LIST 202 - 13/05/16 (a second Eurovision special)

Hello all,

So enjoyable did compiling a Eurovision List prove last year, I thought I'd see if I could assemble another mix of personal song contest favourites and related tracks ahead of tomorrow night's 61st edition of the continent's favourite musical extravaganza.  Here are the fruits of those labours.

As with last year's efforts, not everything here actually appeared in the contest proper.  The tracks from Pussyfoot and Labi Siffre (yep, that one, of Something Inside So Strong and It Must Be Love fame subsequently) were both unsuccessful attempts to win through A Song For Europe; whilst the cover versions by Edwyn Collins, Saint Etienne and Terry Hall/Sinead O'Connor all appeared as part of Channel 4's 1998 "A Song for Eurotrash" song contest special.  It seems quite appropriate to dig out a few tracks from that, given a one-off episode of Eurotrash has just been slated in to coincide with next month's European Union referendum.  If you don't want to know the results, look away then.

European unity, of course, was the very reason for Toto Cutugno's 1990 contest-winning song to exist, and that rallying cry ends this List as part of a double-header of (by Eurovision standards) overtly political tracks; Jamala's 2016 effort, as much of a railing against Russia for previous indiscretions (here: the deportation of the Crimeran Tatars in the 1940s) as current Eurovision song-content rules permit, is the other.

J xx



LAURA TESORO - What's the Pressure (2016)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHF1zlB3raU

SOPHIE ET MAGALY - Le Papa Pingouin (1980)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lu9RictLX3I

EDWYN COLLINS – Ding a Dong (1998)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-F3YwBdzMQ

POLLAPÖNK - No Prejudice (2014)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwfGKEIn5xw

SÉVERINE - Un Banc, Un Abre, Une Rue (1971)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBXuPs7scZo

PUSSYFOOT - I Want to Be Me (1980)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYBUnPA6H2A

GAITANA - Be My Guest (2012)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLsTn_li5d8

DANIEL - Džuli (1983)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-138pFSyez4

SAINT ETIENNE – La La La (1998)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5xJWkqZnNc

SERHAT – I Didn’t Know (2016)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYKFKgwVbV4

WIND - Laß die Sonne in dein Herz (1987)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Tr-1aM2k5w

LABI SIFFRE - Solid Love (1978)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVffNKc4gCc

LOïC NOTTET - Rhythm Inside (2015)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5c_rUBH52C4

FRIZZLE SIZZLE - Alles heeft ritme (1986)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwdO6F6sRJs

TERRY HALL & SINEAD O’CONNOR –All Kinds of Everything (1998)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlAA1AYQaLM

THE COMMON LINNETS - Calm After the Storm (2014)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWe8PRsW4T0

MATT MONRO - I Love the Little Things (1964)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX-ud8sm6Hg

SAMRA – Miracle (2016)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dix6XJ_Uo-w

RIVA - Rock Me (1989)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPBQ22lROR4

PEARL CARR & TEDDY JOHNSON - Sing Little Birdie (1959)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Etl1zYvNSE

BANANARAMA – Waterloo (1998)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLzUbTO1_pg

JAMALA - 1944 (2016)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uv71tmv_c7Q

TOTO CUTUGNO - Insieme: 1992 (1990)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0b5whZydVZc