34 minutes ago, Herbs said:

Na Marina!

Also, Basmati got further than my first choice act (which someone else got…)

So if I was Uncle Ben that’s a victory in itself right?! (On the assumption that neither will win the Gamu round)

I eagerly await Marina’s non-English entry that she hasn’t recorded yet x

I’ve listened to all three categories this morning so thought I’d have a fun alternate reality game and see who’d have been gone if I had all that power!!! Muahahahahaaa

I’d have eliminated (based on plenty of factors but with a heavy weighting given to song choice):

• AGNES

• ROBYN

• HRVY

• DARIN

• FONTAINES DC

• YEARS & YEARS

So 3/6 in alignment with the guest judges! Anyone else had chance to listen yet and give their thoughts?

For the record, I’m not a massive fan but I think the Leona song is beautiful and she sounds heavenly on it. Sophie Ellis-Bextor would be safe af for that choice too!

I’ve always ranked Damien Rice kinda low but always thought that song was pretty. If that couldn’t save him then I doubt anything could.

I would have gotten rid of Robyn and Kate for the females based on song choice and that there often near the bottom of rankings.

For males, Damien Rice going off song choice + previous voting, the other Gary purely on the fact I've not really liked a single song from him.

As for groups, I could not have thrown years & years out, such a great song, but I would have the other one that was, alongside Fontaines for similiar reasons to Gary.

So 2/6 alignment.

37 minutes ago, King Rollo said:

Sorry, it was just me being a grumpy old man when I like music from a time when almost every artist was talented enough to create music on their own without having to constantly seek help from other acts because they are lacking in inspiration. If you take the Robyn song, for example, and we were all able to vote, do we base our score just on her vocal or do we base it on the music as well which is from Royksopp who are a group who are not in the contest, I'm always a bit uncertain what to do when I'm voting. The same would have applied to Clean Bandit and Zara. The songs from the eliminated acts, Agnes and Leona, were solo songs in the solo female category recorded with the musicians that they had backing them at the time so I just feel they were more in the spirit of the contest. That's just my opinion anyway, no need to change the rules just for me.

Interesting! I definitely still don’t agree and in some ways probably agree even less now after the additional context 😂 I definitely don’t equate working with others as seeking help because they’re lacking in inspiration… I can think of loads of people from older eras who worked with others all the time - what about legends like Whitney, Cher, Madonna? None of those people played their own instruments and some didn’t even write the songs they were singing, yet I don’t think people would have had the same issues?

Zara for example probably had equal involvement in Symphony as she did in Lush Life - just that one of those songs you know who else was involved and the other you don’t.

Just now, dandy* said:

Zara for example probably had equal involvement in Symphony as she did in Lush Life - just that one of those songs you know who else was involved and the other you don’t.

Same with Sunlight; Years and Years are credited as writing and being heavily involved with the track. The Magician was basically just the overall producer.

Edited 2 hours ago2 hr by ElectroBoy

1 hour ago, pavi said:

FYI i will be salty until further notice. Although I’ve been on this forum for 20 years so y’all probably knew this would happen x

We love you for it. 🥰

46 minutes ago, Henessy Lake said:

I would have gotten rid of Robyn and Kate for the females based on song choice and that there often near the bottom of rankings.

For males, Damien Rice going off song choice + previous voting, the other Gary purely on the fact I've not really liked a single song from him.

As for groups, I could not have thrown years & years out, such a great song, but I would have the other one that was, alongside Fontaines for similiar reasons to Gary.

So 2/6 alignment.

Henessy keeping the twinks safe, noted for season 4

45 minutes ago, Jaz13music said:

As for anyone suggesting accusations of my perceived prejudice based on language (non ESL), nationality, diversity or any other issue, I will say you know nothing about me. To judge me on the basis of a musical preference, in a so called ‘fun’ music contest, on a music forum is not acceptable. I used the word variety (meaning musical variety only), not diversity, to describe why I didn’t choose too many dark synth groups to go through. New Order and Depeche Mode are two of my favourite bands, and both put forward my favourite songs so, since I was meant to be judging, I put those two through. And yes I did vote iamamiwhoami last in the round before, but did anyone bother to check how I voted in the other 3 rounds? I’ll help you out, it was 9th 5th and 6th, so half the time they would have been in the top six for me. But why let facts get in the way of OTT statements?

I do not know you and haven’t made any sweeping statements about your character etc. based on your decision. But the last ESL act was eliminated from the groups which is what i said. Obviously that part didn’t play that big of a role in your decision but this was your decision and prerogative to eliminate whatever act for whatever reason. I just found the variety (i used diversity mistakenly and I meant variety) reason not lining up with the reality of 5/6 remaining acts being from 80s/90s and both New Order and Depeche Mode still in together. Besides, iamamiwhoami is a fresher sound with an extremely strong back catalogue, incredible artistic direction (with videos for almost every single song they release) that is different to any other acts in the groups. So judging their future potential based on only 5 entered songs is quite unfair if you compare to the established acts with more known discographies. It just seemed like a cop out and I’d rather you be honest that you can’t eliminate other acts because of your personal connection to them. That is much easier to digest, even if this round turns into an act popularity game (which begs the question why even enter any songs but I digress).

Don’t get me wrong, i never ever expected yammywhammy to win the whole thing or even get close to the final. 90% of the acts entered are doomed to fail from the very start. But having one person decide your whole act’s faith, and mind you - my favourite ever - is extremely disheartening. Because no matter what song is sent, it’s doomed to fail. In comparison, i didn’t care that much about my Fred Again’s elimination last time but this one is just hitting a bit too hard especially given the circumstances.

That being said, I apologize if my words were perceived as too harsh, this is never that serious.

(I did warn everyone yesterday and Calum consented to being a piñata x)

Guys, I’ve got a sneaking suspicion Pav might be iamamiwhoami 👀

I've listened to all of the songs this morning and wow, what a bunch, and not an enviable task. I don't know who I'd have voted out or how I'd have come to a decision.

A few thoughts: in the solo female category the features were the best songs for me, and I don't mind them being here as they are integral to the song. One difference between today and the 90s and prior is that producers are given – or take – more credit. Symphony could easily have been a Zara solo credited recorded just produced by Clean Bandit and nobody would have known any different. Maybe in today's world it would be Stock Aitken Waterman feat. Kylie Minogue etc. Symphony sounds so fresh again now radio aren't hammering it! Also The Girl and The Robot is epic, one of my Robyn favourites, and Röyksopp of course, a BJSC winning beauty! The Agnes song is amazing and one of her best, with great ABBA vibes to it. So I'd have chosen between the other five songs. Not the biggest fan of those Leona and Adele songs but the latter would have been very hard to say should go given how much mileage and huge hits she has left.

In the solo male Calvin's debut era is one of my favourites, and that Darin song is brilliant and he's been played so well throughout, so those would have stayed in for me. Damien has been consistently good personally for me and The Blower's Daughter is one of his best, and you couldn't get rid of Gary Numan based on that classic. HRVY is probably the only one that would be in immediate danger for me there, but it's a solid track. The Tom Grennan one is certainly one of his strongest too. So I don't know what I'd do there either.

In the groups, Texas and Bananarama would be at the forefront to save for me, both for great and uplifting picks and because they 'pop' out of this category. However, on song choice, iamamiwhoami's was amazing, I had forgotten about it but used to enjoy it a lot and still do. The New Order and Depeche Mode songs are both classics, as is Sade, and I forgot how much I enjoy that Years & Years song. Also that Fontaines song is for sure one of their best ever and gives me Nick Cave and Kylie vibes. So in short, I would have no good reason to get rid of anyone in this category.

So kudos to the judges involved for this impossible task. And well done to everyone for sending such great tracks.

I actually think if it was those 8 songs put to the public test, we might have seen Adele in trouble for the first time. It’s a great ballad but the line up was killer for the females.

I suspect, from reactions in here, that the 6 in question may well have been fighting for their life anyway. I wouldn’t have said so for Years & Years when their result was revealed last night but some of the reactions in here make me think it might have been their lowest rank so far too.

All I'll say is I'm glad some of the people who have posted their alternative eliminations were not the actual judges xx

I've now listened to all the songs - here's how I think I'd have ranked them, based purely on personal preference for each song, not the act as a whole or their prospects in this contest:

Solo female:

1 Kate 2 Adele 3 Robyn 4 Agnes 5 MARINA 6 Zara 7 Sophie 8 Leona

Solo male:

1 Gary 2 Calvin 3 Sam Fender 4 Damien 5 Sam Smith 6 Darin 7 Tom 8 HRVY

Groups:

1 Depeche Mode 2 New Order 3 Fontaines 4 iamamiwhoami 5 Bananarama 6 Sade 7 Years & Years 8 Texas

More classic Kate. Probably my favourite song on 25 - a passionate vocal from Adele - and Robyn sounds fantastic with Röyksopp. I didn't know the MARINA song very well but it sounds good enough to survive at the very least.

Gary's first classic #1 could not have failed here! This was the other Damien Rice song I was familiar with pre-contest and it's powerfully emotive, but I guess he was on borrowed time.

I may be slightly biased on the groups but that's one of my top 2 Depeche Mode songs, while for New Order it's more like in their top 20 for me but that's still a high bar for everyone else. The Fontaines / ROSALÍA collab gets better with each listen. Really hard to rank everything else - I don't envy Jaz one bit, and as I said I can only do this from personal preference of the songs, of which the yammy one is new to me, so I'm applying a little guesswork still. This is much more up my street than the last Bananarama #3, and I enjoyed the Magician / Y&Y one a lot more than I remembered - the latter almost pushed Sade into the bottom 2 for me, although that is still one of their signature songs.

53 minutes ago, RobBot said:

Guys, I’ve got a sneaking suspicion Pav might be iamamiwhoami 👀

You stole my comment 😭🤣

oh wow I missed all this!

Leona gone far too soon 😢

We’ve all missed out on Pav being able to make the iconic announcement of iamiamamiwhoami 😢