Soluna Samay - Subterranean Homesick Blues

Bob Dylan at Eurocovers, whatevers next? This is Soluna Samay, who just won a ticket to Baku to represent Denmark at the Eurovision Song Contest with the song Should've Known Better.
Read all about the Danish entry and Soluna's amazing history at The Baku Collection.

Sébastien Tellier - Pépito Bleu (Official Music Video)

Now that's an album I'm looking forward to. Bring on 2012!

CD news: Safura's Drip Drop gets a Lena Valaitis makeover

1981 Eurovision singer Lena Valaitis has recorded a coverversion of Drip Drop, the Azerbaijan Eurovision entry from 2010. Original singer Safura took the song to fifth place at the Oslo contest.

The German version of Drip Drop is Ich Will Alles (I want everything). It's the title track of Valaitis' new CD which will be out on Januari 27.
The album also includes Lena Valaitis' new single Ein Schöner Frühlingstag (A beautiful spring day) which is a coverversion of the song best known as Mary Hopkins Those Were The Days (1968).
It is actually originally a Russian folk song from the 1920's (Дорогой длинною, Endless Road)

Lena Valaitis entered the 1981 contest with Johnny Blue, written by Ralph Siegel and Bernd Meinunger. She ended 2nd, only 4 points behind the mighty Bucks Fizzez (?) Making Your Mind Up.


thanks, links and sources:

Special thanks to Marion at Muziek en Media
Lena Valaitis homepage
In 2012 the contest will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan, You can read all about the 2012 contest releases at the Baku Collection.
Here you can read extended release / versions info on all Azerbaijani entries so far.
Johnny Blues
Here you can find a lovely Chinese version of Johnny Blue by Annabelle Lui. A version by Swedish Thorleifs is here.

Happy New Year Cupcakes

Eurocovers wishes all readers

a very Happy New Year.

And may your country win something this year......

and Godspeed to the people of Baku

Smurfular Eurocovers 2011

Here's a shopping tip for the kids, just in time for the Christmasjul:
Having barely recovered from their multi million grossing movie theatre success the little blue guys (+1 girl) in the white pointy hats are at it again.
The Smurfs (or Smurfarna in Swedish) have recorded a Swedish version of Popular for their new album Smurfparty 3.
They call the song Populär. Also on the same album is a version of the Norwegian entry Haba Haba, now titled Bada Bada.
The album is out on Warner / Metronome on december 7. (WMS-5052498-980826)

The same two tracks can be found on their new Norwegian album Smurfeparty 3 (as Smurfene). Popular becomes Populær and Haba Haba is now Dans Meg Til Smurfeland. (Warner 5052498981021)

Since the little critters are cunning multilinguists they also recorded a Danish version Populær for their new Danish album Smølfeparty 3 (as the Smølferne) but that one doesn't have Haba Haba. (Warner Music Nordic)

Eric Saade's Popular and Stella Mwangi's Haba Haba were the 2011 Eurovision entries for Sweden and Norway respectively.
(links will take you to the Düsseldorf Collection pages)
Some Smurftastic Eurocovers of the 2009 and 2010 contest are documented here also featuring some smurfing oldies.

CD news: Young for 50 years: Dúo Dinámico

Here’s some info on a new CD album by Dúo Dinámico, just released last week.
The duo are Manuel De La Calva and Rámon Arcusa from Spain and they have been at it for 50 years now, hence the albums title: Young for 50 years.
Somos Jovenes 50 Años is a collection of newly recorded duet versions of songs from the rich Arcusa / De La Calva vaults. Of course it includes their much debated 1968 Eurovision winner La La La in an interesting new version.

At Eurovision the song was performed by Massiel after the original choice singer Joan Manuel Serrat was axed for wanting to sing in Catalan. (more about that here).
Dúo Dinámico have now recorded La La La with Serrat. The first part of the song is Serrat singing in Catalan, the second part is the duo singing in Spanish.
Perhaps not the best version of the song, but an interesting version for the die hard fans and collectors.

The CD is out in Spain now and also available digitally at Los Tunos. The CD version comes with a DVD with a 'making of' the Somos Jovenes documentary and rare archive material in which they undoubtedly sport many of their attractive trademark sweater vests.

The full tracklist of the album:
01 Quisiera Ser - with Miguel Rios
02 Como Ayer - with Soledad Gimenez
03 Resistire - with Alaska
04 Perdoname - with Lolita
05 Eres Tu - with Andy y Lucas (not the Mocedades song)
06 Amor De Verano - with Carlos Baute
07 Quince Años Tiene Mi Amor - with Ana Torroja
08 Esos Ojitos Negros - with Diana Navarro
09 Somos Jovenes - with Los Pecos
10 Lolita Twist - with Leslie of Los Sirex and Santi of Los Mustang
11 Soy Un Truhan Soy Un Señor - with Julio Iglesias
12 La La La - with Joan Manuel Serrat

Title track Somos Jóvenes is a 1962 hit for the duo. Quisiera Ser is also the title of a 2007 musical built with 24 songs of the dynamic boys in Mamma Mia style.
Como Ayer from 1966 is one of their many contest winning hits, in this case the Mediterranean Song Festival.
In the early seventies they more or less stopped recording and focussed on writing and producing for other artists.
In 1968 the duo recorded and released La La La themselves (as Manolo y Ramon) ♫

Special thanks to José Antonio

Some older La La La posts at Eurocovers:
Norwegian with Kirsti, Oddvar and Arne.
Icelandic with the modern kids of Nútímabörn.
La La La and I'll Cry If I Want To with Lesley Gore.
Estonian with Leelo Karp.

It's blue and it's a single!

German noisy jumpers Scooter recorded C'est Bleu for their new album The Big Mash Up. They got a little help of Eurovision Royal Vicky Leandros, the original singer of L'Amour Est Blue.

The 1967 song, a.k.a. Love Is Blue only ended 4th in the contest, but it became an evergreen. Although several other versions stole Vicky's thunder.
But she's making up for that with a vengeance:  the Scooter/Vicky track is released as a cdsingle (and download of course) and ít will be a smash hit. It's out on the Sheffield/Edel label in Germany.
And above is the official video which is from the Scooter Youtube channel.

BeaRecords sells the 2-track cdsingle which also features the Dubstyle remix of the song.

Update: O.K. it's not # 1 yet, but C'est Bleu enters the German charts at a modest #77 (week 50)

Love Love Love
Eurocovers loves L'Amour Est Bleu a lot (and so do many of you) so there have been several posts since the very first Eurocovers piece on Paul Mauriat and his re-invented 2nd version of the same song.
Check out these:
10.000 coverversions: #2 most covered Eurovision song with The Dells, Liberace and the Amazing Dorothy Ashby.
Little Tempo ft Yoko Futita.
Love Is Blue special with The Pees, Moony and of course Barbara Y Dick.
Thank you India, versions in Hindi and Telugu
Ann Margret or not?
Funky bagpipes: Rufus Harley (if you only check out one....)
Rouge Hot from China
Yvetta Simonova
Åse Kleveland
Disco Colors (tubeclip only)

Poupée de cire, Poupée de son x 2

Viva Niñas

Here's a lovely coverversion of Poupée De Cire, Poupée De Son, the Luxembourg Eurovision winner originally by France Gall. Viva Niñas are Véronica Codesal, Soetkin Collier and Sophie Cavez, all members of Urban Trad of Sanomi fame (Eurovision 2003).

The girls love Eurovision and have performed many Eurovision hits in their live shows From Waterloo To Sanomi.
Poupée De Cire, Poupée De Son was released as a digital single last year and is still available at your digital outlets.

Above audio is from the Viva Niñas Youtube channel.
Also check out.Vina Niñas Myspace.

Jean Cristophe

And here's another cover of the Serge Gainsbourg / France Gall classic. Less cheery-uppety than the Niñas, but equally lovely.

This track is from an album that is scheduled for release on Valentines day 2012: Ma Vie En Rose by Jean Cristophe.

Jean Christophe Ma Vie En Rose website.

Anggun - Puppet on A String - En Route Pour L'Eurovision

Here's Anggun performing Puppet On A String in the 2011 Eurovision presentation show where the 2011 French entry Sognu by Amaury Vassili was introduced.
It was just announced that the same Anggun will represent France in the 2012 contest in Baku. Find out more about next years French bid here at the Baku Collection.

Some Indonesian Eurocovers at the following pages: Lilis Suryani, Hamidah Ahmad, Sandra Reemer

The Kids Are Alright 2011

Avid contest fanatics know that next to the Eurovision Song Contest for the grups there's a version for the kids. The Junior Eurovision Song Contest is going into its 9th edition this year in Yerevan, Armenia.

Loads of fun to be had for the kids.
The kids of 13 countries will sing their pretty little hearts out for their homeland on the 3rd of December.

To celebrate, here's some kids covering some of your favorite Israeli Eurocovers.
The kids on the right are Ensemble Theila, a group of kids doing song and dance through their school (St. Petersburg School № 274 Yerushalayim, Russia).
The happy bunch made an album My Little Land (private issue) covering the classics from Israel, including some Eurovision songs. Some surprising choices and some obvious ones.

The Eurovision songs are:
A Ba Ni Bi, Israels first winner from 1978 (Izhar Cohen and the Alpha Beta).
Hallelujah, the follow up and a home win for Milk and Honey in 1979.
Kan, Duo Datzes #3 from the 1991 contest and still the best example of a classic Israel entry, choreography and all. Love.

Ze Rak Sport (The Theila's call it Rak Sport). This is a bit of a surprise, as I have never before come accross a coverversion of this 1992 entry. Ze Rak Sport was a sunny and poppy ode to the Olympics to be held in Barcelona, Spain that year. Dafna Dekel and her handsome conga boys reached 6th place at the Stockholm contest. The English version of the song was titled Viva Sport.
Amen, Liora's 1995 effort to make a new Hallelujah didn't quite achieve that, but still ended 8th.

Israel has never participated in the Junior, but they sent a 12 y.o. to the grown up contest back in 1989.
Russia has been doing Junior since 2005. They won in 2006 and ended 2nd in 2009 and 2010.


Special thanks to StPeters78

A few years back Eurocovers featured some more kids stuff to celebrate the JESC: The Kids Are Alright 2007.
Part 1: The Girls - Marisol, Tatiana, Teresa Strobl
Part 2: The Boys - Robertino, Demis, Hákon Guðni Hjartarson
Part 3: The Angels - Little Angels of Korea, Les Petits Chanteurs A La Croix Du Boix, Les Petits Chanteurs D'Aix En Provence 
Another wonderful kid is Jacques Aylestock in this Eurocovers post.

The 2011 Junior Eurovision CD (2CD with original an karaoke versions) will be available through BeaRecords. They also stock a host of other Junior ESC CDs and cdsingles of past contests.