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.
LAURA TESORO - What's the Pressure (2016)
SOPHIE ET MAGALY - Le Papa Pingouin (1980)
EDWYN COLLINS – Ding a Dong (1998)
POLLAPÖNK - No Prejudice (2014)
SÉVERINE - Un Banc, Un Abre, Une Rue (1971)
PUSSYFOOT - I Want to Be Me (1980)
GAITANA - Be My Guest (2012)
DANIEL - Džuli (1983)
SAINT ETIENNE – La La La (1998)
SERHAT – I Didn’t Know (2016)
WIND - Laß die Sonne in dein Herz (1987)
LABI SIFFRE - Solid Love (1978)
LOïC NOTTET - Rhythm Inside (2015)
FRIZZLE SIZZLE - Alles heeft ritme (1986)
TERRY HALL & SINEAD O’CONNOR –All Kinds of Everything (1998)
THE COMMON LINNETS - Calm After the Storm (2014)
MATT MONRO - I Love the Little Things (1964)
SAMRA – Miracle (2016)
RIVA - Rock Me (1989)
PEARL CARR & TEDDY JOHNSON - Sing Little Birdie (1959)
BANANARAMA – Waterloo (1998)
JAMALA - 1944 (2016)
TOTO CUTUGNO - Insieme: 1992 (1990)
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.
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Click on the video or link to play each tune (links last checked as all working 15/05/2026).
LAURA TESORO - What's the Pressure (2016)
SOPHIE ET MAGALY - Le Papa Pingouin (1980)
EDWYN COLLINS – Ding a Dong (1998)
POLLAPÖNK - No Prejudice (2014)
SÉVERINE - Un Banc, Un Abre, Une Rue (1971)
PUSSYFOOT - I Want to Be Me (1980)
GAITANA - Be My Guest (2012)
DANIEL - Džuli (1983)
SAINT ETIENNE – La La La (1998)
SERHAT – I Didn’t Know (2016)
WIND - Laß die Sonne in dein Herz (1987)
LABI SIFFRE - Solid Love (1978)
LOïC NOTTET - Rhythm Inside (2015)
FRIZZLE SIZZLE - Alles heeft ritme (1986)
TERRY HALL & SINEAD O’CONNOR –All Kinds of Everything (1998)
THE COMMON LINNETS - Calm After the Storm (2014)
MATT MONRO - I Love the Little Things (1964)
SAMRA – Miracle (2016)
RIVA - Rock Me (1989)
PEARL CARR & TEDDY JOHNSON - Sing Little Birdie (1959)
BANANARAMA – Waterloo (1998)
JAMALA - 1944 (2016)
TOTO CUTUGNO - Insieme: 1992 (1990)
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