Over the course of the Summer I hope to review as many Eurovision artists’ album releases of present and past.  Please remember these are my personal opinions and don’t reflect a majority.

First on the chopping block is Nadine Beiler ‘I’ve got a voice’.

Nadine represented Austria this year with the syrupy sweet ‘The Secret is love’ and while I was not the songs biggest fan I thought Nadine’s vocal was amazing.  My expectations of the album were that it would be a feast of over the top diva style love songs but aside from ‘The secret is love’ there isn’t a single one.

Mr Right Now by Nadine Beiler

The album has fifteen songs and I managed to find six songs that appealed.  ‘Mr right now’ one of the better songs on the album suffers from not having a strong enough dance beat and is desperately crying out for a remix.  ‘Girl or boy’ and ‘Turn Around’ are near perfect dance fillers, while ‘I’ve got a voice’, ‘Against all rules’ and ‘Keep up with me’ manage to weed themselves out from a bed of average songs.

Girl or Boy by Nadine Beiler

‘You are the sun’ could have been a great love song or jazz hit but struggles to find a niche between the two with an added pointless beat that leaves it a confused mess.

The main problem with the album is that the beat in a lot of the songs is so similar it’s hard to find a chorus that sticks in the mind, which ultimately makes many of the songs forgettable.

Nadine’s vocal is faultless which makes this average album more frustrating, understandably she may not gravitate towards diva-esque style music but after ‘The secret is love’ it was what I was expecting and hip hop/rnb is not really my cup of tea.  Fans of Brandy, Deborah Cox and Mariah Carey’s latest styles would appreciate this album but those of early Whitney, Barbara, Celine and Lara stay clear, shame.

secret is love

Verdict: 5/10

After a fantastic result for Ireland at this year’s Eurovision, the brothers Grimes continue on their path toward world domination with an appearance in Celebrity Big Brother on the cards.

According to latest reports, the boys have been offered a cool £1million to take part in the show due to air on Channel 5 this August. Channel 5 bosses are keen to ensure the show is relaunched with a bang and feel Jedward are just the boys to make it happen. Should the lads accept the deal then they may find themselves sharing with former pop starlet Rachel Stevens, Mohammed Fayed, Imogen Thomas and troubled Hollywood actor Charlie Sheen, all of whom are also on the producers wish-list.

Just the thought of a sober Sheen having to cope with the lads antics or the potential red face of Thomas at the mention of Ryan Giggs by the boys is enough to have me hooked! What do you think? Could Jedward out-do Brian Dowling and become Big Brother’s all time favourite housemates?

The wait is over and with more than 2,000 votes cast we have a winner for the 2011 Kate Ryan award, the song that you wanted to see in the Eurovision final 2011.

I want to personally thank you one and all who voted, but can we have a second of silence for poor FYR Macedonia who received no votes at all, not one, not a single sausage

And the 2011 winner is:

Magdalena Tul – Jestem – Poland

Gratulacje Polska, bardzo dobry mecz ! A well deserved win!

Runner up

Stella Mwangi – Habba Habba – Norway

Poor Stella, always seems destined to be a runner up. But we love her anyway

Kate Ryan is a firm favourite amongst Eurovision fans and we here at ESC Ireland love, love, love her, and speaking of love she has released a new single called ‘Lovelife’, an infectious song that will have you shaking those hips.  The single is the first from her forthcoming fifth studio album ‘Electroshock’.  Europop has never sounded so good.

Kate Ryan Lovelife

Specifically number 5, our very own set of Limerick Drag Queens Heidi Hotlips and Sheila Fits Patrick, you can see some other Irish fans in there as well

You can vote on Wiwi Bloggs

There are calls in Irish papers today for RTE to justify spending €226K on sending Jedward to the Eurovision this year.

The bill to send the in the Grimesome Twosome ( ) to Dusseldorf for the song contest they eventually finished eighth in included €49,000 for a hotel, €12,000 for Aer Lingus flights and €70,000 to the European Broadcasting Union for taking part according to figures released to the Irish Daily Mirror.

The total bill was just over €46,000 more than was paid out last year.

The thing is though that RTE always pulls in the advertising and make a profit on showing it. I for one, and I know a lot of ye out there agree with me when I say that it was money well spent, the boys did us proud in Germany and showed a great face for Ireland

In a  statement RTE have said:

The payout was justified given the huge audience figures the show attracted with an average of 1.17 million viewers and 64 per cent of the audience share.

According to Entertainment.ie the Irish family trio from Cork that became an ?internet sensation? last year (although we do prefer the ?Pantibar? version), have entered talks to represent Ireland in Azerbaijan next year.

19-year-old Dervla (the daughter) is sitting her Leaving Cert at this very moment, but she recently took a break from her revision to babble at The Independent about the year gone by: “I’ve worked hard but there’s been so much going on over the past year… Music is what I want to do – and the past year has just been incredible.”

Super, that’s all very nice, but what of this Eurovision claim *in bustles Mammy Mary* “We are having a meeting in a few weeks’ time with some people about the whole idea”… of your son hucklebucking his way around Azerbaijan.

While we love the cheesiness of Crystal Swing I really hope that they do not represent Ireland, I don’t think I can take that.

Jenny Pettersson from Sweden, professionally known as “Velvet” is back with a new song “Lovestrukk”.

The single is not due to be released until sometime in the summer with the Extensive Music label so this is a remix of the song from the wonderful “7thHeaven Productions”.

I think the song is bang on target for Velvet’s faithful fan-base, however this is a remix so we will have to wait for the release of the actual song to get the full overview . I still think this will be a successful song for Velvet though!

You can listen to the clip here (Song number 4): http://www.7hproductions.com/#/4

Velvet competed in the Swedish National Final “Melodifestivalen” as a solo artist three times:

Song 1 (2006) Mi Amore:

http://youtu.be/ZckANwQnI4k

Song 2 (2008) Deja Vu:

Song 3 (2009) The Queen:

She did enter the following song (With Linda Bengtzing) into Melodifestivalen in 2010 but it sadly did not make it through to the televised shows. A real tragedy in my opinion! This would have been great in Melodifestivalen!

Song 4 (2010) “Victorious”:

Thank God she is back, I think I am slighty in love with her and of course her music!!