cookie, and since songs about how we apparently all want some woman's cookie (and vice versa) do VERY well (especially if they are from Mediterranean/Black Sea countries: Greece 2005/2008, Turkey 2003, Ukraine 2004/2008--god willing not 2009, Bulgaria 2007, Russia 2000/2003/2007, Romania 2005), I would watch this one do very well in Moscow.




Armenia has sisters Inga & Anush singing the living daylights out of a Armenian folk-meets-something-like R&B song called Nor Par or Jan Jan. Whatever it is, it's damn catchy and meant to be so. No pun intended, but they're a legitimate dark horse this year, especially since they are similar in spirit with Moldova's entry, but do it in a more accessible manner (in other words, not screaming "Moldova" every 10 seconds).



The Azeris (who I thought were only doing a one-off in 2008) are back with a slightly less shouty duet between singer Aysel and singer/songwriter Arash called Always, and it sounds like Arash listened to Expose's Greatest Hits and just added a few Azeri folk touches. I don't think it's got as much punch as they think it might. They might need the jury sympathy card.




The less said about Belarus and Macedonia's foray into bad 1970s glam (Belarus) and 1980s hair rock (Macedonia), the better off we all are. Well, one thing to Petr from Belarus: Jahn Teigen did this in 1976--in Norwegian, wearing a silly costume and pulling faces no less--with much more panache. (Although he was more in the progressive rock genre.)



Finland on the other hand has made a very astute choice for a 90s revival act, with Waldo's People singing Lose Control. In an earlier time, this would probably be duking out in Sweden, the UK, Romania, or Bulgaria, but yes, this is the Finnish entry.



And the Irish actually manage to do a proper upbeat song that isn't embarassing, even if the electro-pop/rock wave it's riding is very 1992.



Andorra has a Danish emigre doing the honours this year, and she has managed to create the cutest of all cute Andorran entries. They might make it this year, especially with New & Eastern Europe pretty much imploding or preparing to do so at this year's Eurovision--including the host country. (Poland? Isis Gee, but less cartoonish. Lithuania? Really good in Lithuanian, but the truncated English version I think will lose a lot of the punch.)




Yet, I have to say of all the songs selected, I only like a very scant few of the 41 (*sigh* no Georgia, nor San Marino) : Spain, Norway (although it's too cute for its own damn good), Finland, Sweden (not that I think it ought to have won MF), Switzerland, Estonia, Latvia, Hungary (another dark horse), Armenia, and if I get really liberal with the liking, then I'd add The Netherlands (it's also too twee for its own good), Greece, Ukraine (even though it's a hot mess that should absolutely not win or even place in the top 5), and Turkey.

The only prediction I'd be willing to make is that it won't be one of the usual subjects that wins this year, and Malta, Greece, Turkey, Spain, France, and with the slightest chance that everyone wants to get all message-y, Israel are the only ways I see Eurovision going Med.

Still, I'd rather be planning for Tbilisi 2011 (even though I pretty much think the intent was to be agitprop,,,those shooting and hanging gestures plus the close approximation to the fascist salute followed by the "shush" sign would be even more controversial than the lyrics) .

ESC 2009: Georgia On My Mind

Can't say I'm totally surprised, but the fun and sly We Don't Wanna Put In won't be going to Moscow after the EBU rejected it. The reason? Breach of rules as the lyrics are deemed political.

Duh.

But still, it would've been fun.

I doubt they'll rewrite it, in fact given the state of Georgian-Russian relations, they'll probably opt out this year.

A Nonstop Train of Fools

So there is a new 24 hour local news channel here in New York. I almost hesitate to call it a "news" channel, but I also find NBC's description of a "round the clock information and lifestyle channel" a bit too dense.

This channel (for those who don't watch WNBC, which well, is probably a significant part of the market, based on the ratings) is called New York Nonstop, and it's a part of NBC's nationwide focus on local programming via the new digital channels. (If it's successful.)

Since it only debuted yesterday, I will say that everything could very well change as the channel gets its footing.

And it needs all the footing it can get.

• The logo and onscreen graphics look like they are straight from the early nineties.
• The content is high on style and low on substance.
• The "new" programming is basically weekday runs of those inane lifestyle shows that WNBC used to run at times when no infomercial could be found.

Richard Huff of the Daily News called it in today's paper when he described the channel as "Time Out New York TV."

Therein lies the problem. New York Nonstop seems to think by repeating things fast, frequently, with lots of pretty colours and hipster-speak, that they will differentiate themselves from the mothership's operation (yet, why place so much focus on Chuck Scarborough's 7pm newscast?), as well as their other competitors (the other local stations and New York 1).

I don't think that's the ticket.

Hipness is the last thing people need from their news or even "lifestyle" programming. Case in point: Headline News.

Once upon a time, Headline News was the headlines repeated every 30 minutes--no flash, no substance. It was bare-bones and loved for it.

Then it changed.

The anchors started thinking that--or were ordered to, most likely--become more friendly and casual. They added banter, which really annoyed more than entertained. It also made the anchors more important than the stories they presented.

Since few other organisations are foolish enough to create another direct competitor, Headline News can continue with this changes, but there is definite dissatisfaction out there. (Remember the old saying "do one thing well, instead of several things poorly?")

So one has to wonder what WNBC is thinking by emulating some of Headline News's worst decisions.

The Interesting Arms of Veolia

Perhaps this might be of interest to someone like me who finds the various arms of corporations bizarre and slightly amusing.

I was reading the Herald Sun online (I know, but I like Jonathan Cainer), and stumbled across an article that mentioned that Connex operates the suburban rail services in Melbourne. This took me by surprise, as my memory of Connex goes back to when they were amongst the first franchise operators of suburban rail in London. (I remember their trains were awfully dirty and rickety.)

So I jumped on Wikipedia. Apparently Connex is no longer Connex, but is now (and it seems always was) branch of Veolia Environnement, which is a French multinational that started out managing water supply, and branched out into waste management (which is the only time I've ever seen the Veolia name and logo), "energy management" (hard to tell if they are a proper power company or something else, the name "Daklia" gives no indication), and transportation. It also got into film and television as Vivendi.

Vivendi, as some may remember, is the conglomerate that sold off Universal Studios to NBC--thus creating GE's NBC Universal juggernaut (of which Vivendi now owns 20%).

Now things get a bit more confusing.

Lest we think that the same company which pipes the Today Show into American homes is also the garbage company, it turns out that Vivendi spun off its former core businesses into what is now Veolia back in 2000. They'd rather conquer entertainment rather than water, waste, and transport.

Back to Connex.

Veolia for some reason kept the Connex name for the Melbourne rail system, though the Brisbane and Sydney operations are now called Veolia. (Perhaps Connex has a good rep in Victoria?)

Even more of a surprise is the fact that Veolia Transport is really big in the US, with their most prominent operation being the Los Angeles Metrolink suburban rail system.*

* One of the strangest things about the present day US is that it is rare--if ever--to have a privately owned mass transit system. In fact, I have to say I was surprised to find out that there's even a system of franchises. Since American mass transit systems tend to have "practical" names, generally involving an acronym or something with "Metro" in it, Veolia manages to be the largest privately held public transport operator on the continent without having the Veolia name on anything other than its garbage trucks.

Interestingly enough, their old (shoddy) Connex operations in and around London? They lost their franchises.

The Melbourne contract ends in November 2009.

the 1200th post.

I have been racking my brain over how to commemorate 1200 posts at this corner of the internet.

I considered a video log (nope, my webcam has its limitations--especially during the day).

A retrospective (all those flipping posts, I don't think so).

Finally, I remembered the famous saying about brevity being the soul of wit.

So, thank you for stopping by, and do please stick around.

Oh hell, let's toss in a music video: ARIA featuring Ken Yokoyama (aka Mr. Crazy Ken Band) YOU'RE THE BEST

ESC 2009: Ukraine

I'm beginning to think that the reign of Eastern countries in Eurovision is beginning to come to an end. Ukraine has selected an entry that is just bizarre--a fun bizarre, but not the kind of bizarre that I think would get people (both public and jury) to vote for it. The entry itself is called Be My Valentine (it's March, and the contest proper is in May, logic be damned) and the performer is Svetlana Loboda. Now, Svetlana quite simply goes for it onstage, much in the same way Ani Lorak did. (She even does a drum break.) Yet, what Shady Lady had was a sleek performance (even in the National Final version). This is going to need a complete and total overhaul.

The Premium Travel Subsidy

Imagine this: companies getting a tax break for flying executives up front.

Apparently that's what Australian companies are doing according to an article in The Sunday Telegraph.

I suspect that this might end very soon given the current economic state.

ESC 2009: Russia & Estonia

The Russians have "chosen" and it's Anatasia Prikhodko (an Idol winner) with a Russian/Ukrainian song called Mamo, which apparently means "Mama." I'm not totally sold on the song, but I am very surprised to see the Russians actually singing--partly--in Russian (at least at the moment).

One good thing about the song is seeing how Anastasia simply loses it towards the end and goes for full tilt dramatics.




I don't think Russia wants to win again this year, they just want a good placing.

Estonia has also "chosen," and it's Urban Symphony with the goth symophonic rock Rändajad. At the risk of making a weak pun, I'd say this is a dark horse. Why? Well, look at what the Lindsay Lohan clones--also from Estonia--did for Switzerland a few years ago.

The New Zealand Brain Drain

I like the Kiwis.

Seriously, I do.

They are getting seriously beat up in the global economic mess (US$1 = NZ$2, roughly as of this moment), and experienced one of the most highest migrations ever last year, with a total of 48000 Kiwis leaving the country for Australia, and only 13000 returning.

Those numbers may not mean much in US terms, but the entire population of New Zealand at 4.26 million is less than the population of the state of Wisconsin (5.6 million), slightly less than the population of Metro Sydney (4.3 million), and significantly smaller than the city of Toronto proper (6.5 million). They can't afford to lose too many people.

They're also worried about their citizens coming back for the wrong reasons.

I am not being all that flip when I suggest it, but if the Key government (centre-right, and a bit nicer than Harpie up in Canada) is keen to make NZ grow, then they should seriously start courting LGBT migrants.

Currently, New Zealand does not allow for same-sex marriage (they have civil unions which are very close to marriage), nor do they allow for same-sex couples to adopt as a couple (only as individuals and with a prohibition of men adopting female children).

If New Zealand would be willing to address these two issues , and really play it up in the global media, then I think it would certainly help not just stem the brain drain, but also create a brain gain.

I also suspect that New Zealand could enact these policies much quicker than Australia (and considerably faster than the US*).

* Hey, we only decriminalised sodomy in 2003. Australia decriminalised it in (nationwide) in 1994 (although it took Tasmania 3 years to catch up). New Zealand decriminalised it in 1986.

ESC 2009: Switzerland

There's not that much hoopla over this year's Swiss entry, even though this year's entrants are the rarest of rare things: actual Swiss citizens.

It's a band called Lovebugs and their song is called The Highest Heights. Their description/press release on the official Eurovision website describes it as [bringing] all the bands strengths' to the point: the melody, the energy, the thriving beats, spherical guitars and keyboards and the melancholic mood. I hear it and think The La's and The Stone Roses, but maybe that's just me.

Nonetheless, I think this is a dark horse to get to the final.

I'm Truly Past It Now

I freely admit that I can't dance, and that when I do (which generally involves being inebriated), the results are not that terribly good to look at.

So imagine my surprise when I see that the latest dance craze in France looks like a cross between my inept rhythm and an epileptic fit.

Comrades, meet Tecktonik, one of the most bizarre dance/marketing blitzes since the Macarena.

I Thought I Was Feeling Upbeat

Meet Michael Pell.

He's 26.

And he's now running a major portion of Seven's morning lineup.

And he's 26.

Yikes.

It's Mardi Gras Weekend, So Where Are The Gay Stars?

I have to say that in general, I find Australia more tolerant in regards to gay issues than the US. Without a doubt, my opinion is based on being an outsider looking in, so I don't quite have the same perspective as a native. That being said, a close friend who is a born and bred Australian and who has lived in the US, shares that opinion.

I could go on and on as to the reasons why, but it all boils down to the fact that (indigenous natives aside, of course) the US was settled by a hodge-podge of religious zealots and fortune seekers, whereas Australia was settled mostly by convicts, military, and fortune seekers.

I mention this because one thing I find extremely peculiar is that there are very few Gay Australian celebrities. Ironically, the one article that addresses this absence is one of the NewsCorp papers, The Herald Sun.

It is bizarre that in this day and age, in a country that has one of the most prominent and well attended international celebrations of Gay & Lesbian liberation, that there are so few celebrities willing to say "I'm gay."

The New Nonsensical Economic Model for Television?

I must confess that I have never heard of this ZillionTV that all the studios/media corporations are pouring money into, yet it must have something to it.

Personally, I'm not a fan of watching television on the computer, in fact I'm right on the border between sceptic and Luddite when it comes to technology. I want my television on a television and internet on a computer. (I'm willing to revise that when they manage to create a computer that doesn't hum when used for a long period of time. Although it still seems like being chained even closer to one device that already seems omnipresent in modern life.) Nonetheless, I also know that--at age 30--I'm a product of a different generation. (Sigh.)

The networks have made their current programming available via downloads or streaming for quite some time, and the popularity of sites like TV.com (owned by CBS) and Hulu (owned by NBC Universal & NewsCorp)*clearly show that there are people out there eager to watch things online, and where there are eyeballs there are opportunities to make money. This platform was one of the main reasons why the WGA went on strike recently, so it's clearly going to play a role.

* Don't think for a second that in this day and age anything is independent. Not even the Independent Film Channel nor Sundance Channel.

Since I've never gone on one of these sites, I figure I should take a gander. If anything it'll at least increase my hipness quotient by a percentage point.

Stop #1: Hulu

Well, they certainly have quite a selection. The comedy choices run the gamut from American Dad to ALF to Howard the Duck and the 1967 version of Casino Royale. I opt to watch a bit of Rocky & Bullwinkle. There's a brief sponsor message that states "the following program is brought to you with limited commercial interuption by XYZ*." I have always interpreted this statement as a bald-faced lie designed to lure the viewer into having a positive reaction towards the product being advertised.

*They aren't giving me any money, so I'm not going to do their work for them.

That said, it's a bit bizarre watching a show like Rocky & Bullwinkle with "limited commercial interruption." Hear me out. Shows like that are designed for frequent breaks (hence the interstitial animations), so the flow is not quite what the creators intended. Instead, the ad breaks occur at strange times, such as right after the opening for Fractured Fairytales. Put the adverts where the adverts are supposed to be!

Stop #2: TV.com

Since CBS owns TV.com, I hold out hope that perhaps I might find episodes of Designing Women. No such luck. They've got episode summaries up the wazoo, but not even a brief clip. The site itself is also quite tricky to navigate, because you have to look in just the right place for an actual video. (Personally, I'm a bit dismayed by that, since I do have a slight bias towards CBS over the other networks.) When you actually get to the video selection, they have a lot of filler from nearly every network not owned by GE. I imagine that there are people out there who have an interest in seeing an interview with Ted McGinley, but I reckon it cannot be that many. I opt for an episode of Astro Boy (2004)*. There's an advert before the actual show (and as it was for a credit card company, I think they really need to start tailoring the adverts for the show).

* As an aside, it's crying shame to watch the piss poor version of the opening sequence compared to the rather cool openings employed during the original run in Japan in 2003. Interestingly, Astro Boy is also offered on Hulu.

As on Hulu, the ad breaks happen randomly and also poorly suited for the show. (A car ad during Astro Boy?)

Since ZillionTV's site states that they are "coming soon," my journey pretty much ends there.

I do like the idea of being able to access virtually every show in existance, but these sites don't quite deliver on that. (They've got nearly every flop show from the past 2 years, yet it's hard to find a long-running show like Designing Women or Murphy Brown?)

Hulu certainly has an easier way of finding the show one wants to watch (as well as a sleeker design), but when you get to the actual watching, you're a victim of randomly occurring ad breaks that mess up the flow. TV.com is even worse since it is harder to navigate, seems to have less content (in terms of full episodes) than its chief competitor, and also has the ad break issue that Hulu suffers from. If I was a company advertising on these sites, I'd be rather peeved that my product was missing its audience time and time again.

This ZillionTV supposedly will personalise the adverts according to the viewer, and what this ultimately means is that advertising is here to stay whether it is via broadcast on a television or streaming on a computer. Personally, I think this is rather short-sighted of the media corporations, especially given the fact that downloads are also growing in popularity.

If I had a choice between free with adverts or paying some small amount for a ad-free experience, I'd pay. (This is the idea behind iTunes's season pass, also networks like here!, HBO, Showtime, etc.) It continues to boggle my mind that few networks realise that people are willing to part with money for commercial free programming.

Yet, there will always be an audience for free programming, and since "free" programming has its costs as well, there needs to be some advertising. Still, I am surprised that they have not yet figured out how to get the right combination of ads for any given show. They manage to do it on regular television, so how could online be difficult. I am sceptical that ZillionTV's idea of letting the viewer choose their own annoyance is going to work, but I'll wait and see.

Either way, this is the new world, so we'd better get used to it.

Pauline Might Pay For Losing It & More

A part of me is thinking "oh crap, this story actually has legs, now they are going to beat this to death."

The other part is thinking "this might be the final nail in the coffin."

Skewering Freeview

If you don't know what Freeview is (and I don't think a single person on this planet does), this parody ad pretty much seems to explain it all.



This many channels to watch the same programming is a strong possiblity on US screens, in fact NBC Universal already does it. (I think Law & Order: Criminal Intent is played more frequently on USA (+ HD), Bravo (+HD), and Universal HD*, than it ever was on NBC.)

* And it's syndicated as well.

Tuesday Jukebox Loves Tommy and her Mulitple Personalities

Perhaps us February 6 people have a bit of a multiple personality tendency as Tomoko Kawase (aka Tommy february6, aka Tommy heavenly6).

Birthday bias aside, I really like Tomoko's solo projects, because they are really intriguing performance art. First, Kawase creates one character (who seems to live life to a Stock Aitken Waterman soundtrack), Tommy february6 who's cute-as-a-button, albeit repressed with a drinking problem...





...then she creates another character (Tommy heavenly6) as the liberated other half. Genius.






And a very wry comment on the state of Japanese popular culture.

The Flying Roo Can't Catch A Break Part 3

Yesterday, Qantas grounded one of their A380s, today it's now all three, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

There's going to be a revolution over at Flying Roo HQ.

The Flying Roo Can't Catch A Break Part 2

Growing up, my family tended to get to first new big technology (mini-satellites, computers, DVD players, etc.), only to see these things go down in prices and up in quality.

Since then, my mother has adopted a wait-and-see approach, and it's worked out for us.

Perhaps Qantas would be best served by applying this same logic, as their latest A380 snafu (detailed in today's Sydney Morning Herald) illustrates

Pauline loses it

I must admit that I like Mrs. Nasty for comedy reasons, but Pauline Hanson might just be a good enough replacement, especially since she has no problem in losing it on television.

ESC 2009: Sweden Sweden Sweden

Why must everybody talk about Sweden?

Well, certain things are inevitable in Eurosongland, and media/fan focus on Melodifestivalen is one of them. Honestly, I'm glad I don't have the time to live blog Melodifestivalen anymore, plus the fact that SVT doesn't make it easy to watch it.

Still, you cannot ignore the Melodifest this year, when it features the return of Alcazar (pretty much guaranteed to win it or at least come 2nd):



And the bizarre agitprop theatre that is Star Pilots nicking certain 1980s pop songs (Waiting for a star to fall and Eye of the tiger), but being smart enough to fuse them together in the same song.




And then there was Markoolio, who sang a comedic ballad poking fun at Eurovision cliches. It didn't make it to the final, which is a shame.



Proving that MF results MF-ing bizarre, EMD (I've never heard of them, but Swedes have) managed to beat almost dead certs Bodies Without Organs in their heat with this weird fusion of electropop and Broadway choreography:



BWO's You're Not Alone, which looks and sounds like a cut scene from Xanadu.



There, I've said my MF-ing piece about this MF.

ESC 2009: The Weekend that it was

It was a big weekend in Eurosongland, Portugal chose, Croatia chose, Bosnia presented their song, but only two winners stood out for me.

First off, Spain chose Soraya, and hopefully my gut feeling is an indicator that Spain will place very high, I almost think it's a dark horse to win.

And Latvia has gone and done something that shocked me: They chose a song that I like, Sastregums--which will actually be called Probka and performed in Russian (although the chances of the Russian entry actually being in Russian are slim)--by Intars Busulis.

Intars's performance style seems to be highly influenced by the lead singer of The Hives, although his backing performers (and the song itself) seem like they take their cues from Talking Heads. (I realise that might be a very pedantic difference though.)

Nonetheless a great entry. Go Latvia.

The Backlash Against Overzealous Weather Coverage Starts

Oddly enough with the local FOX affiliate in Milwaukee. Watch.



In order to put this in proper context, understand that in Milwaukee they will pre-empt anything if there is the slightest chance that anything more than 2" (roughly 5cm) of snow, because as Tim Cuprisin on his Journal Sentinel blog is fond of pointing out: weather = rating$$$$ for local news operations.

As someone who grew up in Greater Milwaukee, I feel a bit of a traitor for showing WGN's own answer to obsessive snow coverage, however it's funny, I got it via the Journal Sentinel, and it really illustrates the difference between Chicagoans and Milwaukeeans.




Let this serve as a warning to all TV news directors worldwide.

Whither Australian Comedy?

The Sydney Morning Herald boasts a great article that argues that in the hype over Australian drama, the networks have forgotten that they are good at comedy.

I agree, particularly after the last pair of episodes of Canal Road were damn near satire.

Andrew Denton would probably make a killing producing a parody of a typical drama series.

Whore Aim High

Perhaps Sydney was stealing too much of the lurid gay sex crime market from Melbourne, so Melbourne is striking back with this:

A man with the very intimidating or poonce name of Jake Michael Della-Vedova is going to be jailed for 4 months for filming his shag of a "prominent male public figure" (I'm guessing MP, Senator, or someone off of Underbelly) and blackmailing him to the tune of A$15,000, so say AAP.

$15,000?

I know the guy is 25, but I think he should've added an extra zero. In this day and age where a sex tape can fetch a serious chunk of change when any degree of celebrity is involved, Della-Vedova could've gotten much more. Just ask Paris Hilton or Kim Kardashian.

Unless the Victorian prostie market is rather oversaturated, I also think he was aiming a bit low with his base price of $150. He clearly must have the magic crotch because he got Mr. Big to pay his rent the next day. Yet he still went on and sent his blackmail threat the same day? (So he could pay his rent and get a scooter? Must be horrible at his job or at least promotion.)

Hopefully he'll get some minor MBA courses while in gaol, because this guy needs some business education.

Lesson #1: If you are going to blackmail someone make it a large enough sum so that you don't have to go back there again.
Lesson #2: If you were good at your job (even though he's not identified as a prostie, I'm just taking an educated guess), then you wouldn't have to worry about Lesson #1.