Serving Kant with Special Guest Adrian Bradley

Theme: 00:00:01

Hello, London, we are ready for your vote.

Steven Perkins: 00:00:08

Hello, I'm Stephen Perkins and this is Doucebois, the Eurovision podcast from the team behind Bingewatch. It is Monday 10th of February and the line up for this year's contest.

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Is really starting to take shape.

Steven Perkins: 00:00:17

With that in mind, in a moment I will be joined by a special guest to take a look at the results from this weekend's national finals. But first, let's take a quick look at some of the other news that we've had from the past week.

Azerbaijan have selected the band Mamagame to represent them this year.

They were selected in internally by Azerbaijani broadcaster ITV and according to their bio on the official Eurovision site, they are a trio known for their unique fusion of rock, pop and traditional Azerbaijani musical elements. Their song is due to be unveiled very soon, but the lead singer Asaf, has described it as a true representation of our country's essence.

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So watch this space.

Steven Perkins: 00:00:51

part from on three occasions,: 2019

There's no word yet on when they'll be making their official artist announcement, but again we will keep you posted.

Fans who tuned in for the semi finals of Malta's selection process were also treated to the premiere of this year's entry for Czechia as Adonis debuted his song Kiss, Kiss Goodbye.

The acoustic version that he performed at the show is likely not the version that we'll hear at the Eurovision Song Contest itself, as the studio version of the song isn't due to be released until next month. But it sounds promising so far. A big sweeping, animotive ballad with some impressive vocals.

So it will be exciting to hear the final rendition in a few weeks.

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Time as the national final season heats up.

Steven Perkins: 00:01:38

We wanted to get some other Eurovision.

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Fans on here to talk about how.

Steven Perkins: 00:01:40

Things are shaping up and I'm delighted.

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To be joined this week by Eurovision journalist and superfan Adrian Bradley.

Steven Perkins: 00:01:46

Adrian, welcome to the pod.

Adrian Bradley: 00:01:47

Thanks for having me.

Theme: 00:01:49

It's our pleasure. Thank you so much for joining us. It has been, I think we can safely say a pretty busy weekend, hasn't it? There's been a lot going on, an.

Adrian Bradley: 00:01:58

Awful lot going on and an incredibly long weekend as well.

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Yeah, particularly if you're watching the Maltese national final, which we will get to presently.

Steven Perkins: 00:02:08

So let's.

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We'll go in a sort of semi chronological order, so we'll start, I think, makes us start with Ireland, because they were the first ones to come through this weekend.

So the winner is like a party by Emmy, which, for those who haven't heard it yet, is a song about the first animal went into space, which sadly did not survive the journey, and kind of imagines a scenario in which the dog survives, has a lovely party in the sky and that kind of thing. It's quite a strange proposition, but also kind of a bop. What are your thoughts on it?

Adrian Bradley: 00:02:40

I'm probably not as positive as you are about it. It's fine. It feels like Eurovision from a few years ago.

We can get to the attempt of Norwegians to take over the entire world of Eurovision country by country. But putting that to one side, it has a little bit of subwoofer about it, certainly in its kind of topics. It's fun.

But I think the problem that Ireland face is after last year and after what a statement Bambi made and what an impressive, top tier staged performance they had last year, this feels like it's gone backwards. It's going back to the kind of the dance pop.

It's fun, but the real worry is, is it going to have enough to stand out when it kind of comes to a semi final and make it and make it through? I'm not entirely sure that it will and that. That's disappointing.

Theme: 00:03:41

Yeah, no, I'm with you. I think Ireland are in an interesting position this year because for the first time in a long time, they've kind of got something to live up to.

And like you say, I think this like a step backwards.

Obviously, we can't necessarily take the Late Late show performance as an indicator of what it will look like on the night because obviously Bambi's performance was very, very different by the time we got to the stage. But then I think at the same time, Bambi is a lot more of a kind of conceptual artist and probably had a very, very clear idea of what they wanted.

And whether that's true of Emmy, I don't know. So the staging definitely needs work. I think the song itself is like you say, it's fine.

It's not kind of a huge step forward in the way that Doomsday Blue felt like it was. So there's potential there.

I think you were absolutely right with the possibility of it kind of struggling to make a case for itself in a televote semi final. It's going to come down, I think, to them coming up with something really, really attention grabbing for the staging.

Adrian Bradley: 00:04:45

Yeah, I agree with that.

And that brings with it a little Bit of a risk as well, because if it leans too much into novelty as well, that doesn't always go down well and that might not. Now, obviously, we don't yet know exactly who they're up against, but they're in a tough semi final.

They're in a semi final with Finland, which we're going to talk about later. But when it comes to standing out, a lot is going to stand out from that semi final. Is this going to be enough to get noticed in a tally vote only?

I'm not sure, and I think it is, just because we were so excited by Ireland last year that it was going to be really interesting to see what they could have done this year.

And perhaps they've gone backwards or perhaps I'm being very negative and maybe it will improve between now and May and it will be really impressive on stage.

Theme: 00:05:35

Yeah, I think Bambi was always going to be a very, very tough act to follow. So Ireland did kind of have kind of a millstone around their neck a little bit this year.

Before we move on, let's talk very, very quickly about the runner up, which was My Way by Samantha Mumber. Obviously, you know, attracted a lot of attention this year when Samantha Mumber was in the running for Eurosong.

I believe they've been trying to sort of get her for a while, and it's never really worked out for me, this one. I just. I was sort of watching it and listening to it and thinking it just doesn't really go anywhere and it doesn't really take off, particularly.

I don't know if maybe it was one that they were kind of swinging more for the juries with, but it didn't. Definitely didn't feel like it was much of a televote grabber to me.

Adrian Bradley: 00:06:15

Yeah, I think that's probably fair. I actually. I quite liked it and it was probably better than I was expecting it to be.

But what I think we're seeing now at Eurovision, the songs that are going to do well have to have an X factor, for want of a far better term, have to have something that makes it stand out and they do have to go somewhere. If you look back at Sam Ryder, it had that. If you look at Nemo from last year, if you look at Croatia from last year, they had that.

And this was a very good radio song. Again, a song that, if you had performed, you'd think, oh, it's great. Oh, Samantha, Mumba's back. And that's a really good song.

Is it a Eurovision winner? Perhaps not. And that's maybe where it struggled, but then you put it against what won.

And you've got to feel a little bit sorry for Samantha Mumba, that she probably felt she had a chance of going to Basel, but it wasn't to be.

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It wasn't to be. There's always next year, isn't there, if she wants to put herself through it again.

Let's move on, then, to Latvia, who I feel maybe slightly unfortunately, kind of just picked the wrong weekend to have their final a little bit, didn't they? Because they kind of got buried in amongst the Ukraine and the Finland and the Malta of it all. But I did take the time to check it out this morning.

And I'm going to try and pronounce this, because I haven't really had a chance to look up the correct pronunciation yet. But the winner was a Burman Laney by Tauto Matas. I think this one's really interesting, actually. It's very kind of folky, kind of.

There's a lot of chanting in it, some really lovely kind of vocal harmonies going on.

Feels like the sort of thing actually around this sort of period in Eurovision that does do quite well, because it feels very kind of authentically Latvian, to the best of my knowledge. It feels like they've kind of sent something that represents them in every sense. What do you make of it?

Adrian Bradley: 00:08:02

Yeah, I think I agree with you. I think it's a sort of something that could end up doing quite well. A good top 10, maybe even a top five performance.

The bit that really did impress me was the staging of it.

It was very inventive, a very inventive use of lighting, the sort of staging that didn't look like it was necessarily expensive as well, which is quite important, but clever and visually grabbing. And that is what's really important on the stage. I think Moldova proved this a few years ago.

You don't have to spend a lot of money to have an incredibly inventive, incredibly clever staging. You just have to have a good idea and a creative way of executing that.

And I think Latvia found that the song itself, bit reminiscent actually of Czechia last year for me as well. And there is always kind of that place for that authentic folk song within Eurovision that can do well.

It did struggle to stand out on the Super Saturday if it wanted to get attention to itself.

But I'd be interested to see kind of how it develops and what they're able to kind of do with it and how it works on the big stage that they're putting together in Basel and whether it will fit there in the same way that they were able to do in quite a smaller studio in Latvia.

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Yeah, I mean, they were also in that tough second semi final.

Steven Perkins: 00:09:22

But I think what's really.

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What you said about the staging is really interesting, because I did. I did watch this performance and think this feels almost like it's ready to go, like they've got an idea.

They've obviously got a bit of time to kind of enhance it and build on it. But the concept seems very, very solid.

I think that's something we've really, really noticed in the last few years, that people go to the National Finals already set on how they want it to look at Eurovision. Is that something that you sort of picked up on as well in some.

Adrian Bradley: 00:09:50

Of the National Finals? Certainly, to an extent, you can tell the difference between the ones that have got it and maybe will do well and the ones that won't.

So we talked about Ireland and the fact that actually, these didn't seem finished on the whole. And I know that there is some issues.

We were talking about some issues with how that they select and that actually it's quite a short process and by the time they actually turn up on stage, they haven't really thought about how they want to stage it at all. I think that's probably a bit of a problem.

And this is perhaps where the UK's method of holding everything back and choosing it and getting the whole package in one place, where I know we'll talk about this later, kind of helps because they can show the song with its entire identity up front. And I agree with you. I think with Latvia, they have done that.

I don't expect what we see in Basel to be dramatically different to what we saw last night. And that's not a criticism, I think, because they've come up with a concept that works.

There were a few things that you could tweak and improve, but I think they've come up with an idea that works and that is engaging and that makes you kind of stick with the song for three minutes, especially as not masses of people will speak Latvian. They won't necessarily understand it, but there's enough there to connect with.

Theme: 00:11:06

Yeah, definitely. I think sort of sonically, melodically, there was a lot to grab onto there, even if you don't understand what they're saying.

So I think that was great. I looked at the runner up just briefly, which was Heartbeat by Amelia, which is a song I kind of felt I had a lot of time for it. It was fun.

It was pretty good. It did Kind of feel quite, to me, quite kind of, very kind of generically Eurovision entry.

Something that would probably, I think, have struggled to make it through the semi finals, which is. So it feels like they went with the right song. I think they did.

Adrian Bradley: 00:11:37

I know City Zeny were trying again and came third and a little disappointed, perhaps, to have come third, but it was not to be their night.

Theme: 00:11:48

Yeah. And I will go on record as saying that the last time they went to Eurovision, I really, really didn't like their song.

So I'm not going to cry too many tears over that one. Let's move on. On then, to Malta. You and I, we exchanged a few whatsapps last night, didn't we? Because this was a lengthy evening.

Neither one of us caught the whole thing. I think you probably caught slightly more of it than I did. Yeah.

Well, let's talk about the winner, first of all, because I think there's a lot to address here. The winner is. I'm going to be very careful how I say this can't by Mariana Conte. The performance wise.

We talked just now about things that feel like staging wise. They're ready to go to Eurovision. This did not feel ready to go to Eurovision to me. The staging was a mess. The vocals were slightly messy as well.

The song itself is quite fun and quite memorable and is setting themselves up for, I think, a world of trouble. What did you make of it?

Adrian Bradley: 00:12:47

Well, and to bring up Zeny, of course, they have a precedent for this with the Ebu in sending a very similar subtle innuendo led song can't, of course, mean singing in Maltese, which is, I'm sure, what the lyrics are about.

Theme: 00:13:04

Totally. Yeah.

Adrian Bradley: 00:13:05

I think you will struggle in that argument with the Ebu because the entire song is in English, other than this one word and that. That is where I can imagine the Ebu having a. No, you cannot do that. Now also with Malta quite often.

I won't say quite often, but there have been times in the past where the National Final winner is not the song that ends up turning up to Basel. So there's an element of wait and see. It was fun and it's perhaps a better song than we're.

Than we're kind of giving it credit for and talking about a novelty song because absolutely kind of is the song that stands out that you could probably hear on the radio right now in the charts. I agree with you that the singing isn't quite there. The staging, whilst it had a kind of acute concept, really isn't there yet.

And they really, really need to come up with a way of kind of selling that, saying that it will be enjoyable, the fans will love it, it will get a good reaction. It will get a good reaction in Mahal. It will probably do about as well as City Zany did.

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Yeah. I think it reminded me, I think, in some points of Jean Macasse. It's got that same kind of energy to it.

It's kind of very, kind of loud and it's quite sort of strident and it's really fun in that sort of way. I think you made a really interesting point there, which, in terms of how acceptable it is, in terms of the way she pronounces the word cant.

And it's very, I think, very deliberate the way she says it. The whole song is kind of built around that. So if the EBU say, you can't do that, how do you restructure this song to make it acceptable?

Is it going to be, as you say, the case that they say, well, actually, you can't send this song. You're going to have to send the runner up or you're going to have to pick a new song entirely.

I think your point of wait and see here is a very, very key one, because the EBU may have some big issues with this one and I don't see how. I guess there are ways around it, but the whole thing is built around this one. Kind of very, very key innuendo.

And if you're told you can't do that, they have got some fairly big structural problems with this song, I think.

Adrian Bradley: 00:15:12

Yeah. And again, talking about the Latvia song, that wasn't the main hook of the song, it was a gag within the song that you could get rid of.

And actually you had the entire audience shouting that word because they weren't singing it. That wouldn't work here either. And I just. I know that the EBU have stuck the translation in brackets when they've stuck it on the Eurovision page.

Yeah, I don't think that is going to hold up. So let's see what happens over the next few weeks. But I will be very, very surprised if the song we saw was there.

lieve it was due to end about: 11:00

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Yeah. I know so much about Maltese taxes now.

Adrian Bradley: 00:16:08

Maltese. I know about Maltese taxes. I know where I going to buy my paint from in Malta.

Theme: 00:16:15

Yes. I know where to get my. Yeah. My kitchen equipment. Yeah. I feel very, very educated about Maltese culture.

Adrian Bradley: 00:16:24

They have to pay for that show somehow. And I guess that was how they did it.

My one thing that I'm grateful for, and I wish some of the other broadcasters would do this by putting it on the Eurovision YouTube channel was much easier to watch and stream than some of the others where you're having to kind of airplay from your TV because you've got to play in the official broadcaster app. So kudos to Malta for that. However, I just make it shorter, please.

You don't need a three hour show for your national final selection, especially when you've had two semi finals already.

Theme: 00:16:55

Yeah. Blimey. Well, let's talk very, very quickly about the runner up, because we might end up seeing that one again. Heaven Sent by Christie Spiteri.

I quite like this one. It had some energy again to it, a bit of a bop. It was very much the jury favourite, I think, because she had a kind of.

She was going for a bit of an operatic thing in the chorus. I. I don't necessarily think this was one that would. Made a lot of impact at Eurovision. Again, it feels like something that would have got a bit lost.

And the chorus, I think maybe, maybe, maybe needs a bit of work in making a bit more impactful. But this did feel like a strong runner up.

And if it does come to the point where they decide they can't send the song that won, this feels like a song that could conceivably be picked as the backup.

Adrian Bradley: 00:17:39

Yeah. And I thought it was very impressive. I think she was the strongest singer of the night.

And as we know, that's more and more important in Eurovision at the moment. If you can't get the big note and sing live on the stage, you're not going to make it very far. And I agree with you that it was the jury favorite.

I think the real surprise for me with the juries were how much they were willing to give points to Cunt. And ultimately that was why it won, because it was not that far behind Heaven Sent when it came to the televote.

And at which point I was pretty certain that was how the result was going to go. Yeah, I think it was only about 6 points in it. So a couple of.

A couple of different choices from a couple of the jurors and it would have gone the other way. Yeah, we might still see it, we might not.

It felt like the safer choice that Malta perhaps wanted to send and they were kind of offering these two options. Let's wait and see what Happens. It was, in my view, probably the best overall package of the night.

Theme: 00:18:40

Yeah, I think that's fair. Let's move on, then, to Ukraine, obviously. Big hitters at Eurovision. Very, very, very strong track record. I was quite interested by this one.

Bird Of Prey by Ziefa Blatt. It does feel to me like it's very, very outside of the sort of thing we normally get from Ukraine, or certainly in the last few years.

I thought maybe that there were some. Some of the live vocals were a little bit shaky, but that feels like honed in the run up. What did you make of it?

Adrian Bradley: 00:19:08

Yeah, it's interesting. It's. I think, because we've expected so much from Ukraine over the last few years and such impressive songs. This hasn't grabbed me.

It's got this kind of weird pseudo 60s vibe to it, but the sort of 60s vibe that you'd see in an Austin Powers movie. And I'm not sure. And I think I need to give it a few more listens to kind of decide.

It was maybe not so much last year, but the years before it was really impressive. From Ukraine. Is this going to stand out in the same way? I'm not sure.

Again, I think part of my issue with the national final season so far is that I've not yet had that wow moment from any country, which I'm still kind of waiting for. And maybe I was hoping for a bit too much from Ukraine on the subject of long finals as well.

They were between them and Malta for the stretching out as long as they possibly could. I actually think Ukraine was longer than Malta. I think it was about four and a half hours.

Theme: 00:20:17

Wow.

Adrian Bradley: 00:20:18

I got a result. I had a friend that watched the whole thing. That was the one that didn't quite make the cut for me between Finland and Malta watching last night.

So I didn't see it. But, yeah, another very long final.

But impressive quite how seriously Ukraine and the Ukraine broadcaster kind of takes it to kind of put on a show of that standard still every year.

Be interested to see how that kind of develops between now and May, because I think the staging, whilst good, I think there's room to develop that and to use more visuals to make the most of the staging concept that we're going to see in Basel. So let's wait and see what happens with that one.

Theme: 00:20:55

Yeah, yeah, I think that's. It feels like there's decent building blocks there and we can see what comes of it.

They've got three months to kind of really, really hone it, Haven't They I'm conscious that we don't want to run out of time, but let's just very, very quickly touch on the runner up, which was Melody With My Sea. This one. I feel like I've said this about quite a lot of the runners up so far. It felt like it was in itself a relatively strong entry.

It felt like it also was a little bit on the generic side that it, you know, I can sort of see why it did well but didn't win.

Adrian Bradley: 00:21:25

Yeah, it's relatively good. But we've got a theme so far that we've not said that any of your runners up have been absolutely robbed and should have made it through.

So hopefully that bodes well for their selections. We'll see.

Theme: 00:21:37

And then let's go on to Finland. This one, I think, had a lot of the pre evening excitement.

The people thought there was a very, very strong level of quality across the competition as a whole. The one, I feel the one ish, by Erica Vickman, that felt like it was the favourite going in. The one that had a lot of energy behind it, a lot of fan.

And she, I think, fairly fair to say, she did deliver on the night, didn't she?

Adrian Bradley: 00:22:03

She absolutely did deliver.

And just firstly on the show itself, really impressed, really impressed with the show Finland have shown over the last few years they are desperate to win Eurovision again.

And when you see the standard of umk, not just in the performances, but the whole show that they've built around it, the presenting style, the fact that they have commentary in a whole number of different languages to really embrace people watching it from around Europe. I very much enjoyed the fact that I had English language commentary last night. That was explaining what was going on, that was translating, that was.

Had character and was interesting. And that really made it a very enjoyable evening to watch. I think all six were very good, were very enjoyable.

And what we ended up with were a winner and runner up that were both incredibly strong on the themes. I feel like perhaps Ikoma is a little more subtle in its innuendo than serving Kant, but it's in a similar ballpark. That seems to be.

I saw a comment earlier today that we're having the 69th Eurovision and maybe they'll be.

Theme: 00:23:14

People are really leaning into that, aren't they?

Adrian Bradley: 00:23:16

They are.

The moment of the song for me was the climax, for want of a better term, where you have Erica Vegman on a giant microphone with fireworks and pyro spurting out of the back of this microphone. It is an impressive staging and she really did deliver it.

And also there is a positive message and a story in the song that she connects to, and it is about sexual positivity and identity. I really liked it. Whether this is the year that Finland win or not, I'm not sure.

But Finland definitely wants a win and Finland are in this to win it each year, and if they don't win this year, it's coming soon.

Theme: 00:24:00

Yeah, I think. No pun intended. I think I've seen a lot of people saying that Finland have picked a winner already.

I'm not 100% sure about that, because I think this one feels like it's going to be a very, very big hitter with the televote potentially a televote winner. I don't necessarily know it's going to be a jury winner and that. That, I think is where they are going to be struggling a little bit.

It's going to depend very much on what the rest of the field is like, but I think it's definitely got potential.

I think there's a lot of songs in previous years that I thought were much more televote friendly than jury friendly ended up doing surprisingly well with the juries. So I think it's going to depend. If there isn't a runaway jury favourite in the way that there has been for the last two years, this could.

If it's kind of between two or three songs and then this one has the clear run on the televote, then they could win. But I think we're going to need to see the rest of the field before we really know how strong her chances are.

But like you say, I mean, Finland very do clearly do really, really want to win it. And they have turned up with this again, very kind of Eurovision ready staging.

The whole performance felt like they only really need a little bit of tweaking here and there.

The one thing that I thought it just needs is that my favourite part of the studio version is the way that it just cuts off at the end, which I think is an absolutely incredible gag that is just superlatively done. And that's a lot harder to do live because you need the whole. All the sounds cut out at the exact same moment. And it didn't quite happen at umk.

And I think, again, I'm sure that's doable.

I think they've got time to sort that out, but I would love them to just really, really nail that on the night, because it's such a funny joke when it works.

Adrian Bradley: 00:25:38

One thing I also want to point out about umk, they hired Sergio, who designed Bambi Fucks performance last year, having an incredible moment now. This 23, 24 year old creative director, creative designer. But the entire show last night was designed by him.

So it will be really interesting to see if he's going to stay involved with Finland. I know working with a number of other countries as well at Eurovision and how he can kind of bring that imagination into the staging.

I think we are going to see something special from Finland when it comes to the final performance. So I'm really looking forward to seeing what they take to Basel. It was definitely my favourite of the night last night or this weekend.

Theme: 00:26:22

I think the runner up was also very, very strong, made of by Goldilocks. Again, what we were saying earlier about how the staging was quite simple but very, very effective and her pulling off some. Yeah, ready.

And some really, really good live vocals while in some quite difficult physical positions, which I think is quite an underrated skill.

Adrian Bradley: 00:26:41

You may have missed this good live vocals, but they weren't live vocals. So she had lost her voice. Oh. Instead of. Which is what we thought they might have done is play the performance on tape. They played the vocal on tape.

So she was performing live but lip syncing to last night, to the previous night's performance, which is interesting way of choosing to deal with that problem. That's the way that they did it. However it was, you know, it was a vocal recorded live in the arena and it was a really interesting performance.

I could easily have seen that one winning and I think it would have been a really good contender as well. And I think that says a lot about Finland. That's the first song where we've looked at both the runner up and the winner and gone.

Oh, they both are very strong and you know, that's a good sign for them going forward.

Theme: 00:27:32

Yeah, absolutely.

I think the thing that you need is the culture around your selection, that you need it to be this incredibly strong process that people want to take part in, that people feel confident getting involved in, that they feel even if they don't win will be a net benefit for their career. And I think Finland have got that.

Adrian Bradley: 00:27:49

Absolutely.

Theme: 00:27:51

We are I think running out of time.

So let's very quickly talk about the United Kingdom this year because it's been an interesting week because we were sort of possibly expecting an announcement earlier in the week which didn't come and then some people at Radio one seemed to think it had happened anyway and started talking about it like it was a done deal. Officially know the UK's entry yet, but.

Steven Perkins: 00:28:10

The rumours Are heavily.

Theme: 00:28:12

That it is. Remember, I'm trying to get this right because I keep saying the Monday more Remember Monday, I believe they're called, aren't they?

Adrian Bradley: 00:28:18

They are called. Remember Monday.

Theme: 00:28:20

We keep doing a Peter K thing in our house. Who remembers Mondays anyway?

Adrian Bradley: 00:28:25

Yeah. So this is an interesting one. So it's the second year in a row that the sun have revealed probably the Eurovision artist a few days before.

It's getting to the point that it's starting to feel like a strategy if I'm gonna put on my cynical old PR man's hat, that you get a good kind of soft landing in the press to kind of get a lot of your messaging out about the artist early before the release and then since that article in the sun, kind of looking into it.

And I don't know whether you have heard an interview that the British team gave, Andrew Cartmell gave earlier in the week that kind of talked about their strategy for how they're picking now. The key thing is I've got. He was Sam Ryder's manager for five years and kind of.

I'm not sure that he would say this, but kind of made Sam's rebirth of his career right now and that sort of image. And if you look at Rebecca Munday, you can see a similar pattern. You can see this idea that they are.

They are self made, they are singers, that they are building themselves on social media and creating an audience and a connection directly with fans.

So they've had a large number of kind of viral covers also with a Queen song, as of course Sam Ryder did when he was doing his covers during lockdown. And because of that, they've been able to build on those moments to kind of get themselves big moments on tv. There's a lot of positives about them.

They can really sing and that's what we've not had unfortunately in the last couple of years. People that can sing live on a stage. One of their singers, of course, is a West End performer. She's been Christine in Phantom of the Opera.

She's been Miss Honey in Matilda. You can't get away with so so vocals on a West End stage. Their harmonies are beautiful.

hed their voice audition from: 2015

They're doing the sort of song, that sort of country ish sound that is hot right now. There's lots that could be Going right about this. We wait to actually see what the song is. We wait to see how that will come across.

I have a hunch that if it's not this Monday, it'll be next Monday that they announce it because there's no way they're going to not announce them on a Monday. If it's them, we will find out. So I don't know.

I'm not gonna go as far as to say I'm excited, but looking at the rest of the field and I know that we're gonna kind of talk about this a bit, There isn't yet that sort of strong vocal performer in any of the numbers that we've kind of seen so far.

And they have that ability, if they can really sell their harmonies, sell their performance and come up with just something special and a bit of a hook in the song. I don't know. I'm willing to briefly be excited, but let's wait and see.

Theme: 00:31:11

Let's wait and see.

I think it's also interesting that we're sending a group because we don't send groups very often and I think the last girl group we sent was Precious. So we are going back quite a while since we last did that.

Adrian Bradley: 00:31:21

Wow.

Theme: 00:31:21

Yeah, it wasn't a brilliant result.

Steven Perkins: 00:31:23

Wasn't a terrible result.

Theme: 00:31:24

Solidly middle. So we will see.

Adrian Bradley: 00:31:26

We will take. Right?

Theme: 00:31:27

We will take at this point. Exactly. Yeah, we are. We're coming very, very close to the end of our time. But let's talk very, very quickly about what.

What are your thoughts on how the contest is shaping up so far? You've mentioned you haven't had a standout yet. Is there any. Anything you are particularly excited about?

Adrian Bradley: 00:31:41

No, I haven't had a standout yet. I am waiting in sync. I want to. I'm waiting with. I'm waiting with bated breath to see what Mans has to offer us in Sweden.

I think we're still in that kind of weird no man's land before we get into the pre party season.

For me, for example, last year when Switzerland really stood out, when Nemo really stood out, was when you suddenly saw those live performances in front of an audience that wasn't a home crowd. And then you went, oh, they're gonna that special. They're gonna do well. I'm gonna hold my card yet to see.

I'm pleased that we've had one like Finland where I'm like, okay, that's up there. That's there to go. I want to see a few more. I want to see where we're going.

So when all the songs are out and I start to see a few more performances in the next month or so, maybe then we'll start to see who's going to coalesce around the top, the top half of the table yet. But having a look at the few of them, like I looked at Belgium and Belgium feel like they're doing well. That worked for Nemo last year.

Let's do something similar. And that's never a good strategy in Eurovision. So we'll wait and see.

Theme: 00:32:50

Brilliant, Adrian, thank you so much for joining us.

Adrian Bradley: 00:32:52

No problem.

Steven Perkins: 00:32:53

That's it for this week's episode. Thank you again to Adrian for joining us, and I hope you enjoyed listening.

Theme: 00:32:57

To that, if you did.

Steven Perkins: 00:32:58

The good news is that we've got more guests lined up to join us in the upcoming shows to talk about the latest national final results and general Eurovision news. So please do subscribe if you haven't done so already, to make sure you don't miss a single episode.

And if you fancy leaving us a nice review on your podcast platform of choice, we appreciate that, as it helps us to reach out to more people. I'll be back next Monday, but until then, good night, Europe and good morning, Australia.