We have moved:)))))))))))

Okay so ESC is just around the corner and some of you will be checking here to find out what's going on and what we've been up to.....

Sadly, or not for us anyway, we have MOVED HOUSE......you can now find us at.....

http://www.esckaz.com/new/en/blogs/mike-and-daniel

and be sure and check out 

http://www.esckaz.com/new/en 

and

www.esckaz.com

for loads of videos and pictures of rehearsals. And from people much more qualified to do this sort of thing than us:)

There will be some stuff posted here but most of the nonsense that we came up with last year will be on the new site:)))

Follow us if you like 'cos all there will be here is pictures of drunk friends and the occasional tourist photo:)))

Huggies

M+D

Love this and just had to link it:)))

Moldova and planes and parachutes......

I want to see her play the saxophone while doing it:)))

Uk Preview party 2010

Well the time of year has rolled around again when a few brave (foolhardy?) acts fought the volcanic ash (actually only 2 of the 4 did this) and arrive in the UK to give a preview performance to the gathered discerning audience of drunk fans.

On the bill this year were.......................

United Kingdom.

Romania

Ireland

and Cyprus.

The night kicked of with half a bottle of vodka, as is now the tradition. This was swiftly followed by a mad dash to the West End of London cos I was late, a quick scramble to find the venue and then a swift vodka ta the bar.

The place was rammed.....much more so than last year and that awful under filled venue cos of the clash with the Netherlands preview on the same night. That almost put us of from going this year, and when we heard that only 4-5 acts were confirmed it was a tough decision to make.......

However the one and only Naimh Kavanagh was going to be there, Volcanic ash or no volcanic ash so we were sold.

The night started fairly late, the first on stage was Cyrus at around 11ish, nice guys can hold a tune and we were impressed. Would love to see this qualify this year. They sang 2 or 3 songs and seemed to have a ball;)))

Romania up next. Being beset by microphone problems is awful at the best of times......but when it's in front of a baying crowd of ESC fans who will pick up on every fault and blow it up into a crises of Eyjafjallajokull proportions you realise that these guys never stood a chance. Sorry no video clip.....the sound was just too dreadful to be honest and would not be fair on the performers.

Still our dark horse this year.....c'mon if Balkan Girls can qualify then this could actually win:)))) And our bank balance would also be very happy:)

Third up was the delightful young Josh, this years UK (emphasis on the hope here) hopeful. Kudos to the guy he can sing his little heart out, nice stage presence and we can't help but wonder what might have been should the Waterman freak have given him a good song to sing. 

But he didn't 

and we will come nearly last

and it is so not gonna be Josh's fault. 

And finally the Goddess herself Niamh Kavanagh. She sang three songs, In your Eyes being one of them, can't remember the other one and It's for you. Without doubt the best performer of the night, but to be honest she had a very "home" crowd willing her on. 

And we leave you with a brief clip......the sound is not great but the venue was not really geared up for acoustics:((( But you get the idea:)))

39 Reasons to love ESC this year......

Well the reviews of this years songs are coming in thick and fast now......and lets face it they have been coming for ages now.


Nothing we can say or do will change anybody's opinion about any of the entries for this year......so instead of doing a review we thought we'd do 39 reasons to love ESC this year......actually it's 39 descriptions of the various songs so bear with us.


Some of these are a bit negative, so we guess that they might not actually be reasons to love this year, but it's our blog and we don't care:)))
So on with the list.......if you reach the end there is a special prize which will be revealed in Oslo.


(and if you believe that you probably are one of the people that think Germany has a chance this year....OPA!!!!)


Oh just so we are clear these are personal opinions that we fully expect to be bashed about. Again remember who has the baseball bat so bring it on if you think you're hard enough:))


1. That sounds good to me. Lots and lots (we lie here) fought for this prestigious prize this year, will it be Turkey, will it be Spain, will it be that awful pile of rubbish from Slovenia.....all wrong for us this year it's all about Greece. Instant appeal, well staged, way better than last year's effort and our song that is on repeat at the moment:)


2. That sounds shit to me. Loving the fact that there is lots of choice for this one prize. But being honest, and really we hate doing the "that's rubbish" thing, but the only one we care enough about to award this to is Portugal:((((( Please bear in mind that there is an "indifferent" award later on.........and Portugal didn't get this:))


3. Best "live" performance.....of those we saw there were quite a few that could win this. Serbia was in with a chance, as was Lithuania, same could be said of Spain, and even Albania gave a good shot at wow-ing us way back sometime before Christmas. And even though it's a pet hate Norway does give a little belter of a performance. However we have to pick one and this is gonna surprise a few people BUT we really liked Belgium this year live. Simple, effective and does what it says on the tin:))


4. Worst "live" performance. A two way battle this one between Germany and Russia. Russia won.....it usually does in battles with Germany anyway:))


5. Song we will most likely LOL to on final night. Easy. UK. End of.


6. Song we secretly love but will bomb. Estonia, every-time its played I hear different things going on with it. Yes is has been compared to Depeche Mode, wrongly in our opinion, but its a nice little song and way better than the other "slit your wrists" song this year, Russia.


7. Country with the best promo. There are some quite good promos around this year. Spain (this is a recurring theme with us this year) is lovely, Romania is rather nifty, Lithuania is the best comedy value, Finland has something quite charming about it's promo but to be honest Turkey does it for us this year.


8. Country with the worst promo. Estonia. Which is a shame. The artwork was stolen from Six Feet Under and that is blasphemy in our book. They could have done so much more.


9. Male Hottie of the year. There are quite a lot of boys (and a few in-betweeners) this year, but we think that Mr Greece wins this......swiftly followed by Mr Bulgaria, and bubbling underneath are the boys from Israel, Lithuania, UK and Poland. Once we meet them all in the flesh in Oslo this will change:))


10. Female Hottie of the year. Without a shadow of a doubt Miss Georgia wins this hands down. Stunning. Second place goes to Serbia, and bringing up the rear are Miss Slovakia, The Croatian Girls and if only she'd kept the original hair Miss Albania. Once we meet them all in the flesh in Oslo this will change:))


11. Country we were most disappointed with. Ukraine.


12. Best Disco-dolly number. Albania. Nuff said.


13. Best Ballad. SHIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNEEEEEEEEEEE. That's Georgia in case you were wondering.


14. Worst Ballad. Apologies to our hosts this year but Norway. Bored to death after about 3 notes.


15. Song that we publicly hate but that will do really well. Azerbaijan. And this is the only mention it's getting from us!


16. Song most likely to cause divorce in our house. Ireland. You can take a random guess as to which one of us two likes this and which one hates it:))


17. Best of the rock-gods. Though it's not really a rock song it kinda falls into that category. Yes you guessed it Turkey gets the Oscar here. We were slightly disappointed when we first heard it but it grew on us and now even Daniel likes it:)). And Bosnia's not bad either.


18. Worst of the rock-Gods. Macedonia. Vile. Sowwwyyy.


19. Song most indifferent to. Slovenia. It's just so bad that we struggle to remember it at all.:((


20. Entry that will most likely make us get up and dance in Euroclub. Lithuania. Fun fun fun all the way.


21. And the Euroclub toilet break goes to....Denmark. C'mon it really is a WTF moment from them. And we usually like their entries....a lot.


22. Delegation we most want to meet. Lithuania. Though we would quite like to meet Niamh as well.


23. Song we just don't get but that everbody else appears to love. Germany. Just can't see it to be honest, though ESC week(s) in Germany might be kinda exciting and full of promise:))


24. Song that reminds us of something else (but that we still like). Slovakia. It's just Nox remixed isn't it?


25. Best of the Former CIS countries. Moldova. What a great opener to the whole thing. Love the saxophone, will qualify for sure and might just surprise a few people yet.


26. Worst of the former CIS countries. Azerbaijan. Okay for those reading carefully yes it has now had 2 mentions from us. But is deserves them both:)))


27. Entry we know we really shouldn't like but just can't help ourselves. Netherlands. This is a hoot. It should be obliterated from the contest but every time it comes on we just sing along like a couple of demented smurfs on acid.


28. Best of the direct finalists. Okay this is soooooooooo easy that we really should have thought of another category but hey-ho it's (drum roll please) SPAIN.


29. Worst of the direct qualifiers. France. Please it's eurovision not some holiday theme tune from one of the Caribbean Islands. Vile.


30. Car Crash Moment on the night. Hummmm quite a few could get this but personally, even though we like the song, we think Belarus will struggle to even hit one note, let alone get the harmonies right.


31. Country that shocked us most with what they sent in the end. Sweden. not your usual thing from them. But that said we LOVE it. This should do well. Hopefully. Now watch it miss out on the final:)))


32. Folky-Flim-Flam skip round the room moment......Finland. We are perfecting hand-claps as we speak:))


33. Weirdest lyrics of the year. Latvia. Does Mr God know.....and if he does is he actually gonna tell us?


34. Country we bet most money on. This was a tie. Sweden and Romania, both perfectly perfect each way bets.


35. This years Dark Horses. See answer to number 34. And add Georgia to that:)


36. Who will get the UK's 12 points this year. Toughie to be honest. We would like to say Ireland but fear that it might just go where it normally goes....Greece or Turkey. That said the Welsh are very good at mobilising their votes in X-Factor programs so watch out Cyprus, Greece might not be the only country giving you 12 this year.


37. Countries that we think might give the UK 12 this year. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. none.


38. Song most likely to go from zero to hero during ESC week. Malta. I know, we know NOTHING:))))


39. Country whose party we'd most like to go to. Azerbaijan. Okay 3 mentions but they are throwing soooooooooooo much money at this year's contest that the party will at least have free food and drink. And the last Azerbaijan party we went to (Belgrade) was AMAZING. Best party EVER.


PHEW. Got to the end and here's the ones that never got a mention;
Poland,
Iceland
Armenia and
Switzerland,
So just for them. Here's your mention now:)))) There, they've been mentioned:)


Toodles:) and check back sometime for a top 10 from us:)

Sunshine, The London Eye and upside down flags

This year, if you didn't know that Oslo was hosting the Eurovision Song Contest, you have either wiped Alexander Ryback's win from memory or are stuck in some 80's-90's time warp where either the Irish win, or the UK come second.

Which tenuous link brings us to the events of yesterday. NRK, the Norwegian TV company, have decided that this year it should all be about the fans "sharing the moment"..........and hence they will be filming the postcards in various countries with groups of mad screaming fans jumping up and down.

This is all very well until you realise that when you come to do the UK one in the open air in April the possibility of it pissing rain, no-body showing up and those that do show being soooo reserved that it could all turn into a bit of a damp squib!!!!

HOWEVER, this is not what happened. Various e mails went out courtesy of Auntie BBC, some frantic phone calls were made, lunchtimes were rescheduled and viola on a Wednesday afternoon in central London, in glorious weather in the shadow of the London Eye this is what appeared...........

Yes it looks kinda scary.........all these quaint looking people with Union Jacks, short hair cuts and in the middle of a UK General Election, but rest assured this was not some kind of rally for one of the more extreme right wing UK political parties.........no it was something far far worse. It was the various people who turned up for the filming of the UK postcard for this year's ESC.

So what happened. Well it was all fairly tame and well behaved. The noisy ones twirled around in flags and asked where they picked up their Oscars, the quiet ones hid at the back and giggled every time Thomas the cute NRK camera man said "ACTION", the naughty ones (don't know who we could mean here) slouched against the wall and smoked ciggies, and all the while the man from Auntie BBC fussed round making sure everybody's UK flag was the right way up.........

Apparently there have been letters written to the BBC about upside down flags before.......OH DEAR:)))))

We don't really want to say too much about the filming.....why spoil the surprise of who you might spot on the postcard in May.....suffice to say that there were 2 different shots, with 3-4 takes on each one, the usual British reserved attitude was much in evidence, and at one point we all had to move so that the sun was directly in our eyes:)))

And I'll leave you with a few pictures of the day.....there will be more on the BBC website but as this is our personal blog we get to choose who is on here.......

The Norwegian cameraman, Thomas, had run into a few problems with the volcanic ash cloud this week. He can be seen here in the bottom right hand corner, in the blue top. He had just arrived, having run all the way from Prague in his slippers:))

Daniel looking way too cool for school as ever:))

It's the UK. It's and ESC event......hence men in skirts ALWAYS turn up:)))

And finally we heard a rumour that the new version of "that sounds good to me" on this radio station.....today....but sorry we don't know the time:((((

http://sverigesradio.se/webbradio/webbradio.asp?type=live&amp

Failing that you can watch Josh on the following youtube clip.......enjoy!!!!

oh and don't forget to check back over the next few days for the Mike and Daniel review of the year.......only 3 weeks before we leave for Oslo now.......yaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

Sweden tells the world to stop........we are deciding

No the world does not stop.....Sweden decides tonight. But more importantly your digital flies on the wall have been out and about in Stockholm to bring you the news you really want.......who did what, to whom and how many times!!!!!

And now that we have finally worked out how to stop the text being blue, instead of white, we can continue

First introductions go to our new spy-cam. He is called F.L.Y., originally enough, and he has spent the last 24 hours scouring the streets of Stockholm looking for MF performers, ESCNation message board heros, naughty goings on and the occasional CD to add to it's collection.

Sadly there was an accident on the Metro yesterday and the last thing that went through F.L.Y's mind before it died was it's bum. Full funeral rights were observed and then we went out to party. Donations to mark F.L.Y.'s short life can be sent to Moderators@escnation.com. Cash only please:))

We are British and so reserve the right to moan about the weather that we have had this year during the long dreary winter that seems to go on forever. I think we should take a leaf out of the Swedes book and simply return to collect our bikes in May!!!!!!

And another thing......this year's theme seems to be PINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Everywhere. Personally I blame Norway!

And onto the pictures that you know you want to see really. If you don't know who these people are then you really should ask someone. The Doctors that wear white coats and carry straight-jackets will be able to tell you, just before they remove most of the following people to the local funny-farm:)

"Did someone just say that the bar is serving free drinks? Really? Free you say? How the hell am I going to get this smile of my face now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Oh look it's the UK act the Miss Fitz.......no wonder Pete Waterman didn't put them through. I'd be really quite scared to be honest.

"you like my song........really......you do?.......ahhhhhh go ON you're just saying that to keep me happy. But you know actually we are going to be doing lots of work on it.......BLAH BLAH BLAH" Next.

Globen now has a mini-me baby Globen attached to it on the outside. We were not brave enough to do the little trip to the top.......and besides there was NO BAR when you got there, very little to see and KOM was playing in the shopping centre.....far more important than a vertical chou-chou train

"And I said, Don't you go doin' dat to me missy......"

"oh I hear you honey-pie......really I do......but put your arm down that BIATCH Mike has got the camera out AGAIN!!"

Huggies. Marianne is laughing 'cos Drew just told her that the UK song is not his number one.........well not yet anyway.

You heard it here first......

This person on the other hand LOVES the UK song soooooooooooooooooo much that his face contorts into this whenever it's played. OH DEAR

And the winner, by an absoulte mile and a half was the HOTTEST girl there all night long. Welcome to Anthi. Our new Message Board Hero. She is STUNNING and we were all fighting for her attention last night like spoilt school children. We let Geert win. Then Noel and I bitched about it:))))

And finally, for today at least, the most random thing of the weekend so far was approximately 20 British crazies watching the UK National Final in a British pub in the middle of some backstreet in Stockholm, drinking warm beer and trying hard not to wet ourselves with laughter. Hummmmmmmmmmmm!

and thanks from us two for a great night out. We had a blast as usual, drank far too much and hope to do the same thing all over again tonight. But only if KOM wins.

Huggies from us:))

Alcoholics? Us? Never

The institution that is known as the ESC Nation Message Board meet-up arrived in the Fair City of the Emerald Isle...........Yes Dublin we are here, we're queer and we're not going shopping.

We arrived late afternoon and even though we texted everybody, nobody replied. So of round the town to get barrings and find out where we were meeting later. We discovered later on that the boys from Scandi land got of the airport bus and the FIRST building they saw happened to be a pub..........a gold star goes to the person who can guess what happened next......

Back to the hotel and finally someone got in touch, Sir Roger of Norwayia with Lady Carly of Americania were at the Hotel........a swift Vodka later and of we all went to the Korean dog slaughter house........I mean restaurant for dinner.........

There was sat waiting patiently young MerseyMike, swiftly followed by the ever glamorous Egle. Drinks were taken and we awaited the rest of the alcoholics..........the following is a selection of what happened next...........


This was the face Sild pulled when informed by the bar staff that "no there is no more Vodka, you'll have to have a soft drink, we do a selection, would you like to see a menu?"

Nuff said really, there wasn't blood but it was a close call......



A most welcome addition to the maniacs was Fatima from Iran. She was quite shy at first but soon got into the swing of things when Sild tried to tell her that facial hair is not really acceptable in Ireland. An appointment was made for the clinic for today and we expect to see her later at the Guinness Tour resplendent in less restrictive attire:)))))))))))))




"Why didn't anybody tell me that it wasn't as big as my left arm and really it was only a diddy one.......about the size of the shape I'm making with my other hand. I am of course referring to the size of the glass that my drink came in........tsk tsk tsk......you naughty thinking people you"


Look into my eyes, not around the eyes, into the eyes.........now you're under.....**Steals drink from under you're nose**

We were of course very sensible, well someone had to be, and left early to go to bed. Still feel like shit today but that could be more to do with the **coughs** nightcap in the room.

We know you love a bit of group action so here are some teasers before the main event tonight....



Hands above the table please boys.......




AND finally......a big fat gold star to the first person who can name the MBer underneath Jonas hair.........