Waters, Waters everywhere ...

robindch

It's a pity we missed out on the nul points, but all the same, five points from the Albanians is hard to beat.

Waters whinged for 800 words in monday's Time's here:

Who could want to stop the spring?

It wasn't that my belief in our song or in Dervish's performance of it suddenly imploded, but that I remembered, having watched the semi-finals, what we were involved in. Nothing had changed except to get slightly better in the way things had been getting incrementally better through the week.

We had, we remained certain, a good song. Rehearsals were going well. Cathy Jordan was singing beautifully. The response from the floor of the auditorium during rehearsals was warm and connected. The Finnish technicians were dealing with every issue we raised. The steady optimism that I'd felt was growing and deepening.

But now I felt myself contemplating not merely defeat but the possibility of being completely stuffed, of coming last, of not garnering a single vote. It wasn't a fear of voting pacts or of any identifiable trend in the songs which had emerged from the semi-finals. It was neither a premonition nor anything rational, simply an awareness that if this thing can make dreams come true it can also make nightmares real. Suddenly I felt cold.

Then the feeling went away, as the logic of the semi-final results appeared to take shape. I didn't, and don't, buy into the conspiracy theories, the talk of voting pacts or the belief that the contest has become, irreversibly, "The Eastern European Song Contest". I reiterate my belief that the emerging patterns of voting are much less about tribal affinity than cultural, as in musical, recognition.

I repeat: the issue is not tone-deaf neighbourly loyalty but the fact that, clearly, East European countries share a musical ear, whereas the popular culture of the West becomes increasingly fragmented and diversified. What I saw as having emerged from Thursday night was a collection of reasonably good songs, varied, a bit time-warped, but also interesting, absorbing and of a reasonable musical quality.

In the shadow of the question-mark left by Lordi's victory a year ago, this seemed like it might be good for Ireland. Just as I didn't accept the idea of crude voting loyalties, I didn't see Lordi as mere kings of spectacle. I still feel there was a coherent musical message behind last year's result (just as there is a coherent musical message behind this year's result, even if, for the moment, I freely admit that I have only the vaguest idea what this might be). In the warmish Helsinki light of Friday, I made a choice to take comfort from what I had half-digested of the previous evening.

Nothing of this prepared me for Saturday night. It was utterly, unspeakably, crushing. It may seem daft, but I have never in my life felt more disappointed, not just for myself, but for Dervish, for Cathy, for the wonderful team of people from RTÉ and for my co-songwriter, Tommy Moran. I console myself with the idea that it wouldn't be possible to enter this arena without risking this level of rejection. If we refuse to take risks, we shut ourselves off to reality's capacity to make dreams come true.

This is this. If we were to set out again, we might not start from where we did. I remain proud of our song and of Cathy and the band. The feeling we got from home during the week was tremendous.

This was a necessary toeing of the water. We went to Helsinki in a spirit of taking part and enjoyed ourselves tremendously up to the meltdown. To be part of this extraordinary event was a privilege and a pleasure. For as long as I live I'll not forget the hour I spent walking about between the dressing rooms just before Saturday night's show, encountering the artists from 23 other European countries going through their paces - warming up their vocal cords, doing their physical jerks and, despite intense rivalry, sharing their hopes and expectations.

It would be a pity to allow disappointment to turn any or all of us against entering Eurovision and trying to win. But we went to Helsinki with the intention of winning - and came last. I'm not interested in blame or excuses, but only in establishing not so much what we did wrong as what we failed to understand in order to get it right. Above all, we need to look at the victors and the near-victors and see how they did it. If Eurovision's centre of gravity has drifted east, we need to ask ourselves if we are prepared to do what is necessary to compete and occasionally have a chance of winning.

The central questions gravitate around the cultural implications of the still relatively recent collapse of the Berlin Wall. The taste gap between East and West can be addressed in one of only two ways: radical introversion or a more enthusiastic opening up to the new. I prefer the latter.

They can't stop the spring. We can't stop the spring. Who could possibly want to stop the spring?

Does he really get paid for writing this stuff? It's cringe-making.

monkeyfudge

They may take the honey but they'll never take the sting!

At least he isn't blaming block voting...

rockbeer

And this blabbermouth halfwit has the gall to criticize some of the other songs for being time-warped!

Leaving aside the inability of Cathy Jordan to sing in tune, it's a shame JW seems unable to draw the obvious conclusion from the EV result - that his writing is simply irrelevant in the modern world.

Asiaprod

bluewolf wrote:

So if I was a journalist who wrote a similar article in reverse, attacking the church, would I still have a job...?

Probably no.

Myksyk

I'm a bad person ... I relished our coming last and cursed Albania for those 5 points. If there was a hell, do you think I'd go there?

PDN

Myksyk wrote:

I'm a bad person ... I relished our coming last and cursed Albania for those 5 points. If there was a hell, do you think I'd go there?

If you watched the entire Eurovision show then I would say you have already been there.

Dades

PDN wrote:

If you watched the entire Eurovision show then I would say you have already been there.

coffee_cake

That dervish woman couldn't even sing. remotely. she was completely out of tune and that false vibrato drives me up the wall.
I still think UK were worse though with their aeroplane song

karen3212

I think the UK was taking the p*ss, deliberately doing it, when they've had a decent entry lately they didn't get a vote, so I'd say they might be protesting.

I can't believe anyone imagined we could win with that song. Did he write the music or the words or what? Anyway he seems desperate to defend religion. He must know it can be lost, if he was so sure of it and of people holding on to it then he wouldn't seem so desperate.

Schuhart

bluewolf wrote:

I still think UK were worse though with their aeroplane song

But they had the advantage of looking like they didn't want to win. How else do you explain the song asking the whole of Europe 'would you like something to suck on the way down?' Arf Arf.

karen3212 wrote:

Did he write the music or the words or what?

I think he co-wrote with someone else who did the music, but he's responsible for the lyrics.

He has some line about 'from Lissadell to Latvia', which encapsulates that wonderful vagueness of the parochial mindset equating a country with a place in Sligo.

His 'Jiving at the Crossroads' was actually, IMHO, a decent book that catchs the air of Ireland at that time. It even contains an amount of description of the kind of conflict in ideas, with his inherited baggage from growing up in a small town. But somewhere along the line he seemed to give up thinking.

aidan24326

He's on telly right now. RTE1.

EDIT: Don't know if anyone saw this it was a show called 'Faraway Up Close', a documentary type thing. Waters was in Zambia to see the state of affairs in that country and argue that western exploitation (and indirectly western aid) is responsible for the problems being experienced in that country.

It was ok, he came across alright even if it was nothing earth-shatteringly new. Strange that he can seem rational and reasonably well-informed on an issue like this and then go off on a tangent the minute his beloved religion is mentioned.