Brélican

re: @jimwatts in the previous streaming thread - that Kyla song is just the original that was sampled in 'One Dance', and indeed also in her only other top 40 hit with ArrDee. The original peaked at #48, would be nice if it can finally become more of a hit in its own right (but ofc who knows if anything will come of it entering now or if it's just a fleeting appearance).

@WhoOdyssey your country name just keeps being (presumably) autocorrected to 'Whole' in the spreadsheets lol x

Suede stole my number I'll settle for 43 then x

As far as I'm aware it'll be the normal contest format, the graphic with the country names over the World Cup groups is just for fun. (Will be quite a lengthy spinoff if everyone does confirm, I wasn't expecting all 48 countries to actually be taken lol)

I'm pretty sure the rules in 2023 were the same as they are now, the Tom Petty song just did not reach a hypothetical chart position high enough for the OCC to notice to give it a reset. (It would have been a very fleeting minor chart entry at best anyway)

Triple A-Seed of Jerd, Meekul and mer representing North Africa bloc (and Julian being our 4th A-Seed x)

It's been "doing a Man I Need" since literally before Man I Need was even released lol

Scenes when the top 2 is a Robert Smith collab and a song titled 'the cure' (Not happening x (probably))

Taylor's third day Spotify numbers are lower than Ariana's were now - I do expect she'll get the #1 still (especially if they do bring CDs forward ofc) but might be close.

Lol when I voted it was only me and one other person voting to keep them in vs. iirc 12 to exclude them, at least it's a little more even now I do understand the argument for excluding but I would have preferred keeping them for completeness (and 'Kiss Kiss' is still a banger shh xx).

Phresh #1

I liked Alyssa Grace's previous top 100 hit - I can see why people find her voice offputting but I thought it worked well with that style of song (similar to Bella Kay). Withholding judgement on if it's the same on the new song x Interesting that Taylor has a (very) marginally lower opening day worldwide than Ariana had last week but a solidly higher opening day in the UK specifically (and the US) - does Ariana have more non-Anglophone appeal than Taylor?

Malcolm Todd has had a song in the top 40 for the last 2 months x

I think this rule has just been copied over from previous editions and hasn't actually always been enforced - I'd be happy to be more lenient on that rule, as long as it's not an artist with only a tenuous link to the country (especially for the smaller countries). I'm fairly sure we even once had an artist sent for Jamaica who wasn't even tenuously Jamaican lol

No thanks @ Audrey Hobert, I'd rather keep the staleness.

Welcome to Vaskla from Persephonia too (if also maybe just for Worldvision)

But let's hope not x (I believe Algeria is actually institutionally opposed to the French language due to colonial history lol (although it is still widely spoken there))

But let's hope not x

It's a good indicator that the type of Taylor fans that will rush to order things from her FOMO "limited" CD runs haven't spontaneously disappeared. The CD sales alone aren't going to guarantee it being a big hit.

I mean her physical releases are always going to sell out quickly, that doesn't necessarily mean the song will be a massive streaming hit. I do think it'll probably debut at #1 but I wouldn't be that shocked if it didn't, her recent releases outside of albums haven't even gone top 10 (yes I know this has more of a push behind it etc. but even she is really not guaranteed to go to #1 straight away with literally anything she releases - in the singles chart anyway).

It's been charting for a while, debuted at #82 in the official chart last week (due to the album title track going to ACR again). Presumably is just a viral hit.

Lentil

My most recent song contest winner (Rachid Taha in The Best Song Contest In The World... Ever!) was Algerian so hopefully that can be a good luck charm! (Not to mention both of my BJSC winners being Arab-adjacent x)

Ahh I was wondering what suddenly convinced you to change your mind but fair if you're just joining for Worldvision - we'd still love to have you in the main contest if you ever feel like it though welcome to New Helvetica from Persephonia in any case

I think 42 is still free despite me napping through half the numbers being taken so I'll take that please! (I don't want to mess up the list copy and pasting it so I'll trust all numbers are being accounted for) Cabo Verde is still out there 👀