Common. It's like the Garcia of Ireland.

There were two Kavanagh's as Niamh's backing last year, the one on the flute was her cousin (also Niamh) and Nikki, who is not related.

Jury for Dutch NF revealed

The jury for the Dutch NF will dramatically change after last year's remarkable outcome and fuzz after the NF:

Johnny Logan is out.
George Baker is out.
Tatjana is out.

The new jury is:
Daniël Dekker, the Dutch commentator and DJ will however stay in the jury.
Second member is Annemieke Schollaardt, one of the few female radio DJs in Holland.
And last but not least: René Froger, oldest member of The Toppers and ofc legendary for singing Shine in Moscow, 2009.

That will be the jury for 30th January.

YAY! He'll have to find some other NF to give him his power fix/income for the 2011 season.

Oh very dear.

It'll be fine as long as they don't invite senile old Pierre Kartner along again. What a farce the Dutch NF was coming down to a random decision from him.

Malta's songs are revealed

...and guess what? Not that many ballads

Our prayers have been answered.;D

Here you go

http://televisionmalta.com/category/eurovision2011/

Listen to Croatia's contenders

http://idemonaeurosong.hr/

No song(s) have been selected yet. The singers will be chosen first.

Cyprus will choose their song internally

They're keeping their singer and the song will most likely be in Greek.

Norway's first semifinal results

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=rjzZRA-ftkI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iandm_-Z3XE&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

These lovely ladies landed straight to the final. Helene was second place and Aste & Rikke won the heat.

The ones that went to Second Chance were Sie Gubba and Use Me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7RUqGJHAUo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvkzxHcTKe0

The eliminated acts were the following (Gatas Parliament, Carina Dahl, and Sichelle)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDNNUVRhGSo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEkxugHLRpM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHJl66xVwis

My personal favorite is Helene, but she was nervous. I hope she improves in the final.

Iceland's first semifinal results

Trimmed from 5 songs to 2. These two made it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETBn1-STEi4&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhbBJqSOeCA&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

The eliminated acts were -Böddi & JJ Soul Band – Lagið þitt, Pétur Örn Guðmundsson – Elísabet, and Hanna Guðný Hitchon – Huldumey
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdIJRaxdGds&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL (ouch, microphone troubles)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWHbWbG5XbE&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORmYSSCzm6Q&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

SLOVAKIA IN THE SEMIFINAL DRAW!

An article on Eurovision.tv says that Slovakia's in pot 6. The strange thing is that while other sites had said that Slovakia withdrew, Eurovision.tv NEVER made an article on their withdrawal and now their latest article says that Slovakia is part of the semifinal draw...

Hahaha look at these semifinal pots which are "meant to reduce bloc voting based on voting patterns"

Pot 1

* Albania
* Bosnia & Herzegovina
* Croatia
* FYR Macedonia
* Serbia
* Slovenia
* Switzerland

Pot 2

* Denmark
* Estonia
* Finland
* Iceland
* Norway
* Sweden

Pot 3

* Azerbaijan
* Belarus
* Georgia
* Israel
* Moldova
* Russia
* Ukraine

Pot 4

* Armenia
* Belgium
* Cyprus
* Greece
* Holland
* Turkey

Pot 5

* Ireland
* Latvia
* Lithuania
* Malta
* Portugal
* Romania

Pot 6

* Austria
* Bulgaria
* Hungary
* Poland
* San Marino
* Slovakia

Half will go to semifinal 1 and the other to semifinal 2. Please for the love of everything good keep Turkey away from Belgium and Holland, Turkey and Azerbaijan apart, Greece and Cyprus apart, Russia and Armenia/Belarus apart, Romania and Moldova apart, and Ireland away from as many Baltic states as possible. ;D

The songs for the second semi-final in Iceland are up!

Including Yohanna's!

http://vefir.ruv.is/songvakeppnin/

Talk flying around the escdaily.com editors facebook group is that Slovakia left it too late to withdraw, so might be sending a singer internally selected who will foot some of the costs, as it will be cheaper than withdrawing.

Why not do this in the first place if they're having financial trouble though? It's surely a much cheaper option than going though that MASSIVE selection they have the past two years.

Norway's second semifinal snippets are up

http://www.nrk.no/programmer/tv/melodi_grand_prix/1.7454221

I dunno, what am I? Slovakia's mum?

T'was a rhetorical question inspired by what you'd written as opposed to me directly asking you why STV are annually insistent on bringing themselves to the verge of bankruptcy to find a song for Eurovision for which all of 300 people continent-wide will bring themselves to vote for.

SEMI DRAW

Draws:

First half of the first semi:
Albania
Finland
Armenia
Switzerland
Norway
Georgia
Turkey
Serbia
Russia
Poland
Second half of the first semi:
Croatia
Azerbaijan
Lithuania
Hungary
Malta
San Marino
Iceland
Greece
Portugal

First half of the second semi:
Holland
Bosnia-Herzegovina
Cyprus
Ukraine
Austria
Sweden
Moldova
Belgium
Slovakia
Second half of the second semi:
Israel
Bulgaria
FYR Macedonia
Romania
Denmark
Latvia
Belarus
Estonia
Slovenia
Ireland

BIG FIVE:

United Kingdom and Spain will vote in Semi 1.
Germany, Italy and France will vote in Semi 2.