The Sunovision Song Contest

Does anyone actually care about Eurovision anymore, in any way that doesn't involve irony or drinking games? Turns out that none of the Amusemenents clan had even heard the UK's entry in the build-up to this year's competition, so some deliberate YouTubing took us to What The Hell Just Happened? by Remember Monday. For my money, it's pretty terrible, features one of the worst first lines in pop music history ("Someone lost a shoe"), and can't seem to decide which of three different types of song it wants to be. If it's in the top half of the table at the close of Eurovision proceedings... well, I don't wear a hat but if I did I'd be seasoning it and finding some cutlery.

But anyway, you've read the title of this post and are possibly wondering what the Sunovision Song Contest is? Let me explain.

Last Sunday night I sat alone, nursing a lovely pint, in an unfamiliar pub in an unfamiliar small market town. At the next table, a loud woman with a dog was pontificating about all manner of things, to the rapt attention of three very different men, all of whom seemed to be falling over themselves to pay atttention to her every word, apparently for the sole reason that she was borderline visually attractive. I may be oversimplifying but that's how it seemed to me, over the rim of my glasses. And trust me, I didn't want to listen in, but couldn't help it as she was quite loud in a otherwise quiet pub. After listening to how she would redesign one of the bloke's website for 50 grand, and how her dog was barking at another dog, she finally got onto Suno. "Have you heard of Suno?" she asked her three devotees, "It's incredible, look." And then she proceeded to demonstrate the Suno AI tool that enables users to provide a text prompt and have a song spat back at them. Yep. A fully fledged, multi-instrument, verse/chorus/middle eight/break/fade song with original lyrics, churned out by Suno's AI engine in a matter of seconds. Honestly, it took longer to type the prompt than it took Suno to generate the song... a song that borderline woman proceeded to play loudly from her phone, shattering the peace of the pub even more than her voice and barking dog already had.

God, I sound like a cantankerous old sod, don't I?

Of course, the acolytes all cooed, "That's amazing," or similar. And in a way, it is. Technically, as a programming and computing achievement, it is astonishing, even. But musically? Borderline woman's Suno-song was crap. Anodyne, generic, pointless, meaningless, forgettable... just awful.

And then it occurred to me, after listening to the UK's Eurovision entry yesterday and accidentally sitting through a few minutes of one of the Eurovision semi-finals, that all those words could probably be applied to a lot of the songs that will get churned out in Basel on Saturday night too. And an idea formed.

So here we have the inaugural Sunovision Song Contest. Yes, I used Suno to create the songs, and in keeping with that I used ChatGPT to create fictional countries and their representative artists. But listen up! You have to cast your vote at the end, so strap in and let's take this semi-seriously...

First up, representing Elystène, is L'Orée d'Or ("The Golden Edge") and their track Lonely Shadows. The island nation of Elystène is known for its high art, fashion, and diplomacy, apparently. L'Orée d'Or describe their style as dream power pop, and are known for their ethereal soundscapes, poetic lyrics, and avant-garde fashion.

L'Orée d'Or · Lonely Shadows

Next up is Symphony of Collapse by Elias Vergrave, representing Ormandia. Elias is classically trained, would you believe? Of course you would, he's from Ormandia after all, a central European duchy with misty hills, medieval castles, and a strong literary culture.

Elias Vergrave · Symphony of Collapse

Getting exciting now, isn't it? Silver Vatra describe themselves as politically charged dance punks mixing traditional sounds with modern beats. No surprise as they're representing Thesskora, a Balkan state with a turbulent history and rich musical tradition. But there's no rebellion in Dancing Kitty, an unabashed Europop anthem!

Silver Vatra · Dancing Kitty

The Verdant Sigil are from Virelia, and are known for blending traditional forest instruments with modern rock, evoking the mysticism of Virelia’s deep woods and mountain temples. Not that you'd know it from their entry, the cryptic power ballad Alone Together.

The Verdant Sigil · Alone Together

Next up, the beautiful Solène Morra, representing the warm, Mediterranean nation of Caldovaria, where Roman ruins and Moorish architecture mix. Solène is a sultry and dynamic solo artist who blends classic Mediterranean rhythms with contemporary pop and Latin guitar in her entry, In the Quiet of the Night.

Solène Morra · In the Quiet of the Night

And finally, the bookies' favourite, Frostwake, representing Drevona, a northern land of fjords and pine forests, with a strong seafaring and folklore heritage. Frostwake combine droning harmonies with ancient Drevonan runic chants and heavy instrumentation on their lively entry, Terminverzug.

Frostwake · Terminverzug

So bienvenue and wilkommen, members of the Blogosphere jury, now it's down to you. Who gets your douze points? And who gets the dreaded nul points? You must give every song a score, and you can only give each score value once. Vote now!

As ever, I'm playing with all the AI stuff so you don't have to. And let's be clear, the six tracks produced here are all pretty awful by any objective measure. Laughably so, in places. But really, are they that much worse than some of the pap that will get served up at Eurovision in Basel? Possibly not. And here's the other thing. All the AI work, the Suno track generation, the Chat GPT fictional countries, bands and bios, took less than ten minutes all told. Writing this post took me nearly an hour, what with uploading MP3s to Soundcloud, drafting my devastating prose, formatting it all and pressing "Publish". And therein lies the rub. If you want originality and quality, you might be prepared to wait (and pay for) carbon-based creatives. But increasingly customers are just going to want something cheap and quick. AI is coming for us.

Come back soon to see which track won Sunovision 2025, and what prompt I used to create it...

Before we're bones

Does this sound 45 years old? Probably, but I don't care. Black Sea is on the EHSHO masterlist for a reason.

There is no language in our lungs
To tell the world what's in our hearts
No, no, no, no, no, we're leaving nothing behind
Just chiselled stones
No chance to speak before we're bones

Sunday shorts: Lead Me Home

Another track that surfaced from introducing The Walking Dead to Amusements Minor (series 3, episode 12, fact fans).

I don't know much about Jamie N. Commons but I can tell you that, for all his bluesy Americana, he was born in Bristol, before moving across the pond whilst still in single digits. Oh, and I can tell you that I quite like this.

Blue Friday: 1984

Whenever I run out of things to blog about (which is often, after twenty years of this digital guff) I take a look at my YouTube Watch Later list and see what I've saved for future consideration. Which is how I come to be blogging today about 1984 by Anaïs Mitchell.

I'll be honest, I don't know anything about Anaïs that can't be gleaned from her Wikipedia page. I don't know any other songs by her either, except the one that Billy Bragg covered. Blimey, I can't even remember what led me to this song, much less why I saved it in my Watch Later list. I wondered at first if I had heard it as background music in some television show or other but the always-excellent Tunefind tells me it hasn't been used anywhere I'd have heard it, so who knows? What I do know, though, is that (a) I rather like this, and (b) it has some well-crafted dystopian lyrics that seem very "now". There's a real kicker in the last verse too.

Anyway, however it found its way to my ears, here is 1984, from the 2017 album Hymns for the Exiled (the mere title of which is enough to pique my interest). And if all this floats your boat, you can find out more at anaismitchell.com.

Down at headquarters there's a big database
With black and white photos of the side of your beautiful face
And your library records and all your test scores
And an invitation to party like it's 1984

Baby don't look so nervous, they just want the facts
And it's all written out in the USA Patriot Act
'Cause we don't take no chances in a nation at war
So tonight we're gonna party like it's 1984

Oh baby what did I tell you about the house being bugged
They can hear us making breakfast, they can hear us making love
Excuse me a minute, Big Brother's at the door
And he's ready to party like it's 1984

You know you're my one and only, you always have been
Sure is gonna be lonely after I turn you in
So I'll wait 'til tomorrow to file my report
And tonight we can party, oh, tonight we're gonna party
Yeah, tonight we can party like it's 1984

The truth is in what you see...

If you read last Friday's post you'll know that The Man Of Cheese and I went to see From The Jam, down in The Smoke. And that, more specifically, we had wrangled our calendars to fit this in, so we could see Bruce Foxton live one last time, before he retired at the end of May.

When the band announced that the current run of dates would be Foxton's last, the official line was that he was retiring to focus on his health. This comes after Bruce was admitted to hospital for an "immediate procedure" last August. He's had other health issues too, not least knee problems, tinnitus and cataracts. Nothing that unusual there though, not for someone who turns 70 in September.

But on Friday night... well, it's the right time for him to retire, let's put it that way. When the band came on at the O2 Indigo, Russell Hastings announced that "Mr Foxton is in the building" ... but he wasn't on stage. Some bloke from the backing band was stage-right, playing Bruce's basslines and singing his vocal parts. Hastings kept intimating that Bruce would join us soon ... but when FTJ played Smithers-Jones and Foxton was still nowhere to be seen, I was starting to wonder.

Bruce finally came on-stage half-way through the set. He played his bass perfectly, of course, and his backing vocals sounded okay too ... but the energy of yesteryear was gone. I wasn't expecting the leaps of old (knee issues, remember?) but honestly, he barely moved on stage. And when he introduced Hastings to the audience, his voice and words were croaky and weak.

The net effect of all this was to leave me feeling sad. Yes, of course everyone gets old and yes, of course, eventually all those wonderful skills and abilities erode away with age. It happens to everyone, even the best of us, even to our heroes. But I still felt sad. I wrote last Friday that FTJ are "as close as you are going to get to seeing The Jam live" because of Foxton ... but that didn't feel true last week. Admittedly not helped by what both TMOC and I felt was poor sound, Friday's performance could really just have been any half-decent Jam tribute band. And that made me sad too.

As he heads towards retirement it is undoubtedly better to remember Bruce like this, with his other songwriting highpoint. Yeah, Mock The Week may have made us blasé about News of the World, but it remains an absolute cracker. With bonus 70s Battersea Power Station content too. How did this only reach #27?

So cheers Bruce - before last week's gig I was sad you were retiring but now I'm sort of glad, going on your own terms whilst you can still raise a bassist's thumb to the crowd at the end of the set. Happy retirement!

A-G...A-I-N

I've somehow avoided featuring this for six years, but it's time... A-G...A-I-N. Somehow even faster than the already-frantic album version.

Sounds great, but I'm not sure I approve of the over-processed video in this clip...

May the fourth be with you ... always

I'm very aware of my somewhat sombre tone of late (what do you mean, "of late"?), so maybe some levity is in order. We're not going to push any musical boundaries with this, or change any lives, but genuinely here is a song that, once heard, is never forgotten. And never not funny ("That log had a child!"), as long as you have at least a basic knowledge of Star Wars... which everyone does, right?

Altogether now, "Hmm-ha, hmm hmm-hmm ha ..."

All of which, of course, explains this:

And if you, ahem, "enjoyed" this bad lip reading, you might also like this, from The Last Jedi. With added bacon references.

A new meaning to life

All things being equal, The Man Of Cheese and I will be off to see From The Jam this evening, in that there London. Songkick tells me it will be the tenth time I've seen them. Now critics will say they are nothing but a glorified covers band which, despite some new material, is hard to argue with, especially since the late Rick Buckler quit the band in 2009. On the other hand, proponents will say this is as close as you are going to get to seeing The Jam live. And that's not because of Russell Hastings' attention to detail as a surrogate Weller, however good or otherwise he may be. No, it's because Bruce Foxton is there; he might not spring up into the air quite so much any more, knees not being what they once were, but his unmistakable basslines are all present and correct.

Not for much longer though. As I mentioned when Rick died, Bruce is retiring after the current run of FTJ dates, so you've only got until the end of May to see him. TMOC and I have wrangled our schedules to fit this in, one final Foxton pilgrimage. We'll see FTJ again in the future, no doubt, but it won't be the same without Bruce.

To celebrate then, here are four versions of what was, arguably¹, Foxton's finest songwriting contribution to The Jam, Smithers-Jones, the lyrics to which were inspired by Bruce's dad being made redundant. We'll start with the regular band version, from the B-side of When You're Young, then have the orchestral reworking from Settings Sons, then a delicate live TV performance by Foxton & Hastings, and finally the full-on FTJ live performance that I expect to see tonight. Which is your favourite?

Thanks for everything, Bruce - enjoy a long, happy and healthy retirement.

1. It's either this or News of the World, surely?

You must've thought I didn't exist

The National frontman Matt Berninger is soon to release a solo album, Get Sunk. Now I have nothing against The National (who are still going, by the way, it's not like Matt's solo album is post-breakup), but nor am I a fan particularly. I certainly don't own any records by them and, truth be told, I am unlikely to race out and buy Berninger's new effort. Having said all that, I did hear lead-out single Bonnet of Pins on the radio at the weekend, and rather liked it. And now, having sought out the video, find that it has some interesting lyrics.

All in all, it might be a grower or it might be one of those songs that sneakily grabs your attention with a turn of phrase before it gradually becomes apparent that it's actually a bit ordinary musically and the attraction wears off. We shall see.

What do you think?

Sunday shorts: The Thing

Pixies first thing on a Sunday, you say? No problem. Here's The Thing, originally a B-side to Velouria.