Who totally spoiled Eurovision?

Thai ladyboys are a small yet very specific personal interest for some of the members here – you only find out about them when they stick their heads above the parapet and out themselves…;o)

I admire your humour but I work professionally as a teacher in Thailand and avoid things such as ladyboys… but if that’s what fills your entertainment charter, then so be it. Bring them here and put them on stage with some British singer of similar bond or genre. Perhaps someone who’s done the West End like Chicago?

It was meant to be a humorous post, still never mind perhaps Thailand will win it next year with a troupe of scantily dressed Ladyboys.

That again is an attempt at humour.

I’ll get my coat.

TAXI!

Perhaps if we leave the EU we could leave the song contest as well?

The Eurovision Song Contest and European Broadcasting Union has no connection at all to the European Union, hence why countries such as Israel are part of the contest when they technically are an Asian country.

Even if the UK leaves the European Union, the BBC would still remain part of the Eurovision Song Contest and the UK would still be in the “big 5”.

I speak to singers of the contest via direct messaging and I’m rather involved with the contest itself.

Perhaps if we leave the EU we could leave the song contest as well?

Snafu

I’m not all that shocked into disbelief that you should hold such views.

Because you believe that is how all right-thinking Englishmen should be thinking? No, sorry to disappoint you.

Such wit!

Snafu

I’m not all that shocked into disbelief that you should hold such views. Next, we’ll be told that you drive a white van.

I tell you what’s gone wrong, it is yet another aspect of the great levelling down, dumbing down, reductionist society in which we now exist. !

Go on, admit it. It’s all these ruddy immigrants, coming into this country and dumbing down the rightful white, Anglo-Saxon natives. Education has had to be dumbed down in return to accommodate them and it has had a marked affect on society as a whole, you mark my words…*

Enoch Powell had the right idea, eh?

In other news:

Romania has been expelled from the Eurovision Song Contest.

Romania expelled from Eurovision Song Contest

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-36111208

Seems they haven’t been paying their subs since 2007, and their entry will have to go back to his usual job as a 24 hour emergency plumber in Walthamstow.

* Sarcasm, just in case you don’t recognise it, in full, guns blazing action.;o)

Meddle,

Whats wrong with Flanders & Swann ? Tho’ I must say, I prefer Huntley & Palmer.

Beermat,

“you’d pay to see it”. So would I !

Reductionist society, John? Are you sure that’s what you meant?

Do you mean ontologically, theoretically or methodologically reductionist? Or is that a)not talking proper, b)technobabble or c)psychobabble?

I’m sure that armed with your expensive education you will be able to enlighten this sweaty state-school peasant.

We could always take a camera and get sponsored to make a ‘fly on the wall’. Man from 50’s timewarp goes to contemporary arts and music festival. I’d pay to see it.

I would watch that. An hour into it and he would be protectively clutching his Flanders and Swann LPs in the back of an ambulance somewhere.

Snafu, I have never been to Glastonbury, but I do know the rough history of the event. There are clips of a really early Glasto online, with the band Family (check them out, John) performing their song ‘Drowned In Wine’. Sadly there isn’t any Gong or Hawkwind footage. There is a lot of archival footage out there, which makes me question why live broadcasts are no better now than they were back then. Yes things can be tricky live but, if anything, it should be easier now that a lot of musicians use DI-feeds on instruments or at least use smaller combo amps and modelling equipment. I would have thought the BBC could have just taken a split feed off the various channels and take their own mix, rather than a lop-sided soundboard feed or whatever is going to the PA stacks. As a bassist my pet peeve is the move towards ridiculous studio drum sounds reproduced in a live environment, with crystal-sharp cymbals and everything mic’d and gated to the nth degree. This usually turns into nothing but high end hiss and boomy kick-drum through PA systems, to the detriment of all other performers. My next pet peeve is with sound technicians that decide to become your producer for the night and offer (bad) advice on how you should actually be playing something. They take one look at my bass equipment then send me packing with a knackered Behringer DI box held together with tape.

….>>

When watching TV, take particular note of the way that people talk. Many do not move their mouths. Their lips remain in an obstinate line. It is as tho’ they are practising some arcane form of ventriloquism…….>>>

I notice this particularly with BBC news presenter Naga Munchetty.

Snafu, let’s take John to Glasto.
🙂

I get offended by the thought of having to rub shoulders with the sweaty peasantry !

What ? What did yer say ? Speak up.

To wife: “I swear I need my hearing tested, I can hardly hear the sexual content and swearing”.

Wife: “I’ve thought as much for sometime dear but, I didn’t like to mention it, I know that you suffer from SOD (Sudden Onset Deafness) when I ask you to go to Tesco and thought that this was merely two sides of the same coin”.

To wife: ” Strange how I can hear from thirty miles distance ATC yattering in my ear and, apart from the content, have little problem with TV news presenters successfully negotiating ‘PROfessional’ not ‘PERfessional’ and ‘TEMPERature’ not ‘TEMERcher’.

Quoting ‘technobabble’ doesn’t cut the mustard. People do not properly speak. Go into any store; PC World is a great favourite. Staffed by mainly young, bright eyed twenty somethings, they, in response to the simplest question deliver a stream of high quality gobbledegook at something approaching two hundred words an incomprehensible minute. I believe that the reason for this is to assume a cloak of professionalism; to sound ‘hip’, to demonstrate what they see as efficiency and knowledge.

When watching TV, take particular note of the way that people talk. Many do not move their mouths. Their lips remain in an obstinate line. It is as tho’ they are practicing some arcane form of ventriloquism. Speech should not just ‘happen’. It has to be taught, vowel sounds in particular. Public speaking, whether or not on TV, acting, drama, whatever you call it, is part of the learning process.

If, fifty or so years ago, people could speak with clarity, what’s gone wrong ? I tell you what’s gone wrong, it is yet another aspect of the great levelling down, dumbing down, reductionist society in which we now exist. If it’s any good, get rid of it. If it smacks of excellence or, Heaven forbid, elitism; forward with all haste to the tumbrils !

Me. I can.

Having Wogan present the contest, was the only thing that made it vaguely watchable.

In my mind, they should go back to the singers having to sing in their own language. Not that I’ve watched it
for god knows how many years.
When Wogan was presenting, it was worth watching just for the scores at the end. It was the only thing
I enjoyed watching him do.

Who can forget Katie Boyle ? : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lSUrRbAoKA

We could always take a camera and get sponsored to make a ‘fly on the wall’. Man from 50’s timewarp goes to contemporary arts and music festival. I’d pay to see it.

Not this year!

And he can pay for it! Should freak him out good and proper…

Snafu, let’s take John to Glasto.
🙂