The Irish national song contest to chose a song for the Eurovision usually bores the hell out of me and I haven't watched it for years...and I didn't watch it this year either. I must admit that initially I cringed on hearing that we had selected a glove puppet - Dustin the Turkey.
I watched the video on the net today and I felt a bit better. I've always said over the last few years that what we needed was a good punchy visual stage extravaganza. This act pulled it off fairly well. It's a crap song and Dustin can't sing but the words are funny and I also wouldn't underestimate the hypnotic effects on the voting masses of the regularly repeated words... "Irelande douze pointe"! He looks funny too and there's dancers and colour etc. The Eurovision is now a money sucking operation aimed at the millions of fools who pay to vote on instant impact entertainment...it is unfortunately no longer an outlet for exposing great music - which often has to be listened to repeatedly to fully appreciate.
I saw also a video of Dustin being interviewed on Sky News....an ideal exposure for him...the TV equivalent the Daily Mirror for instant appeal sugar coated stories. One big thought came to me from watching the Sky interview...ironically it shows we have grown up somewhat as a nation. Twenty years ago we would have been far too embarrassed to put such an act together. We had an inferiority complex as a nation....we would be afraid that other countries - especially Britain - would laugh AT us.
Now it's different. We are confident in ourselves, we stand shoulder to shoulder with the best nations and are better off and more skilled than most of them. We've won the Eurovision seven times - more often than any country. If we want to do something different and put on a light hearted fun show at the Eurovision - then why not!? If it does very well (as it might) it will be the perfect statement of what the Eurovision has become.
Go on ya good thing!
