#Ellinikós Telikós 2007

[eurovision-revisited]

Eurovision 2007 - Number 63 - Christos Dantis - "No Madonna"

There were only three acts at Ellinikós Telikós 2007, ERT's Greek national selection for the year.  After two years choosing an artist then having a song selection final, it was back to a traditional format of artists with songs.  Each artist was selected by ERT, five were considered and willing, but for whatever reason two acts weren't ready for the deadline, and so only three made it to stage.

One of those three was Christos Dantis - the writer of Greece's pride and Eurovision joy My Number One - the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2005.  He'd teamed up with one of his co-writers from 2005, lyricist Natalia Germanou to write No Madonna.

This time around though Christos wanted to be front and centre.  It's one thing winning the writing prize, but now he wanted a piece of the action on stage as well as off it.   He'd been releasing albums of his music as well as writing since the early 1990s and more recently he'd been on a tour with Katy Garbi, Greece's 1993 Eurovision representative.

No Madonna is certainly a step up in the raunch factor.  Rather than the sweeter and more innocent My Number One, Christos absolutely launches himself at the song.  No pussyfooting.  He's someone who has clearly been accused of playing around and frankly he's not in the mood to deny it.  He'd rather clap back.  Loudly.  He absolutely chews his way through this song  with a degree of indignation and fury only a man (rightly) accused of philandering in public can muster.

He's all huff and puff and not really in the mood to go, but his pride can only allow him to attempt to take the high ground and walk out the door on the relationship.  But you know next year he'll be begging to get back with her.  Performative indignation with some light undressing, stabbing chords from synths, and guitars spitting their punctuating power at full volume.  

It's a screech of a song and one that Christos pretty much loses control of vocally from the start.  He's rasping, he's throaty, he's shouting, but he gets there. The singing may not be perfect, but damn he's going to make sure you know his side of the story.

Christos thought he should have won.  He didn't.  He came second of the three, though not by a long way.  However, even if he hadn't come last with the juries, he still wouldn't have made it.  He did manage to beat future Cypriot Eurovision star Tamta into third place though.

No matter, he still had another five albums in him over pretty much the next five years.  He toured a covers tour with songs from the Killers, Kaiser Chiefs, Stevie Wonder and James Brown.  He also wrote a song for the 2012 Greek national final as well. This though is pretty much his last Eurovision hurrah.  He'll always have the memories from 2005.

[eurovision-revisited]

Eurovision 2003 - Number 19 - Marian Georgiou - "Can’t Escape – Come Back"

Marian Georgiou has been in the Greek language national final scene for a few years. Alternating between Cyprus and Greece depending which country has been relegated and which has been in the contest. She's not been hugely successful. Her best result came in Cyprus in 2000, when she finished fourth. In Greece, she's never qualified for the final.

Perhaps unwisely, she teamed up with song-writer Konstantinos Tseleste, who was behind her 2002 failure. He came up with Can't Escape - Come Back. Let's start with the staging - I can't remember if this is the first time I've seen bare-chested male dancers. It's certainly the first time I've seen them swinging ropes. Together with Marian's red PVC ensemble and the title, it's a kink-fest.

The song itself is a bop. The sound-quality is lacking, but Marian shimmies seductively at the centre of things while Middle Eastern motifs and drums suggest an stereotypical exoticality. Marian may be lacking some energy, but nevertheless all the suggestive bells and whistles are there and in place.

The audience of Ellinikós Telikós 2003 hosted at Ciné Keramikos Nightclub in Athens seem underwhelmed at the end. The jury and the televote agreed. They placed her 10th and last of the songs competing. There was also an SMS vote this year, but they still only place Marian 9th. Overall, last place.

I'm not sure what was going on here. I don't think it's the sound as that was the same for all the competitors. It could be the over sexiness, it could be the musical hints at Turkishness, it might be Marian's inert presence at the heart of things. Maybe there was something else going on - Marian does seem very keen to leave the stage. Whatever it was that yielded such poor results, it was another flop.

Yet this is exactly the direction that Eurovision was going in. The song is fun, sexy and has huge potential for a bigger stage (and better microphones). I really like it.

Marian herself did have one more go at a national final in Cyprus in 2009, but again without success. What was far more successful was her single Ta Rialia which came out in 2007 and was a big hit in Greece and across Europe more widely. Although it's her only single listed on either Discogs or last.fm, her YouTube channel shows lots of releases all the way up to last year.