#eurovision 1997

[vintageurovision]

Bianca Shomburg, Germany's representative in the 1997 Eurovision Song Contest, performs on stage during dress rehearsals at Dublin's Point Theatre on 3 May 1997 [photo: Peter Harding]

[transsherlock]

Okay guys apparently Páll Óskar is a lil bit of a uhmmmm guy (I did a wikipedia deep dive like a year ago) BUT I just want to bring this performance to you guys's attention.

This is the first Eurovision act done by an openly gay man at the time and it is mesmerizing and weirdly heterosexual.

[yourdailyqueer]

Saba (Anna Oehlenschlæger)

Gender: Female

Sexuality: Lesbian

DOB: 11 August 1997

Ethnicity: Ethiopian

Nationality: Danish

Occupation: Singer, songwriter, actress, model

Note 1: Represented Denmark in the Eurovision Song Contest 2024

Note 2: Has Bipolar Disorder

[eurovision-facts]

Eurovision Fact #711:

The Point Theatre has been the venue of the Eurovision Song Contest more than any other venue. The Irish theater has served as the venue a total of three times, first in 1994, then in 1995, and finally in 1997.

The theater was rebranded and underwent heavy renovations and remodeling in 2007, and is now known as the O2.

[Sources]

"A whizz through our wonderful Host City history," Eurovision.tv.

Point Theatre, Wikipedia.org.

[eurovision-revisited]

Dublin 1997: Televoting

It was only natural for Eurovision countries to try to select the meta if they wanted to do well. A stubborn, conservative and stagnant consensus had formed. The ballad-schlager axis.

Occasionally a new strand would emerge accidentally (traditional Celtic/Irish music), and there was a rush to exploit it. It did not last long, and once again Balladageddon re-established itself. In the real world, these songs were not selling.

There was a push to encourage national selections to be braver and some were, but nothing managed to challenge Eurovision orthodoxy. It was time for the EBU to take action.

The juries were the problem. Not only did they consistently fail to vote for the new or experimental, they also tended to favour neighbouring countries or countries with similar musical cultures to their own. Block voting had been an issue as far back as 1963 when there were accusations that the Norwegian jury changed their results to favour Denmark. It had never really gone away, and now it was discriminating against the newcomers.

The juries needs a shake-up.

Luckily there was a solution. Telecommunications technology had recently begun being able to handle televoting. Short phones calls to exchanges that could record numbers and could cope with a sudden burst of incoming calls. It had been used in several national finals for some years, even if there were some teething problems like those that afflicted the Finnish national selection final in 1996.

In 1997 the EBU took the plunge. Five countries with the most experience at running televotes were selected to replace their juries with 100% televoted results. These could be gathered and verified during the interval act. There was only a short time for voting, but it was enough. It had the additional benefit in that those televotes cost the callers money, so there was income to be generated, although at first that reward was taken by the telecommunications companies themselves.

Even in 1997, the results were there to be seen. Some counties that scored reasonably highly with juries, did not with the televote:

Slovenia got 60 points and finished 10th, but it didn't get a single point from the televoting countries.

Spain got 96 points and finished 6th, with 17 counties giving them points. Among those that gave them nothing were three of the televoting countries.

Malta, the perennial English-language boosted nation got 66 points, finishing 9th, but no points came from the televote.

Other countries were more favoured by the televote but not at all by the juries.

Iceland got all but 2 of its 18 points from the televote

Denmark got 10 of its 25 points from just three televoting countries

Bosnia & Herzegovina got 13 of its 22 points from four televoting countries in possibly the first case of televoting sympathy for a country recently at war (although I know it's hard not to vote for Alma)

There were still some oddities, and there was some neighbourly voting clearly remaining. The German televote gave Türkiye 12 points which could be the first instance diasporic voting, but Türkiye's song finished with 121 points and finished 3rd overall, so possibly not.

Was it a success? Well more data would be needed, but there were some shifts in the direction the EBU wanted to go. That data would start rushing in during the 1998 Eurovision Song Contest. The first one to be 100% televote. Well except for the three countries that still had juries. What would the brave new jury-less world look like?

[signoraviolettavalery]

Well I guess today was a day for going down the Slovenian music rabbit hole

[babolat85]

Love Shine a Light - Katrina and The Waves

Hadn’t listened to this in a while, and now it’s come up on my Spotify playlist every day for a week.

[sweet-cassi-cd]

...And we're all gonna shine a light together, aaaallll shine a light to light the way. Brothers and sisters, in every little part Let our love shine a light, in every corner of our hearts...

"Love Shine a Light" by Katrina and the Waves, the UK entry and winning song of Eurovision 1997.

I have to admit that Eurovision is one of my guilty pleasures (I have a few lol,) I used to watch it with my Mum when I was younger, probably not picking up on Wogan's cheeky remarks. These days it's Graham Norton cracking the jokes and still a great fun evening, we keep trying to have a Eurovision Party, it's definitely on the to-do list!

A lovely positive sing along for a lovely sunny morning, I really enjoyed this outfit, both taking some photos in the house and heading out for a stroll in that early Summer sunshine too. Hopefully you like the photos as there will be definitely be a part 2 for this one, I hope this little earworm brightens up your day too!!

Cassi Xx :-)

[betweenthetimeandsound]

Probably the highlight in a very uninteresting year.

🇹🇷 Klips ve Onlar - Halley

[useless-englandfacts]

england winning the euros after starmer was elected would be like the uk winning eurovision after blair was elected in 1997

[vintageurovision]

[a-silent-symphony]

The 4 songs Nightwish have only performed live once

They’ve been around for two-and-a-half decades and played nearly 1,000 shows, and through it all symphonic metal’s superstars have only performed these songs one time

You can’t talk about symphonic metal without mentioning Nightwish. Not long after forming in the mid-1990s, Tuomas Holopainen’s majestic mavens became the measuring stick for the genre. They scored regular chart success in their native Finland while at the same time earning critical acclaim, thanks to their unencumbered, all-instruments-blaring vision.

Nightwish have written upwards of 100 songs since they started, and most of them have serenaded fans during their litany of live shows in that time. Hammer’s already listed the tracks that these maximalists have never once performed, but an even more exclusive club is that of the ones they brought out once then immediately scrapped. Below are the four songs Nightwish have only played live on a solitary occasion, according to setlist database setlist.fm.

Moondance (Oceanborn, 1998)

Nightwish’s debut, 1997’s Angels Fall First, was written and recorded with the intention of it being a demo, not a fully fledged studio album. As a result, it’s far more raw, rough and ready than anything else the Finns have ever unfurled. Followup Oceanborn swiftly chartered them down more grandiose avenues, and the instrumental Moondance is indicative of the more heroic sound the band craved: keyboardist Tuomas busts out a bombastic melody as his fellow musicians gallop along.

However, maybe because it would leave Nightwish’s vocalist with nothing to do for a bit, this segue’s only ever made the set once. It was at Club Feeniks in Turku, Finland, on February 13, 1999, performed as part of a broader instrumental suite towards the end of the night.

Sleepwalker (2000)

Oceanborn marked Nightwish’s commercial coming out party. Its lead single, Sacrament Of Wilderness, was the band’s first song to top the Finnish charts, then the album’s cover of Walking In The Air repeated that feat in 1999. Because of such success, the maestros decided to battle for a spot at the 2000 Eurovision Song Contest, hoping to represent their home nation with a newly written piece, Sleepwalker.

Sleepwalker won the public vote when Nightwish made their case on national TV to stand for Finland, but the scores of a judging panel brought them down to third place overall. The bid was disappointingly dashed, meaning that the sole performance of this song was to those stuffy judges in Helsinki on February 12, 2000.

Meadows Of Heaven (Dark Passion Play, 2007)

Nightwish brought the tour for 2007’s Dark Passion Play to an end in poetic fashion. Meadows Of Heaven is the final song on album six (the first to feature Anette Olzen behind the mic), and it ends 75 minutes of cinematic metal in appropriately operatic form. Its live debut was saved for the very last show the band played before retreating into the writing room to dream up Imaginaerum, aptly closing the main set.

Nightwish didn’t return to the stage until 2012, by which point they had 75 more minutes and 13 more songs in their arsenal. Unsurprisingly, then, Meadows Of Heaven became a one-and-done, but it served its role beautifully the one time it did rear its head.

Pan (Human :||: Nature, 2020)

Like many, many other metal bands, Nightwish saw the pandemic through by replacing the touring they should have done for 2020’s Human :||: Nature with a livestream. Actually, strike that: they hosted two. The band played a two-night set, dubbed An Evening With Nightwish In A Virtual World, which marked the debut of numerous songs from the preceding album, including Shoemaker, Tribal and Noise.

The only one that didn’t make it onto real-life stages was Pan. It’s a shame, as not only does the song continue Nightwish’s overblown ways unabated, but it flaunts some pretty gnarly riffs to boot. Sadly, though, the fact remains: this anthem was dispatched following its livestream debut. And, given that Nightwish are currently gearing up to release Human :||: Nature’s successor, it’s unlikely it’ll get its time in the sun.

[yourdailyqueer]

Silvester Belt

Gender: Male

Sexuality: Bisexual

DOB: 26 November 1997

Ethnicity: White - Lithuanian

Occupation: Singer, songwriter

Note: Represented Lithuania in Eurovision 2024

[ministerforpeas]

Is this a sign?

In a rare moment, England actually won in penalties in their UEFA Euro match against Switzerland, and just after Labour was elected too! A coincidence? The UK have won Eurovision five times over the years, but...

1967 - Harold Wilson (Labour)

1969 - Harold Wilson (Labour)

1976 - Harold Wilson (Labour)

1981 - Margaret Thatcher (Conservative)

1997 - Tony Blair (Labour) 4 out of 5 times the UK have won Eurovision was under a Labour government and out of that alone 3/4 was under Harold Wilson! It should also be mentioned that England won their only World Cup in 1966 under Wilson, and the final of Eurovision 1976 was held on 3 April. 2 days later on 5 April, Wilson resigned as PM. So this therefore proves that Wilson was the best PM ever. Also also, 1 day after Tony Blair became PM the UK won Eurovision 1997 on 3 May, so clearly this means Blair was a great PM in his first term before he became a war criminal.

So if Starmer's the new Labour Prime Minister now, will England win the Euros this year? On 10 July, England will have to face the Netherlands in the semi-finals. If they win, it will be proof of more luck thanks to Labour, and they'll have to face either Spain or France in the final... if England wins against France in particular, especially as they lost to them last time in the World Cup 2022, that'll mean that it's no coincidence that a Labour government ensures the country good luck in international competitions.

[eurovision-facts]

Eurovision Fact #445:

Only one American has ever won the Eurovision Song Contest. Katrina Leskanich of Katrina and the Waves took home the win for the United Kingdom in 1997.

Leskanich is originally from Topeka, Kansas.

[Sources]

'Made in the USA - Americans who have competed at the Eurovision Song Contest,' Aussievision.net.

Participants of Dublin 1997: Katrina and the Waves, Eurovision.tv.

[eurovision-revisited]

Dublin 1997 - The interval act and other performances

The benefit of having a bona fide, 100% genuine pop star as a host is that the interval act is sorted. It's right there. In Oslo they had Morten Harket, and such was their extravagance, they had him as the opening song. They put on a huge separate interval act without him

Ireland and RTÉ weren't going to look a gift horse in the mouth and neither were Boyzone's management. The interval was Ronan and his fellow Boyzone band members performing their song Let the Message Run Free. Initially this just had Ronan on his own with a dance troupe, but he was soon joined by the boys dressed in full black leather trench coat ensemble, anticipating The Matrix by at least a year. They even got some choreography at the end to match the dancers.

This is Boyzone at the absolute pinnacle of their popularity. They were trying to make a push to break into the US market. To this day they're the second most popular boy band in the UK chart history after Take That. They're were also popular across Europe, so this is Eurovision getting a big name to start at the centre of the show - another attempt to get Eurovision to more credible and marketable across Europe.

If I'm honest, despite the contemporary big name, it's not particularly memorable. What you think of it will entirely depend on how well you think of Boyzone. There's no trip around Ireland on video. Nothing traditional, although Ireland have already ticked that off in 1994 and 1995. This is as straightforward a pop performance as you can get. And it only lasts about six minutes.