LexC

Not my qualification being upstaged by a nil pointer! Congratuwelldone Seven!

NLX’s votes be in!

They seem to have been going less for the constant variation and more for the ramps up and down in tempo. Like in Semi One we start with Albania, ease off the tempo a little bit but staying up high with Latvia, going down to midtempo with Lithuania and then settling on a ballad with Switzerland. Then later they ramp up in the second half going from Portugal - Croatia - Denmark - Austria and then a reset (after a break?) with Iceland - Greece - Norway. Not saying this is good or bad but its clearly a different approach in design ethos - will be interesting to hear it in sequence.

Confirmed Semi Final Running Orders Semi-Final One 1. Albania 2. Latvia 3. Lithuania 4. Switzerland 5. Slovenia 6. Ukraine 7. Bulgaria 8. Netherlands 9. Moldova 10. Portugal 11. Croatia 12. Denmark 13. Austria 14. Iceland 15. Greece 16. Norway 17. Armenia Semi-Final Two 1. Finland 2. Israel 3. Serbia 4. Azerbaijan 5. Georgia 6. Malta 7. San Marino 8. Australia 9. Cyprus 10. Ireland 11. North Macedonia 12. Estonia 13. Romania 14. Poland 15. Montenegro 16. Belgium 17. Sweden 18. Czech Republic

Actual running order drops this lunchtime.

How I'd program Semi 2 01 Finland: The Rasmus - Jezebel 02 Azerbaijan: Nadir Rustamli - Fade To Black 03 Serbia: Konstrakta - In Corpore Sano 04 Malta: Emma Muscat - I Am What I Am 05 San Marino: Achille Lauro - Stripper 06 Israel: Michael Ben David - I.M 07 Georgia: Circus Mircus - Lock Me In 08 Australia: Sheldon Riley - Not The Same 09 Cyprus: Andromache - Ela 10 Belgium: Jeremie Makiesse - Miss You 11 Romania: WRS - Llamame 12 Poland: Ochman - River 13 Estonia: Stefan - Hope 14 North Macedonia: Andrea - Circles 15 Sweden: Cornelia Jakobs - Hold Me Closer 16 Czech Republic: We Are Domi - Lights Off 17 Montenegro: Vladana - Breathe 18 Ireland: Brooke - That's Rich Finland opening in the same vein as Flo Rida/Rybak opening their semis with the biggest name. I also figured that maybe the EBU would take the charitable approach and try and get last years non qualifiers/participants the better slots rather than give it to Sweden or Poland who don't really need them.

Nu Lexico Nu Disco 6pEqPFTzsQw

So with the full lineup confirmed for Semi Final 2, this is how I see things shaking out; Safe Sweden Poland Would truly be shooketh to see either of these two fail at this hurdle. Solid Finland Cyprus Estonia All three of these songs I can see having reliable televote and jury scores that shouldn't put them in danger but not technically impossible for one of them to bomb and let another borderline one through. Borderline IN Montenegro Ireland Australia Czech Republic Malta I actually toyed with putting Montenegro in the next section up but ended up sneaking it into this section down to their questionable track record. Everything else from Ireland to Israel is actually very close together but my gut is telling me that Ireland and Czech Republic will be favoured well in the running order and have enough banger energy to get them over the line and Australia and Malta will likely be jury saves. Borderline OUT Romania Azerbaijan Belgium Israel These four could all pose a threat to one of the borderliners if one of them screws up (like, say, Czech Republic has issues with the live performance). Romania and Israel are probably Ireland/Czechs biggest threats and Azerbaijan and Belgium could usurp Australia or Malta as jury picks. Struggling North Macedonia Georgia San Marino Both North Macedonia and Georgia I see struggling to be memorable (which I didn't expect to say for an act called 'Circus Mircus') and San Marino needs good jury support if its going to overcome its natural televote drag and Stripper...is not the song to do that! Nope Serbia Virtually no appeal to anyone outside the ex-Yugo countries and their diaspora - would be extremely surprised if this qualifies. -x- So Semi 2 is a lot harder to call beyond those five safe qualifiers - could very well go one of several ways.

...eh. It's alright but a bit of a non event for me.

New Lexico are now confirmed in and with a new kind of sound for us as well!

As far as Semi One goes, my current thinking is something like this 01 Albania: Ronela Hajati - Sekret 02 Bulgaria: Intelligent Music Project - Intention 03 Slovenia: LPS - Disko 04 Netherlands: S10 - De diepte 05 Latvia: Citi Zeni - Eat Your Salad 06 Lithuania: Monika Liu - Sentimentai 07 Ukraine: Kalush Orchestra - Stefania 08 Switzerland: Marius Bear - Switzerland 09 Moldova: Zdob şi Zdub & Fraţii Advahov - Trenuleţul 10 Iceland: Systur - Með Hækkandi Sól 11 Armenia: Rosa Linn - Snap 12 Portugal: MARO - saudade, saudade 13 Norway: Subwoolfer - Give That Wolf A Banana 14 Croatia: Mia Demsic - Guilty Pleasure 15 Austria: LUMIX feat. Pia Maria - Halo 16 Denmark: REDDI - The Show 17 Greece: Amanda Tenfjord - Die Together As tempting as it is to begin the whole contest with Latvia's first line, realistically speaking Albania is the only real choice to kick off the show with a high energy number. The whole show is also a little lacking in the higher energy songs so I tried to space them out as much as possible. The only exception being the closer which I gave to Greece for the high drama rather than Austria which it could also be swapped around for. I also thought about swapping Moldova and Ukraine but though best to put Moldova in 9th in aid of that slower pace section before Norway.

So come Monday we will officially have all of the songs of 2022 released so its time to play producer - what order would you programme all of the songs in both semi finals in order to produce the best/most entertaining show possible? We're not necessarily here to predict what will be placed where (but you can do so if you wish) so much as share your own views on what could/should happen. The songs you have to work with are; Semi One First Half Albania Bulgaria Latvia Lithuania Moldova Netherlands Slovenia Switzerland Ukraine Second Half Armenia Austria Croatia Denmark Greece Iceland Norway Portugal Semi Two First Half Australia Azerbaijan Cyprus Finland Georgia Israel Malta San Marino Serbia Second Half Belgium Czech Republic Estonia Ireland Montenegro North Macedonia Poland Romania Sweden

Should probably start looking for an entry huh

Interested to see what this throws up, for all the worries of it being a 50% hip hop 50% straight bro country lineup, the diversity of this set of songs looks like it'll be pretty varied. Will feel like a bizzare melfest/eurovision mash-up to watch but I'm cautiously optimistic!

The situation is so unprecedented that there's really no way to solidly prove what's going to happen with Ukraine this year until the day of the final BUT my gut is telling me that the Ukraine winning odds are being overpriced. Not that it won't do well but it's at least a believable sequence of events where, say, the producers want a hassle-free job on deciding the next hosts so conveniently stick it on early to dampen down their televote score and the juries aren't too fussed which caps their position at about 5th or something. My gut, which is all I really have to go on here, tells me that people will obviously be sympathetic given the circumstances but they'll have to actually like an enjoy the song if they're going to go to the effort of voting for it.

So at the current state of play in Semi Final One I'd call it like so; Safe Norway Greece Ukraine Any of these three not qualifying (if Ukraine make it to Turin!) would be a complete shocker. At this stage I can see Greece winning the semis jury vote and Norway being the clear televote favourite and Ukraine doing reasonably well across both. Solid Albania Netherlands Austria Latvia Reasonably sure all of these will qualify but I would be less shocked if we lost one of these than the top 3. Albania has one of the few high energy numbers and a strong voter base to rely on. Netherlands could potentially be a Greece spoiler and get the jury win but regardless of televote it'll probably qualify on jury votes alone. Austria is also bringing the only other really high energy song in the second half but a questionable live performance could drag it down. And I toyed with putting Latvia is the borderline group but I think the televote will be pretty strong and musically there's enough there for them to get enough credit from juries that it won't drag them down too far. Borderline IN Moldova Switzerland Armenia I think a lot of people are sleeping on Moldova slightly but I feel like they're going to bring the happiness and energy that will give it enough of a kick to get them over the line. Switzerland and Armenia are both 50/50 calls and obviously the latter is subject to being revised up or down depending on the final version but my gut is telling me that both of them have less drag issues than the borderline out group. Borderline OUT Lithuania Denmark Croatia Sentimentai feels a bit like the Lithuanian "Bigger Than The Universe" in that its appeal outside of its own country is a little bit lost and Denmark and Croatia both feel that little bit too anonymous to really excite a strong voter base but all three of these songs could make it through instead of a borderline one if somebody bombs it. Struggling Iceland Portugal Both of these songs will have an uphill struggle to get enough televotes to be in contention for qualifying but both should score well with juries to the point where I wouldn't be shocked to see one of them pull through but they'd probably need to be top 3 with the jury vote to stand a chance. Out Slovenia Bulgaria Both will likely be on early and don't have enough inbuilt voter support or musical quality in their compositions to do much with either jury or televotes. -x- Obviously, this is all just my opinion!

At time of writing we're waiting on one full entry, one upgrade to a demo and one will they/won't they entry change but, with enough songs confirmed for the first semi final at least, we can begin to dip our toes into the predictions game for 2022. A word before we begin though, nearly everybody who makes a prediction will get something wrong and something bang on the money so be accepting of the fact that what might seem like a dumb call could turn out to be a genius bit of foresight and what looks like the obvious call might look like utter madness come May 15th. So, Buzzjack; start predicting NOW!

Not a Milanov track but I'm fairly sure I hear Dotter on backing vocals here NWjANdKRX_w

8xeQrCmnuk4 Not officially released yet but the leak is out (allegedly the demo version but the demos are never a million miles away from the final version lets be honest)

Armenia 2022 Rosa Linn Snap 8xeQrCmnuk4

Saudade, saudade convincingly wins both the public and jury vote! Opax09U5-Qk Really liking this - I can see this potentially qualifying.

RVKDTR and the country ladies into the last 2 like Jafet predicted!

YYYYYAAAAAAAASSSSSSSS!

Dafuq is this artpop slam poetry of an interval act?

I did call Klara getting Wiktoria-ed at least.