Musings – the land of might have been

14 Mar 2012

Musings – the land of might have been

Posted by Andrew Bell

Now is the winter of our national selections
Made glorious summer by this son of Humperdinck;
And all the babushkas that low’r’d upon our venue (built or otherwise)
In the deep bosom of the ESC buried.

Or something like that.

With all the songs for 2012 more or less settled upon a chance revelation by my colleague Hikaru Freeman led me to ponder about those songs & singers not selected.

This is not a happy time for them.

But they do have a chance of living on, beyond the disappointments of the various NSFs, Evrovizijska Melodijas and associated televisual delights of the last few weeks.

During our chat about Spain in the ESC, Hikki sallied forth about his devotion to “Las Supremas de Móstoles” who he says were dudded at the 2005 national selection.

They were edged out of the big one 24.2% to 21.% by Son de Sol, but their legacy lingers.

Actually it bellows.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nj4M-S0zPOo]

And if you Espanol isn’t quite up to it, the song, “Eres un enfermo” (You are a pervert,) tells of a woman who has grown tired of her husband’s addiction to cybersex.

I am now #2 fan in the Melbourne branch of the “Las Supremas de Móstoles” Appreciation Society.

Brilliant.

The national selections are often an even richer source of ESC gold than the lower reaches of the scoreboard.

So off I went, looking for near things and might have beens.

This year’s Melodifestivalen in Sweden was a slug out between the eventual winner Loreen and Danny Saucedo.

But it was this one that somehow called out to me, probably because I lived next door to a pub in Newtown, Sydney where rockabilly was a Sunday night event.

Onya Mårten & Lina Eriksson.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxSmKTg6wSo]

My wanderings through the archives have found me in some strange places and have fed some strange desires.

The early approach of the Norwegians at their Melodi Grand Prix to sings songs twice really tickled me.

Add to that the last placed song of all in 1966 and it’s a quinella I can not resist.

And yes that is Odd Børre (Norway’s contestant in 1968) looking most unimpressive on the tambourine in the first of the two clips.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMOrqTVK8zc]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j928sM-PUYY]

“Vims” got four measly points.

My outrage is considerable.

To the 70s and Olivia Newton John presented a bundle of songs in the 1974 “Song for Europe” for the BBC with the somewhat alarming Jimmy Saville presenting.

The great British public sent in their postcards and selected “Long Live Love”, but “Have Love Will Travel” would probably done just as well in the face of the ABBA onslaught. It is almost identical, apart from the lack of Salvation Army references.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHrdS3B0DJc]

In closing, there is only one place to go.

Helsinki.

1973.

A song that could only have been spawned by someone’s overwhelming but ill-conceived desire to make it big in Eurovision.

When the wind howls & the rain beats down, it is to this darkest of musical corners that I go … and every year as the “The Full Catastrophe”. celebrates Eurovision !

Why wouldn’t you ?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Y8wt0e9SEk]

Intended or otherwise, the song is a classic of its genre … which contains just one song.

Now off you go my pretties to hunter-gather the songs that carried dreams, but ultimately fell short.

And please, please, please do tell us about any really good/bad/silly/special/fabulous ones at joyeurovision@myopera.com.