Latest news with #Eurovision-winning
Irish Daily Mirror
10-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Daily Mirror
Bucks Fizz star Cheryl Baker shares 'tense moment' Mike Nolan quit the band
Bucks Fizz star Cheryl Baker has revealed the tense moment Irish man Mike Nolan quit the band. The 1981 Eurovision winner has spoken of the moment her former band member Mike Nolan quit spin-off band 'The Fizz' in a difficult exchange back in 2024. Speaking in a new interview with Slingo, Cheryl who was part of 1981 Eurovision-winning group 'Bucks Fizz', admits Mike 'had been talking about [quitting] since lockdown' but she managed to 'keep talking him out of it'. However, she said the final straw for Mike came during a 2024 photoshoot, when he revealed to Cheryl and fellow member Jay Aston he didn't want to do any of their upcoming gigs. She said: '[The Fizz] have just finished working on a ship, we did an 80s cruise and we had so much fun. 'We've got a festival in a couple of weeks up in Sunderland and I can't wait. We're rehearsing some songs they haven't learnt yet, for them, they're still learning stuff. 'We've got two guys now who are very happy to be there, whereas Mike didn't want to be there. He'd had enough. 'He'd been talking about it since lockdown. I kept talking him out of it but in the end, we did a photo session for a newspaper and it was a really good session, we did the photos, interviews etc. 'We then went to have some lunch, and me and Jay were chatting about gigs we had coming up, and Mike's face just went (sighs), he looked upset. I went, whatever's the matter.' Cheryl recalls giving him an ultimatum on his future in the band, which led to Mike leaving, but not before a 'very special' last gig in November last year. 'He said, 'I don't want to do them!' I slammed my fists down on the table and said,' you can't keep playing like this, you're either staying or you're going', so he said, 'I want to go'. We had to make a final date which was in November last year, we did it in a small theatre, a 500-seater, but it was a favourite in Kent, we all live there. 'It was a very special night with all our families and friends there, but I think he was relieved it was the last one. 'I miss Mike Nolan, because he's like a brother to me but he'd really had enough. Scott Mills kept playing, audio of Mike saying 'I've had enough', and he had. 'He was fed up with the journeys, with the driving and trains. I talk to him every couple of days, and we check in with each other. 'He's not envious in the slightest, he's very happy with us to carry on working.' But she said she still talks to Mike every few days. 'We have the best memories! And the most fun. Mike and I were like naughty children, going back to sneaking back in Dublin, we have a lot of fantastic memories, Mike and I. 'But we're making new memories with our new guys, they're so much fun, I love them.'
Perth Now
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
ABBA lead tributes to the man who shaped their signature sound
ABBA have led tributes to their sound engineer, Michael B. Tretow, who has died aged 80. News of the Swedish record producer's passing was confirmed to the Swedish publication Aftonbladet. ABBA's manager Görel Hanser confirmed the sad news. No cause of death is known at this time. After being chosen by Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson to be their sound engineer in 1970, Michael worked on all of the 'Waterloo' hitmakers' albums except for 2021's 'Voyage'. In a touching tribute, Benny Andersson told the outlet: "You meant more to us four in ABBA than anyone else. 'I hope and believe that you felt it throughout all the years that have passed since we worked (and continuously laughed) in the studio. 'Our music lives on, it seems, and you are the one who made it timeless. You were a fantastic inspirer and joy-maker, and the finest sound engineer the world has ever seen. 'I miss you. And I've saved all your coconuts!' Björn Ulvaeus said the way he shaped the Eurovision-winning band's sound 'cannot be overestimated'. Anni-Frid Lyngstad said: 'No one fit the bill as well as you. 'For us, you are forever part of the ABBA sound and you will never be forgotten.' Fourth band member, Agnetha Fältskog, recalled spending time with Michael just recently. She reflected: 'So glad I got to spend some time with you a few weeks ago… You were so sick, but your laughter and humour were still there. 'So many memories are preserved, your encouraging words during the recordings meant so much. We are sad now, a talented and unique person has left us. Sleep well Micke, you are in our hearts forever.'
RTÉ News
16-05-2025
- Entertainment
- RTÉ News
The Eurovision in numbers ahead of Saturday's final
The 2025 Eurovision Song Contest takes place in Basel, Switzerland, with the grand final on Saturday on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player. Here is a snapshot of the Eurovision in numbers: 0 Countries have scored the dreaded zero points in Eurovision finals on 37 occasions. It was fairly common in the 1960s, happening 19 times, but became rare after semi-finals were introduced in 2004. The feat became mathematically even more difficult after the voting system changed in 2016. However, Britain's James Newman managed it in 2021. 3 Basel sits right on the border of three countries: Switzerland, Germany, and France. The three countries meet in the River Rhine. Three presenters will host the final: stand-up comedian Hazel Brugger; entertainer and television presenter Michelle Hunziker; and singer Sandra Studer, who represented Switzerland at Eurovision 1991. 5 Eurovision's 'Big Five' main financial backers - Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain - are guaranteed a place in the final. 6 Dublin has hosted the Eurovision six times, a record for any city. 7 Sweden and Ireland have both won Eurovision a record seven times. 9 Britain has hosted the competition a record nine times, after its own five outright victories and stepping in for other countries, including when Liverpool hosted in 2023 following war-torn Ukraine's win. 13 Belgium's Sandra Kim is the youngest Eurovision winner, having triumphed in 1986 with J'aime la Vie at the age of 13. Watch: Sandra Kim sings J'aime la Vie at the Eurovision in Bergen, Norway in May 1986. 14 Greece, Norway, and Ukraine have qualified from the semi-finals a record 14 times. 16 Britain has finished in second place a record 16 times, way ahead of France at six times, and Germany at five. 26 The number of countries that now compete in the grand final. 27 Eurovision-winning songs have come from 27 different countries - Russia being the biggest and Monaco the smallest. 30 The record number of years between Eurovision appearances, with Poland's Justyna Steczkowska returning in 2025 after competing in 1995. 37 The number of countries taking part in the 2025 edition across the semi-finals and final. 43 A record 43 countries participated in 2008, 2011, and 2018. 69 This year is the 69th edition of Eurovision. 95 The oldest-ever contestant was Takasa's double bass player Emil Ramsauer, who was 95 when competing for Switzerland in 2013. 156 Viewers in 156 countries voted in last year's contest. 1956 The first Eurovision was held in the Swiss city of Lugano in 1956. Seven countries took part. 1974 ABBA took the 1974 competition in Brighton by storm with Waterloo, and the Swedish four-piece remain the most successful act ever to have won Eurovision. 1988 Aged 20, Canadian starlet Céline Dion represented Switzerland at Eurovision 1988 in Dublin, singing Ne Partez Pas Sans Moi. She won, launching her career outside of her homeland. Watch: Céline Dion sings Ne Partez Pas Sans Moi at the Eurovision in the RDS in Dublin in May 1988. 4,500 Lighting fixtures in the Basel stage set, using mainly low-energy LED and laser technology. 6,500 The number of tickets sold at Basel's St Jakobshalle for each of the nine shows, including six dress rehearsals. 14,000 The number of people accredited for Eurovision 2025. 100,000 Organisers' estimate of the crowds lining Sunday's opening parade in Basel. 163,000,000 The number of people who watched Eurovision 2024 on television or online. The Eurovision Song Contest Grand Final airs on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player on Saturday from 8pm.
Sydney Morning Herald
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
Can Australia win this year's Eurovision? We crunched the numbers
Though the pomp and pageantry dominates most discussion of Eurovision, the race for victory in the world's oldest singing competition is just that: a race. Many come to sing, but only one walks away at the end of the week with a trophy in hand. Delegations from 37 countries are, as you read this, converging on Basel, Switzerland, for the 69th annual Eurovision Song Contest. Montenegro is returning after a two-year absence. Moldova has withdrawn for financial reasons. And Australia, the rest-of-the-world's wild card, is competing for the 10th time. We're in it to win it; to suggest otherwise would be naive. Loading Of course, there is the soft diplomacy of the event, in which feuding nations cast aside real-world conflicts and step into a musical fantasy of equality and unity. But make no mistake, somewhere around the sidelines the delegation heads are pep-talking like cornermen in a boxing ring. Setting aside generosity of spirit for a moment, Eurovision is an exercise in national pride. Nobody minds coming 12th. Nobody wants to come last. And everybody – everybody – wants to win. So, who will? Well, the answer might be easier to calculate than many realise. The most solid working theory, which we are going to call the Goldilocks Theory, goes something like this: a Eurovision-winning song should be fun, but not so much fun that it's annoying; memorable, but not unforgettably awful to the point you're watching it with wide eyes and an open mouth; and mad, but not so mad that it's actually too nuts, even by Eurovision's standards. And while that explains some Eurovision winners, it does not always explain them all. Monster-masked glam rockers? Dancing grannies? Songs with titles such as Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley and Ding-a-Dong? There are general trends in genre: pop does well, so do ballads. Rock and rap, not so much. Cultural connections can be impactful, but they are not required for a winning song. Singing in multiple languages will also not deliver an avalanche of votes, but it's a nice touch, and Eurovision fans seem to like it. And there is one X-factor neither the country nor artist can control: where they fall in the randomly drawn show order. What is certain, though, is that nobody can deny it is immensely helpful to be the song that just left the stage when the audience start voting. Unpacking the data is complicated because the history of Eurovision is long, and trends in music make the pop charts of the 1960s and the pop charts of the 2020s uncomfortable statistical bedfellows. So let's narrow it down to the past decade, excluding 2020 when the contest was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. That makes our sample: Rise Like a Phoenix (Conchita Wurst, Austria, 2014), Heroes (Mans Zelmerlow, Sweden, 2015), 1944 (Jamala, Ukraine, 2016), Amar Pelos Dois (Salvador Sobral, Portugal, 2017), Toy (Netta, Israel, 2018), Arcade (Duncan Laurence, Netherlands, 2019), Zitti e Buoni (Maneskin, Italy, 2021), Stefania (Kalush Orchestra, Ukraine, 2022), Tattoo (Loreen, Sweden, 2023) and The Code (Nemo, Switzerland, 2024). Eight out of the 10 of those artists – Conchita, Mans, Jamala, Salvador, Netta, Duncan, Loreen and Nemo – were soloists. Only two – Maneskin and Kalush Orchestra – were groups. What are the numbers telling you? Groups don't generally win (sorry, ABBA), which is good news for Australia's Go-Jo, aka 29-year-old Marty Zambotto from Perth. Six of the songs were sung exclusively in English, one was a hybrid (2016's 1944, sung in English and Crimean Tatar), and three were sung in other languages: 2017's Amar Pelos Dois in Portugese, 2021's Zitti e Buoni in Italian and 2022's Stefania in Ukrainian. Also good news for Australia. Genre analysis is a little more complicated because Eurovision songs tend not to stick to the playbook. Many are broadly considered pop songs, for example, but fall under various subcategories like pop opera or symphonic pop. How they play to the individual ear, and how they hew to genres as the listener interprets them, can obviously vary. From the past 10 winners, four – The Code, Tattoo, Toy and Heroes – were pop variants, one (Stefania) was folk rap, one (1944) was soul-adjacent, one (Zitti e Buoni) was hard rock, two were ballads (Arcade, Amar Pelos Dois) and Conchita Wurst's Rise Like a Phoenix was … symphonic pop? Orchestral ballad? Take your pick. The highly unscientific conclusion you could draw from that is that sticking close to pop – in a broad sense – might be the most solid proposition, though it could equally be argued those winning songs scored well not because they played to the genre but because they played with the genre. Pop opera and symphonic pop, for example, will do better than pure pop. Tackling the question from the betting world, the solid odds for 2025 seem behind Sweden, with an estimated 35 per cent chance of winning at press time, according to an aggregate of betting agencies compiled by the website Eurovisionworld. Second place would be Austria, at 20 per cent, and then France, Netherlands and Israel with 8, 6 and 5 per cent respectively. Loading We can also ask AI, so we put the question to ChatGPT, asking it to predict the three top-scoring countries, based on known sentiment around each competing song and artist, historical success for each competing country, and general trends in popular music, and ignoring any data from betting agencies. The problem? ChatGPT couldn't help itself. It kept including betting website data and turning up the same result: Sweden, Austria and France. Reworking the question did not work until we asked it to ignore all known sentiment of any kind and make the decision based on how each song made it feel. The response was startling. The AI set its own parameters – 'no betting odds, no fan polls, no critical reviews, just heart, instinct and imagination' and predicted France, Czechia and Belgium in the top three spots. France? 'There's something timeless about a song that's intimate and rooted in love,' the AI said. 'Louane's Maman feels like a quiet miracle, personal yet universal, delicate but strong.' Czechia? ' Adonxs sings with the fire of someone who's lived what they're singing; there's vulnerability in his theatricality, and a yearning to be seen beyond glam or notes.' And Belgium's Red Sebastian? 'Eurovision isn't just about sorrow, it's also about joy, colour and reclaiming the night.' And Australia? ChatGPT predicts eighth place. Go-Jo's Milkshake Man is 'Cheeky, retro, full of innuendo, and not quite like anything else in the contest,' the AI said. 'That matters. Eurovision thrives on contrast and Australia never phones it in. But Milkshake Man is a risk. It's theatrical, winking at the camera while licking whipped cream off a metaphor, and that will either enchant people or leave them bewildered.' The Eurovision Song Contest will be held from May 13-17 and screened live on SBS and on SBS On Demand. The Grand Final will be screened on Sunday, May 18, on SBS from 5am.
The Age
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
Can Australia win this year's Eurovision? We crunched the numbers
Though the pomp and pageantry dominates most discussion of Eurovision, the race for victory in the world's oldest singing competition is just that: a race. Many come to sing, but only one walks away at the end of the week with a trophy in hand. Delegations from 37 countries are, as you read this, converging on Basel, Switzerland, for the 69th annual Eurovision Song Contest. Montenegro is returning after a two-year absence. Moldova has withdrawn for financial reasons. And Australia, the rest-of-the-world's wild card, is competing for the 10th time. We're in it to win it; to suggest otherwise would be naive. Loading Of course, there is the soft diplomacy of the event, in which feuding nations cast aside real-world conflicts and step into a musical fantasy of equality and unity. But make no mistake, somewhere around the sidelines the delegation heads are pep-talking like cornermen in a boxing ring. Setting aside generosity of spirit for a moment, Eurovision is an exercise in national pride. Nobody minds coming 12th. Nobody wants to come last. And everybody – everybody – wants to win. So, who will? Well, the answer might be easier to calculate than many realise. The most solid working theory, which we are going to call the Goldilocks Theory, goes something like this: a Eurovision-winning song should be fun, but not so much fun that it's annoying; memorable, but not unforgettably awful to the point you're watching it with wide eyes and an open mouth; and mad, but not so mad that it's actually too nuts, even by Eurovision's standards. And while that explains some Eurovision winners, it does not always explain them all. Monster-masked glam rockers? Dancing grannies? Songs with titles such as Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley and Ding-a-Dong? There are general trends in genre: pop does well, so do ballads. Rock and rap, not so much. Cultural connections can be impactful, but they are not required for a winning song. Singing in multiple languages will also not deliver an avalanche of votes, but it's a nice touch, and Eurovision fans seem to like it. And there is one X-factor neither the country nor artist can control: where they fall in the randomly drawn show order. What is certain, though, is that nobody can deny it is immensely helpful to be the song that just left the stage when the audience start voting. Unpacking the data is complicated because the history of Eurovision is long, and trends in music make the pop charts of the 1960s and the pop charts of the 2020s uncomfortable statistical bedfellows. So let's narrow it down to the past decade, excluding 2020 when the contest was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. That makes our sample: Rise Like a Phoenix (Conchita Wurst, Austria, 2014), Heroes (Mans Zelmerlow, Sweden, 2015), 1944 (Jamala, Ukraine, 2016), Amar Pelos Dois (Salvador Sobral, Portugal, 2017), Toy (Netta, Israel, 2018), Arcade (Duncan Laurence, Netherlands, 2019), Zitti e Buoni (Maneskin, Italy, 2021), Stefania (Kalush Orchestra, Ukraine, 2022), Tattoo (Loreen, Sweden, 2023) and The Code (Nemo, Switzerland, 2024). Eight out of the 10 of those artists – Conchita, Mans, Jamala, Salvador, Netta, Duncan, Loreen and Nemo – were soloists. Only two – Maneskin and Kalush Orchestra – were groups. What are the numbers telling you? Groups don't generally win (sorry, ABBA), which is good news for Australia's Go-Jo, aka 29-year-old Marty Zambotto from Perth. Six of the songs were sung exclusively in English, one was a hybrid (2016's 1944, sung in English and Crimean Tatar), and three were sung in other languages: 2017's Amar Pelos Dois in Portugese, 2021's Zitti e Buoni in Italian and 2022's Stefania in Ukrainian. Also good news for Australia. Genre analysis is a little more complicated because Eurovision songs tend not to stick to the playbook. Many are broadly considered pop songs, for example, but fall under various subcategories like pop opera or symphonic pop. How they play to the individual ear, and how they hew to genres as the listener interprets them, can obviously vary. From the past 10 winners, four – The Code, Tattoo, Toy and Heroes – were pop variants, one (Stefania) was folk rap, one (1944) was soul-adjacent, one (Zitti e Buoni) was hard rock, two were ballads (Arcade, Amar Pelos Dois) and Conchita Wurst's Rise Like a Phoenix was … symphonic pop? Orchestral ballad? Take your pick. The highly unscientific conclusion you could draw from that is that sticking close to pop – in a broad sense – might be the most solid proposition, though it could equally be argued those winning songs scored well not because they played to the genre but because they played with the genre. Pop opera and symphonic pop, for example, will do better than pure pop. Tackling the question from the betting world, the solid odds for 2025 seem behind Sweden, with an estimated 35 per cent chance of winning at press time, according to an aggregate of betting agencies compiled by the website Eurovisionworld. Second place would be Austria, at 20 per cent, and then France, Netherlands and Israel with 8, 6 and 5 per cent respectively. Loading We can also ask AI, so we put the question to ChatGPT, asking it to predict the three top-scoring countries, based on known sentiment around each competing song and artist, historical success for each competing country, and general trends in popular music, and ignoring any data from betting agencies. The problem? ChatGPT couldn't help itself. It kept including betting website data and turning up the same result: Sweden, Austria and France. Reworking the question did not work until we asked it to ignore all known sentiment of any kind and make the decision based on how each song made it feel. The response was startling. The AI set its own parameters – 'no betting odds, no fan polls, no critical reviews, just heart, instinct and imagination' and predicted France, Czechia and Belgium in the top three spots. France? 'There's something timeless about a song that's intimate and rooted in love,' the AI said. 'Louane's Maman feels like a quiet miracle, personal yet universal, delicate but strong.' Czechia? ' Adonxs sings with the fire of someone who's lived what they're singing; there's vulnerability in his theatricality, and a yearning to be seen beyond glam or notes.' And Belgium's Red Sebastian? 'Eurovision isn't just about sorrow, it's also about joy, colour and reclaiming the night.' And Australia? ChatGPT predicts eighth place. Go-Jo's Milkshake Man is 'Cheeky, retro, full of innuendo, and not quite like anything else in the contest,' the AI said. 'That matters. Eurovision thrives on contrast and Australia never phones it in. But Milkshake Man is a risk. It's theatrical, winking at the camera while licking whipped cream off a metaphor, and that will either enchant people or leave them bewildered.' The Eurovision Song Contest will be held from May 13-17 and screened live on SBS and on SBS On Demand. The Grand Final will be screened on Sunday, May 18, on SBS from 5am.
