I remember Sjúbídú A-Ba-Ni-Bi, Boom Βang-Α Bloody Βang & Diggey-Friggin’-Loo “Yama Yama”’s, “Bana Bana”’s, “La, La, La”’s, “Ding Dang Dong”’s – Sophisticated songs! Noel Kelehan and Ossi Runne – where are you? Terry Wogan – what a rogue! – ‘n’ Johnny Logan too No-one’s better than such a veteran Nowadays are sour days – Yes, the Eurovision’s gone down the pan Chorus 1:
We were the ESC kids Jury votes were all we did And Germany would never ever ever give Turkey the douze Then televoting came along Now quality’s irrelevant – Pick any song Just give ’em belly dancers, somersaults and trannies if you don’t wanna lose Verse 2:
I used to have a go at Croat, and Danish vowels Oh how I hungered for Hungarian and Hebrew growls Though we had no choice We had a patriotic voice
Now Finns have finished singing in the Finnish tongue No longer will we hear the phlegm of Flemish sung We were, when we were young A polyglottal lot Whichever fool made up the Free Language rule Should be publicly shot Chorus 2:
Before we had the likes Of announcing votes by satellite and radio mikes Luxembourg and Italy were the names of the game But then the contest took a knock We were invaded by the Eastern Block And in case this sounded racist – relegation’s to blame Verse 3:
Now ABBA’s been ‘n’ gone; Céline Dion’s still here But these days even entering can end a career Though she was hoping for fame Whatever happened to…What’s her name?
I used to dream of being chef d’orchestre With a brolly as a baton in Napoleon dress But should playback remain My dream’s down the drain Better rally the Musicians’ Union and campaign Chorus 3:
We were the ESC kids VHS was all we did Though Bucks Fizz got kinda fuzzy – and tracking couldn’t fix their strip-tease But now we beg, steal or borrow – from afar Thanks to Napster, Bearshare, Morpheus, Soulseek, and Kazaa Goodbye videos – hello DVDs and free mp3s Verse 4:
A theory has been posited that ev’ry man Is obviously closeted unless a fan And most probably a friend of Dorothy
The plagiarism recently is sad but true Del Bo and R Kelly are due to sue More retro than het’ro; rich in kitsch Euro-trash: an abundant source But sheesh, would you rather pastiche or Father Ted’s “Lovely Horse”? Chorus 4:
From the Hans Christian Anderson couplets that didn’t scan with rhymes that jar To the “A long time ago, was it?” Ulrika faux pas The standard of presenters is the start of a slippery slope Now Albania, Andorra, Belarus, have songs to send And there’s the full Serbian-Monty – where does it end? Well, I hear next year the Vatican is entering a rap by the Pope Coda:
English lyrics used to rhyme But that was once upon a blue-moon Now we’ll never hear an oboe live… Katie Boyle’ll never be revived…
And every has-been has already been A decent song will never win And with this manufactured boy-band thing We still have puppets on a string
With this bluff your way in English stuff Our grammar suffers rough and tough With syntax lax and off the cuff – (As if Maltish wasn’t bad enough!)
I say, those were the days my friend Before the sing-in-English trend We’ll never hear Norwegian sung So La Det Swing – it von’t be svung!
Knock, knock! – Who’s there? A treat in store… A star behind the myst’ry door Who could it be? Now, don’t confer… It’s Linda Mart