Eurovision 2nd Semi-Final

More entertaining than Tuesday night with the added bonus that the UK got to vote for its favourite acts (hence Croatia and Latvia getting through).

Here’s a rundown of the good, the bad and the SSOO bad it’s good!

First off, I have to say I exercised my right to vote and voted for Turkey. A good traditional rock sounding song. They sung in Turkish but it sounded good. The music style was a but Manic Street Preachers. Quite good.
[youtube=http://youtu.be/riMSxOc7ZyA]

Something else not traditionally Eurovision was Bulgaria’s entry. I liked it, but I think it got a little lost in the mix.
[youtube=http://youtu.be/MLLkumF7EkE]

Lithuania was BAD BAD BAD!!! The guy looked like a cross between Potsy from Happy Days and Nick Cave! He belted the song out like Meatloaf and a had a mullet that I haven’t seen since 1988!! Awful awful awful. BE WARNED!
[youtube=http://youtu.be/NDz92qPVTsI]

The Czech Republic did a song called “Have Some Fun”. Probably the most incorrect song title of the night. I won’t even tortue you with a video.

Georgia got through to the final with a song sung by a blind Shirley Manson lookalike called “Peace Will Come”. It was sung in English which (I know I shouldn’t take the “piss” out of someone’s grasp of English, but…) made the song title sound like “Piss Will Come”, which had me in stitches. Tiny things pleasing tiny minds and all that…
[youtube=http://youtu.be/rVMFZu39tmY]

At least the song had a political slant and wasn’t just another boring love song.

Now the “so bad it’s good” category. This belongs to Latvia and Croatia. A haaaarrrrr me maties! Here’s Latvia’s entry! Avast!!! Pieces of eight, pieces of eight!!
[youtube=http://youtu.be/zHLqfkU_0xA]

Croatian entry. 75 cent, you rock!!!!
[youtube=http://youtu.be/KkHL5tULoWw]

Onwards to the final…

It’s Eurovision Time!!

Man, I love this time of year! Two of my most favourite TV events happen each May. The start of Springwatch, but before that, this weekend is the Eurovision Song Contest. 

Guaranteed to be gayer than Elton John in his Marie Antoinette costume at his birthday. Camper than a row of tents, Eurovision highlights the world of cheesy pop like no other festival can!

It all kicks off tomorrow night. In the UK the first semi-final airs tomorrow night (Tuesday) at 8pm on BBC3. The second semi-final is on Thursday night at 8pm on BBC3. And the final is on Saturday on BBC1 at 8pm. 

In Australia coverage is on SBS all weekend. Friday and Saturday nights have the 1st and 2nd semi-finals on at 7.30pm, with the final airing on Sunday at 7.30pm. 

For those of you wanting to see the show but haven’t got any TV channels in your area showing the contests there will be live webcasts at Eurovision.TV

Anyone having a Eurovision party over the weekend? Have a hoot!

I’m really looking forward to Ireland’s entry.

Furkan Hell!!!

I saw this guy’s name on the BBC London news and just HAD to flip back on the PVR and capture an image of his name!

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It Wasn’t Just Children Who Were “In Need”!

Shambolic is the only word that could describe this years Children In Need. And why the hell should I be made to feel guilty for not donating when Terry Wogan can command 1500 pounds an hour for his hosting “skills”. The man is crap! He behaved as if drunk. If wasn’t taking his cues properly. He was making weird “off the cuff” remarks. He was amateurish at best.

Most of the acts were throw away. The cast of Eastenders doing Beatles songs. The Spice Grans MIMING their new single “Headlines” which sounds more like they are singing “hairlines” to me.

Not 5 minutes into the show, the new Joseph lost sound on his mic when performing “Any Dream Will Do”. The sound problems continued all night.

It WAS awful! I’ll never get those 7 hours back!

For those of you wondering what the hell I’m talking about. Children In Need is sort of like an old style telethon in which a load of “entertaining” bits of TV are put together to get people to watch and donate money. It’s put on by the BBC each November. For more info in to: www.bbc.co.uk/pudsey

It’s Only Hair!

“But I liked it!”, replies the attention-seeking, recalcitrant no-mark. Another “victim” of Celebrity Scissorhands. If you have no experience of this programme, it’s about training a group of “celebrities” (I put them in commas because unless you live in the UK and have no life “HELLO” – waves hands in the air – you will probably not have heard of ANY of these so-called celebrities) to become hairdressers/beauty therapists with around 13 years experience in just 3 weeks.

It’s all for charity. The BBC’s annual fund-raising event which is broadcast each November, called Children In Need. Last year on the night, the celebrities that remained in training styled the hair of the people taking part in Children In Need that night. This year they will be taking part in a hairdressing “show-down” where they will be performing styles in front of a panel of hairdressing and celebrity judges. The best is crowned “Celebrity Scissorhands Hairdresser of the Year 2007”.

Nine “celebrities” are taking part with the assistant to head hairdresser (and trainer) Lee Stafford, being last year’s favourite, Steve Strange (of 80’s pop icons Visage). All the celebs are to train in all aspects of hairdressing and beauty therapy. So they’ll be doing anything from cutting and styling hair, to waxing, to massage, body wraps, facials, manicures and pedicures…everything.

Members of the general public apply online to go into the salon to be “clients” of the celebrities. You can state your preference between having your hair cut, to having a beauty treatment, or an entire makeover.

Obviously the hair cuts are the best entertainment. The celebs start cutting on day one, with absolutely NO pre-training, just a very basic “this is how you hold the scissors and this is how you make a cut” approach, and off they go!

Baring this in mind, can anyone explain to me WHY someone would apply to this programme IF they are SO precious about their hair? It must be to get on TV, as there would be no other reason if you are that uptight about it. On day one, Ben Nicholas (Stingray off Neighbours) cut a ladies hair and she was getting really pee-d off. She said he’d made her “look like a boy” and so STEVE STRANGE (if you happened to watch last year, you’ll know why I put this in capitals) was sent to rectify what “butchering” Ben had caused. Trust me, the last person you want to touch your hair if it has already been butchered is Steve Strange! Suffice to say, Steve tried to “salvage” the job and for a change didn’t do too badly. But anyway, it’s FOR BLOODY CHARITY!

So, you’re a big-headed love-me-do, but, you know you just happen to have a charitable side (that shines through most while you have your mug to TV it just so happens). You’re happy to apply to CS for a hair cut, because you know it’s for charity and you’ll raise some money for Children In Need. Until you’re at the salon, when Steve Strange approaches you and you rather hypocritically start to panic. You then start to forget about the little 2 year-old girl sleeping on the streets of Malawi you’re meant to be there to help because Steve has just left a big V-shaped gap in your hair. GET OVER IT! How pathetic do you look, obsessing about your hair when some child you are meant to be there for is being abused by their father while you’re there crying into your own hands because your hair looks funny. GET A GRIP!!

I love the show, but why oh why do the people that end up on there get SSOO worked up about their hair? One lady, obviously wonderfully charitable, raised £5,000 to have her hair cut on the show, but was visibly unhappy with her cut. I mean, take it on the chin! You raised 5K’s! Shouldn’t you be happy?

I’d be wrapped to be “Stranged” (as Steve’s cuts have come to be known). It would be a unique cut for one!

Just friggin’ live with it! It’s only hair after all.

Name a type of bean?

[youtube=http://youtu.be/kLZTlsgOdXY]

I watched this last night on TV. Thank GOD, someone put this up on You Tube. This is just brilliant. It’s from Family Fortunes (otherwise known as Family Feud elsewhere in the world).

Can you name another type of bean that ISN’T a baked bean?

If this face greeted YOUR marriage proposal, what would YOU think?

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This was the face that greeted the character Pepper on neighbours when she asked Adam to marry her. NICE! What would you think if you were greeted with this face?

Anyway, it transpires that although Pepper is quite “into” Adam, she proposed purely for “marriage of convenience” purposes, to help him able to stay in Australia. NAUGHTY!

Who The Hell Are “Family First”?

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Looking around on the ‘net, I decided to go to some Australian news web sites to see what’s going on “Down Under”. Of course one issue that is taking up a lot of media coverage at the moment is the upcoming federal election on November 24th. As I was looking around the news.com.au web site, I saw the “vote-a-matic“…great name! This little questionnaire is meant to help the “swinging” or “marginal” undecided voter who to choose on election day. I decided to do it for a bit of fun, mostly in the hope that it wouldn’t show me up to be a right-leaning Neo-Nazi.

As you can see by the image, gladly the outcome was such. But it left me with the question, “Who the hell are Family First?” So here they are…Family First. Yes, I have a lot of time to kill, but it was a bit of fun, and I enjoyed seeing the result.

Attack Of The Killer Ladybirds!

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I was just reading a story on the BBC News web site about ladybirds (700,000 of the little blighters) being sent into Manhattan on attack to kill aphids. Well I don’t want to disappoint the recipients involved in this deployment but after watching The Nature of Britain last Wednesday night, it would appear the ladybird is not the lean (well, they are not exactly “lean” anyway), mean, aphid killing machine as initially suggested. From the depiction given on the television the other night the ladybirds usually just walk past aphids and it’s only them clumsily walking over them forcing the aphids to fall off plants and get caught in spider webs do the ladybirds actually help combat aphids.

Let’s hope it works out for the people involved. Go ladybirds!!

Read the full BBC story here.
Photo supplied by Jasmic under creative commons (some rights reserved).

A Guilty Pleasure?

Yes! I admit, I watch X Factor. Do you think I’d get away with calling it a guilty pleasure? I like to think so, because it will let me off the hook for liking it. This week saw the start of the show “for real” with the final 12 acts chosen to sing live to the public. This year there are 4 categories: Males (aged 14-25), Females (aged 14-25), Groups and Over 25’s mentored by four judges: Simon Cowell (groups), Louis Walsh (+ 25’s), Dannii Minogue (males), and Sharon Osbourne (females).

This is what I thought of the final 12’s performances tonight (and what I have thought of them up til this point).

Females:
Kimberley – totally robbed tonight. Thought she gave a good performance. Not the strongest, granted, but it was high energy and she definitely has a strong voice.
Alisha – probably will end up stronger vocally than Kim so deserved to stay, but both ladies should NOT have been in the bottom two. Her performance wasn’t strong, especially the second time round (but hard as she knew she was in the bottom two at that stage) and the song choice didn’t let her show of her vocal capabilities.
Emily – tough stuff for someone who’s only 15, but she did well. It wasn’t the strongest performance, but hey, she’s 15 and she’s singing to an audience of about 7 million people so, you know…in the grand scheme of things. I’m sure she’ll get better.

Males:
Leon – he sounded fantastic, if a bit TOO much like Michael Buble`! He was totally slagged off by the judges. Yeah, it was a bit messy musically, but the bloke can sure sing.
Andy – a bit cheesy for my liking. There are strong parts to his voice. It’s unique, but a little weak to me. We’ll see what happens with him. Maybe it was just song choice letting him down.
Rhydian – OMFG! What can I say? Well, the guy is a knob as far as I am concerned. I totally agree with Sharon there. He’s WAY too OTT for me. He’s got a great theatrical voice. Great for the West End, not for X Factor.

Groups:
Hope – bleah! Pussy Cat Dolls wannabe’s. They did Rihanna’s Umbrella. It seems the only freakin’ song they can do, seeing it’s the only bloody one I’ve seen the perform! I mean, YAWN!
Futureproof – like the name, but that’s about it. Just another turgid boyband. Even more so considering they didn’t actually exist as a group at the beginning of X Factor, but were the “reject” boys that were the rejected 6 from bootcamp. And that’s also how Hope were formed.
Same Difference – OMG! Get me a gun, now! Like a brother and sister Steps – and predictably end up doing Tragedy (a Steps cover of the Bee Gee’s song). And it was as the song title suggested. I was sure they were going to be in the bottom two with Rhydian…but what do I know?

Over 25’s:
The best lot…
Beverley – Fantastic, and more so ‘cos she’s a Luton girl!!! Great voice, good performance. Simon slagged her off for not being able to dance…erm, it’s a SINGING contest isn’t it?
Niki – best performance of the night. Great voice. She’ll do well.
Daniel – not the best performance, but heart-felt. He’ll do better. I’m sure I’ll have more to say on him as time goes on.