[LMBTO] Eurovision 2017 Weeks 4 & 5 - Armenia's Got Talent...

Eurobash was on last weekend so unsurprisingly I was enjoying that event rather than updating my blog and I will be providing my highlights on what went on in Manchester very soon (including my first ever interviews with actual Eurovision celebs) but I wanted to keep up to date with what has stuck in my mind Eurovision-wise recently, so here goes with the fun bits of the fledgling season...

As you can see from the lead picture, Armenia kicked the Eurovision season off with the first two episodes of their selection process, Depi Evratesil.  For those of you who missed either or both, here they are:

Now I know no Armenian at all but anyone with any exposure to Pop Idol / X Factor / [Your Country]'s Got Talent will recognise the way that the hopefuls for Eurovision are being selected.  Six judges, each with buttons, putting through those they like during an audition stage.  It has all the Armenian Eurovision heavyweights as judges and presenters - Anush and Inga, Aram MP3, Hayko, Essia and of course Iveta, along with host Gohar Gasparyan (recognisable as the Head of Delegation in previous Eurovisions).  After all the intros (not so sure about the braided purple hair on Iveta but it's different) and the realisation that four of the jurors needed to buzz to allow a contestant to go through, it was quite the entertaining process, without the X Factor 'joke entries' which sometimes plague this sort of format.  Not a bad selection seeing that there's just three million people to choose from.

Standouts for me in show one were:

• Syuzanna Melqonyan who opened the show, with an amazing voice that seemed so suited to jazz and great stage presence;
• Kristina Avetisyan with a cover of Hozier's "Take Me To Church" which was strangely endearing and hypnotic to watch - I suspect she might end up being the 'quirky one'; 
• Amalya Margaryan, who needed a second snippet of a song to convince Essai to take her through but, although a bit rough around the edges when belting out the high notes, gave a pure, innocent performance; and
• Artsvik Arutyunyan, closing show one, giving superb attitude and powering out an amazing vocal - possibly one to go all the way through?

One thing future acts might want to take notice of - DON'T cover 'Wild Dances'!  And if you want to join the annals of Eurovision Apocalypse, the alternative view of the National Final season by Roy D Hacksaw, then maybe you ought to bring your own material to the table and create an "Illusion" (see what I did there?) to shock and bewilder six ex-Eurovision artists into putting you through to the next round:




Eurovision Village is go!
This will be where Eurovision Village is going to be - Kyiv's central street, Khreshchatyk.  Not sure how much of it will be given over to the festivities but it looks an impressive area, architecturally at least.  Liking the mirrored dome there, lots of spectacular pictures to be had, methinks...


B&H say no but lots say yes...
One of the best elements of the 2016 Bosnian entry was this lady, Ana Rucner - we might still see her in Kyiv as Croatia are back but she won't be joining up with Deen, Dalal or Jala in 2017 as B&H have decided early that they won't have the money to allow them to enter again.  Shame but I suspect that unless they get a big name sponsor in each year, their license fee just won't allow entry into Eurovision.  Maybe Ralph Siegel could forego San Marino as a pet project and move to Sarajevo...

As is typical of the days leading up to the last official day to withdraw without incurring a fee, quite a few nations confirmed their participation.  Georgia and Serbia have both merely said they are attending, no more, no less.  Russia's participation was verified too but not by them.  The executive manager of NTU, Ukraine's national broadcaster, let the cat out of the bag in an interview by stating that:


It is not known how their artist will be selected but what appears to have happened in Ukraine itself is that there may no longer be a 'blacklist', at least not one instigated by the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine's national parliament.  The bill put forward that would have introduced restrictions on all Russian artists' touring Ukraine has been voted down, thereby burying the initiative.  Whether that is the end of such talk is another matter.

Ah, the old chestnut of 'who can participate at Eurovision'!  The old edict was 'anyone coloured green on this map', as in those being within the Eurovision Broadcasting area but of course that has been added to by the proviso 'or a member state of the Council of Europe', which allowed the inclusion of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia via a special expansion of the EBA.  Now I didn't know until I read a summary article on escchat.com that 4% of Kazakhstan is actually in Europe - given it is the 9th largest country in the world by area, that 4% covers about 108,000 square km, roughly the size of Bulgaria!  Now the nation could wait to jump through the political hoops to become a member of the Council, thereby becoming a full EBA member and being able to sing at Eurovision or perhaps the EBU are already considering letting them in early.  ESCToday asked the EBU about the likelihood of this happening and got the following reply:

Of course, this could mean nothing and it will just be Australia back again if they choose to do so.  The other extreme would be that any other associate members could be allowed in - China?  The USA?  Canada?  Mauritius?  Given the information that I now have about a small part of Kazakhstan actually being in Europe, I would actually argue for their inclusion, even ahead of Australia, although I have accepted that the Aussies are here to stay for as long as they want to.  How about giving this lady a 'Jessica Mauboy interval slot' to get fans and viewers prepared for the Kazakhstani arrival: