Null Points Again?

Apparently the Eurovision Song Contest must be coming up as the UK's latest attempt to achieve 'null points' was unveiled at the weekend.  Having heard it several times now, (the BBC News Channel insisted upon inflicting it upon us in every bulletin yesterday), I think I can say that two and a half minute recording of Sir Cliff Richard breaking wind would stand a better chance of winning the contest.  It would probably also have more artistic merit.  The sheer awfulness of the number is underlined by the way in which it was effectively sneaked out over the weekend with a minimum of fanfare, indicating that those responsible for selecting it know just how bad it is.  I'm left wondering just how dire all the other entries were if this was considered the best.  Of course, well never know, because these days the UK entry for Eurovision is chosen in secret, with no public participation.  Unlike the 'good old' days when it was a big event with the candidates being profiled on TV before a public vote to choose the winner.  Not that this resulted in better quality or more successful entries - the great British public, rightly viewing the whole Eurovision contest as a camp joke, invariably went for the quirkiest, most eccentric entries possible - who can forget Scooch, for instance?

But at least when they crashed and burned at the finals, we could feel that those entries at least represented some kind of popular choice on the part of the UK.  The problem the UK has suffered with regard to Eurovision in recent years is that the general viewing public see it as a joke, a bit of fun in which we get to laugh at the bizarre and awful entries of those crazy foreigners, and, when the choice of the UK entry is left to them, invariably try to find someone as off beat as they perceive the other acts to be.  By contrast, when it is left to the 'professionals' to select an entry, they seem to take the whole thing seriously, apparently over-analysing winning entries from previous years to identify the elements which make up a Eurovision winner, resulting in some blandness which is already out of date.  However, that still doesn't explain this year's choice, which is neither truly bizarre enough nor calculatedly 'Eurovision' enough to get anywhere.  Still, one thing which can be said in its favour is that at least it breaks the recent cycle of exhuming popular singing acts from yesteryear and sending their mummified husks to Eurovision to represent the UK.   Frankly, I was dreading the prospect of the likes of Showaddywaddy or Slade being dusted off and sent off to Austria to be ritually humiliated by being beaten by everyone except Albania,