And what about 2007? :snif: The studio version :kink:

I loved the studio version of Dervish actually, but not the live version :puke:

 

I generally find Ireland's entries quite pedestrian though :(

I must get on with this, although in less detail than before (we've all seen the videos :kink:)

 

25. Euroband – This Is My Life – Iceland 2008 peaked at #3 in my chart

24. Sahlene – Runaway - Estonia 2002 - peaked at #3 in my chart

23. Elitsa & Stoyan – Water – Bulgaria 2007 - peaked at #4 in my chart

22. Fame - Give Me Your Love – Sweden 2003 - peaked at #2 in my chart

21. Dimitry Koldun - Work Your Magic - Belarus 2007 - peaked at #1 in my chart

 

Iceland's fantastic dance anthem from Euroband was quite underrated in the final but was stunning and came with a great performance, something that Iceland are evidently very good at!!! Estonia's last great song of their amazing late 90's/early 00's run was Runaway by Sahlene, who tried again for Sweden this year...the song came joint 3rd with the UK and thoroughly deserved it!!! Elitsa & Stoyan gave Bulgaria their best result with by far and away their best entry, the hypnotic dance/tribal sounding song, Water which finished 5th in the final...Another one from Sweden, male/female duo Fame provided the usual schlager but it was another brilliant song which deserved its top five position!!! and finally, Belarus were the other usually faltering country to excel in 2007, the brilliant pop track Work Your Magic, which I once compared to a long lost Bond theme, topped my chart for a couple of weeks and came a very deserving sixth in the final!!!

 

 

To be honest, the only one of those I really love is This Is My Life :unsure:

20. Jessica Garlick - Come Back – UK 2002 - peaked at #2 in my chart

19. Lena Philipsson - It Hurts – Sweden 2004 - peaked at #2 in my chart

18. Lovebugs – The Highest Heights – Switzerland 2009 - peaked at #1 in my chart

17. Lynn - To Dream Again - Malta 2003 - peaked at #1 in my chart

16. Helena Paparizou - My Number One – Greece 2005 - peaked at #1 in my chart

15. Malena Ernman – La Voix – Sweden 2009 - peaked at #2 in my chart

14. Jade Ewen – It’s My Time – UK 2009 - peaked at #3 in my chart

13. Ruslana - Wild Dances – Ukraine 2004 - peaked at #1 in my chart

12. Serebro - Song Number One - Russia 2007 - peaked at #2 in my chart

11. Julie & Ludwig - On Again...Off Again - Malta 2004 - peaked at #1 in my chart

 

Kicking off the top 20 is our only entry to come top ten this decade (until Saturday that is :magic:), Jessica Garlick's power ballad Come Back should perhaps have been a place higher than 3rd too if Latvia had got out of the way with their monstrosity...back to Sweden for aging diva Lena's song about anal sex apparently :heehee: more typical schlager and another 5th place and No.2 in my chart, lets hope Malena follows their lead!!! This year's Swiss entry failed to qualify due to a bad performance but the song is great and is already my 18th favourite of the decade!!! The 2003 Maltese entry is rather unloved in these parts so I shall show my love, a breezy midtempo pop song that didn't deserve to come in the bottom three at all! Helena's My Number One is one of the best winners of the decade and Greece's finest entry in my eyes...it topped my chart in 2005 for a week and was the only ESC song of that year to top my chart due to the unbelievable dominance of Ten Days by Australian singer Missy Higgins!!!

 

Malena kicks off the top fifteen with the popera anthem La Voix, now a confirmed 2008 finalist thank god, it's too good to miss the final and it was breathtaking to watch her do it live (thrice) in Sweden earlier in the year!!! The UK are on form this year and Jade Ewen's It's My Time is already at No.14 here...London 2010!?! Ukraine have shown what they are made of time and time again in the past and their finest hour was arguably Wild Dances, the tribal anthem from their superstar Ruslana...first time I heard it, I whacked a fiver on it at 10/1 and was £50 richer after the contest, there were no other contenders for the win in 2004 it seemed to me...Serebro's dirty pop anthem Song #1 doesn't really sound like a Eurovision song, more like something a contemporary girlband would come up with...which is why it worked so well, there was no particular ESC formula being followed, it was just a great edgy pop song and Russia's finest hour of the decade for me...I wish they'd won with this instead of Dima the following year...and finally, another mini popera twinned with very twee bubbly pop from Malta, male/female duo Julie & Ludwig gave the 2004 contest one of its most colourful songs and the song topped my chart for a couple of weeks in 2004, and I believe I even contacted and got a response from Julie at some point back then (can't remember why or what about though!!!)

Brilliant! Those are all total classics :D I really thought Julie & Ludwig could win it... great song, and I don't know why, but it reminded me of Moulin Rouge (my fave film at the time) so much :wub:

Water was IMMENSE! My Top 10 of all time i'm certain :wub:

 

Oo nice to see some 2009 entries in the top 20! :o

2009 is getting gradually better in my eyes, I had thought it was weak but on the whole some great songs have gone through to the final so far, and there are a lot of growers, and 4 or 5 songs still stand out massively for me

Surely, the Semi 1 has played a good role in it :kink:

I generally find Ireland's entries quite pedestrian though :(

 

What do you mean by Pedestrian? :huh:

 

Like boring and safe, by the books?

 

 

Edited May 14, 200917 yr by Sabrewulf238

What do you mean by Pedestrian? :huh:

 

Like boring and safe, by the books?

 

yes, boring is what I meant

 

Ireland usually send either uneventful ballads or 'verging on good but not quite there' pop...not that the UK are any better, sending a load of old rubbish usually :lol:

into the top ten we go, must finish this before tonight :kink:

 

10. Scooch - Flying The Flag (For You) - UK 2007 - peaked at #1 in my chart

9. Birgitta - Open Your Heart – Iceland 2003 - peaked at #1 in my chart

8. Carola - Invincible – Sweden 2006 - peaked at #1 in my chart

7. Vanilla Ninja - Cool Vibes – Switzerland 2005 - peaked at #2 in my chart

6. Alexander Rybak – Fairytale – Norway 2009 - peaked at #1 in my chart

 

Rather shamefully kicking off the top ten is Scooch, the UK's much ridiculed 2007 entry which finished second to last...I absolutely adore this type of cheesy Europop so it was no surprise that I loved this and indeed I was one of many who voted for it over Cyndi in Making Your Mind Up 2007...I love band reunions and I found nothing more amusing than the fact that this song provided the rather underrated Scooch (at least they were in their 'heydey') with their biggest hit single, and the most successful UK Eurovision entry, chartwise, of the decade!!! Back to the quality and over to Iceland with 2003's best entry by a mile, the opener of the show, Open Your Heart by Birgitta...the lady, who rather reminded me of a human version of the Cadbury's Caramel bunny, put in a stunning performance of an energetic pop song and easily got my vote!!!

 

Back to Sweden once again and the Eurovision legend Carola returned for another try in 2006 with the schlager-tastic Invincible, supported by the most powerful wind machine ever seen at Eurovision!!! So completely generic and predictable from Sweden but this one never fails to put a smile on my face! Of their five fifth place finishes this decade, this is the one that most deserved to go a few places higher!!! Always underrated, Switzerland's finest entry and best result of the decade was 8th place in 2005 for the Estonian girlband Vanilla Ninja! One of the finest pop tunes seen in Eurovision this decade, the dark and moody track was less chirpy than the average Eurovision song but won my attention from day one and is to date, the most successful No.2 single ever in my chart, peaking their for five weeks without ever reaching No.1...and finally, the highest entry from this year, although this list is a bit old now so Jade would be top ten now in place of Scooch...Watching Melodi Grand Prix religiously in January (mainly thanks to the host being Maria Haukaas Storeng!) it became painfully obvious that this would win, and after storming through the semis, it beat the also excellent Butterflies by Tone Damli Aaberge by 7-1 in the televotes!!! I'm not expecting a similar landslide this evening for Alexander but I'd be shocked if he didn't finish top 3 at the very very least!!! A great violin led pop song by a very talented artist, it just defines noughties Eurovision, so much more than I Wanna and Believe ever could do...

 

 

I still insist that Switzerland 2005 was just the prequel to Serebro; hence why I now refer to it as 'Song #0' :kink:

 

I fully expect a top three of Maria Haukaas, Ira and Charlotte :heehee:

Oh, and plastic orange thing from Belarus 2007 :kink:

Maira is surely #1

Maria vs. Ira :o

I still insist that Switzerland 2005 was just the prequel to Serebro; hence why I now refer to it as 'Song #0' :kink:

 

I fully expect a top three of Maria Haukaas, Ira and Charlotte :heehee:

 

I agree :o Switzerland wuz robbed! they should have at least finished 2nd behind Helena instead of the overrated Chiara song :(

 

top five coming up, Belarus 2007 has been and gone :P

5. Daz Sampson - Teenage Life - United Kingdom 2006 - Finished 19th in the final - Peaked at #1 in my chart for 3 weeks

 

 

Now usually I do a heroic job of pretending to love the UK song (:kink:) but in 2006, I genuinely loved it! Absolutely ridiculous school themed rap from the man behind absurdly popular Hi-NRG covers of Kung Fu Fighting, Rhinestone Cowboy and Out Of Touch amongst others...despite not being fancied at all, I had a sneaking suspicion that Daz would win the right to represent the UK, due to the nature of the UK sense of humour, and sure enough, it beat Kym Marsh, Anthony Costa and (the amazing) City Chix to become the UK's least atrocious result of the 2005-2008 era finishing 19th in the final and getting points from 10 (count them!) countries, 5 more than certain other countries that finished much higher due to neighbourly voting...

 

The song is an absolutely ridiculous rap/high pitched vocal sort of thing (like a worse version of Scooter!?!) but it worked for me in every way. Not far off Where Is The Love in its melody, at one point I thought the UK had a shot of going top ten with this despite the ESC's deep hatred for rap music. I was listening to this months after the contest and still love it now, and I was extremely impressed that it managed to reach the UK top ten too!

4. Tanel Padar, Dave Benton & 2XL - Everybody - Estonia 2001 - Finished 1st in the final - Peaked at #1 in my chart for 2 weeks

 

 

Love me hate me say what you want about me but don't mock my love for Estonia 2001 :P The oddest duo ever seen at Eurovision, the uplifting disco pop song Everybody is regarded as one of the worst winners of the contest but it's actually my favourite of the decade! Love the melody, especially in the verses and bridge which are in my opinion stronger than the chorus...I voted for it on the night after not rating it highly beforehand, I just absolutely loved the performance and despite the hugely high quality of the 2001 contest, I was supporting this one right throughout the voting and was ecstatic that it won. Better still is that it was the darkest horse since Denmark the year before it (:P)...you could see that they assumed that it was destined for failure and had drunk themselves silly during the voting, leading to a highly over exaggerated and ridiculous reprise. Brilliant in every way, still love it loads!

3. Charlotte Perrelli - Hero - Sweden 2008 - Finished 18th in the final - Peaked at #1 in my chart for 4 weeks

 

 

Obviously an instant pre-contest favourite for three reasons; 1) It's Swedish, 2) it's shclagerdiscopoptastic, 3) Charlotte won the contest back in 1999 with Take Me To Your Heaven, the now/then (!?!) married Mrs Perrelli returned to Eurovision in 2008 with the absolutely amazing pop song Hero. Unfortunately it was not a song that was translated very well on screen and she was shown in black and white in the first half, not to mention the fact that she hadn't aged as gracefully as we might have hoped in the 9 years between her appearances. An air of ego surrounded her and many were happy to see Sweden flop in at 18th for the second year in a row. I however, was not one of these people and was gutted that such a fantastic pop song could fail in such a dramatic way, picking up support (and not even full support) from Scandinavia, and barely anywhere else...it only qualified for the final thanks to the jury saving it!!! Regardless of all of this, it's an absolute anthem and has a well deserved place in my top three of the decade! Hearing the entire 20,000 odd audience, young and old, sing along to it word for word at Melodifestivalen this year was quite a sight as well, I can't quite imagine Andy Abraham provoking quite the same reaction, in fact I can't even remember how Even If goes most of the time :lol: