Montenegro 2018 - Vasilije - Just Wanted To Be Free

(Click here for the wails…)

Another regular early adopter is young Vasilije here. It's frequently suggested around this time of year that he might be the automatic selection for his home nation of Montenegro - although those suggestions do actually come mainly from him, it must be said.

And while our pals in Podgorica are prone to making many of the more delightfully left field attempts at our fair contest over the last few year, we suspect that they're unlikely to be going to whole hog and anointing this laddy any time soon.

Why can we be so certain of that? Just have a listen for yourself and you'll see why. If this was three years ago it would have been the first on the Swiss list of application hopefuls.

Moldova 2018 - Sasha Bognibov - Love

(Click here for the traditional start to any great Eurovision year…)

It's been a slow old September in Eurovisionia this year. What with the Swiss keeping their songs secret for now, and hardly a sniff of news doing the rounds, we've all been chomping at the bit for some sounds.

Until now.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I officially open the 2018 Eurovision Apocalypse season with my good friend and musical hero, Sasha Bognibov!

We had the teaser clip, and now we've got the full malarky. And boy what treats does it deliver. The haunted, willowy vocals are the same, but they're layered on a fractious wall of sound that canters along unsettlingly like a distracted horse, before clattering to an intense and unexpected halt.

Yes, of course we like it – it's Sasha after all - but the everlasting boy is beginning to show some sings of musical maturity that bode incredibly well for the future. We've been doing this for long enough now to know that this year almost certainly won't be his year. But that day is surely coming ever closer!