Switzerland have won Eurovision twice, in 1956 (the first ever competition!) and 1982 (with world famous Celine Dion).  Their luck of late hasn't been great when it comes to Eurovision, with a bunch of dismal results in the early 00's cumulating with a big fat zero (nul points) in the 2004 Semi-Final.  Fortunately (and deservedly) Switzerland did much better in 2005 with the imported estonian rock-chick group Vanilla Ninja, singing 'Cool Vibes'.  One of my personal favourites that year, Switzerland finished a comfortable 8th in both the Final and Semi-Final, and at one point in the voting looked as though they were going to win the whole thing.  So for a change, Switzerland were qualified to the 2006 Final, and went for broke with super group six4one singing some good old Eurovision smaltz 'If We All Give A Little'.  Unfortunately Eurovision didn't take to it and they had to satisfy themselves with 17th place.  2007 saw them enter the bookies favourite, but 20th place was a rather long shortfall and they failed to qualify.

 

 

Despite being drawn so early I always knew that this year’s Swiss entry was going to be one of my big favourites this year, and it still is.  It’s a great song, performed well that doesn’t pretend to be something it’s not.  It’s the perfect song for a song contest, and that’s what I love about it.  I do love Eurovision because of the outrageous and various performances, but I love this entry because it brings the whole thing back to its roots without looking or sounding dated.  It’s perfectly professional in every sense, and Paolo’s performance when the song was presented was *flawless*.  I would hate for Switzerland to miss out due to political voting like they have done so many times before, but hopefully, that will be the glory of this years new format.  They won’t pick up very many 8’s 10’s or 12’s, but should manage to make it into each countries top ten, and even if they only average on 5 points from each country, that’s 90 points and enough to qualify.  One other thing I should point out is that the song is sung in Italian, something of a theme this year, but I deifnately think it’s the best Italian song we’ve heard in a while, and don’t think that will scupper Switzerland’s chances.

 

 

An initial prediction will appear here soon.

 

 

A prediction will appear here when all 25 songs in the Grand Final are known.