Estonia 2017 - Kerli - Spirit Animal

(Click here to see the obligatory awkward breakfast TV appearance...)

OK, so I think we can effectively cancel Eesti Laul, because Kerli's back. A lot of water has flowed under the crystal-crusted bridge since her last assault on Eurovision back in 2004, and now we see a singer at the height of her powers, the complete and finished article who's had hits across the globe, coming back to wave her glittery hand at the screen and hoover up the votes. But will her name alone be enough to carry her to Kiev?

Well the song itself is no world-beater. It's packed with fantastically parpy electronic noises and a terrifically bouncy chorus, but still plods along in a somewhat disappointingly pedestrian fashion. That's not to say that it's a bad song, however - and you just wait until you see the live show...

Because if you've not had the pleasure before, Kerli is a proper visual treat. Imagine something somewhere between America's Lady Gaga, Japan's Kyary Pamyu Pamyu and some astral pop fairy floating about between the stars. And if enough of her rabidly fervent Moon Children are packed into the hall Laul night will become something of a three minute Kerli show. I for one can't wait. The only way that she's not going to Ukraine is either if her home nation has finally tired of her, or the Kerli haters gang up against her in the superfinal. Both of which would be an incredible shame, because the girl is offering us the first proper bit of star power of the season.

Georgia 2017 - Tornike Kipiani & Giorgi Bolotashvili - You Are My Sunshine

So I went to bed after eating a little too much cheese last night, and I woke up in a basement squat  in Camden in 1991with this little beaut playing. I'm channelling Nitzer Ebb, I'm channelling Renegade Soundwave, I'm channelling Front 242 and a little bit of Senser, but I can't quite see who the act is.

Then suddenly I'm transported to a Spiral Tribe rave somewhere like Castlemorton, and I'm propped in a haze front of a speaker stack on the fourth stage and this flipping song is playing again. Then I wake up and realise that I've been enjoying a bit too much stilton, and I'd left the Soundcloud account with the Georgian songs on repeat play.

Yes, it might be a throwback to a far distant day when the punks finally worked out how keyboards worked and got into skunk, but I think I love it all the more for that. And yes, it's only got the same four words repeated over and over again, but that's surely the whole point! I suspect that it'll be just me an my ravey Valencian mate who will dig this one, but do let us have our fun. I know it's going absolutely nowhere in the contest, but I'll be having it on repeat for at least a week - and I'll be keeping off the cheese this time. Honest I will... Now where's my tie dye trousers...?

Georgia 2017 - Trio Mandili - Me Da Shen

(Click here for three minutes of utter funtimes...)

So, the other night I got wind that the fabulously folksy Georgian girl group Trio Mandili had thrown their hat into their national final ring. I was expecting more of the same of the minimal stripped back walky-singy schtick that has made their down home videos such a regular YouTube treat. So I was thoroughly disappointed when I discovered that they were doing a proper song, with instruments and everything.

For about twenty seconds.

Because this enthusiastically bouncy little gem is an absolute delight! Imagine the kind of songs that you hear coming out of the open window of every cab and local snackfood outlet everywhere east of Athens - only with more joie de vivre and pure unabashed fun than any ten of them put together. And then some.

I fear that this is perhaps a tad too niche to make a massive impact in their national final - especially as there's some decent sized pop rock acts and some massive frocky ballads up against them on the song slate - but I'd sooooo love this to get to Kiev. Imagine the larks we'd have!

Ukraine 2017 - Alex Angel & Natasha Olejnik - Running For Love

(Click here for live action show. Good girls…)

Our boy Alex Angel had his live audition in Ukraine yesterday, and he bought a friend along to help him. And boy did she help. The faces of the judging panel as they watched this incredible three minutes are an absolute picture, I tell you!

As far as I am aware, this is the only video available from the auditions, so I'll just this curious slice of Ukrainian TV life here for you to, erm, enjoy.

You might not want to be watching it at work, mind. That's all I'm saying…

Armenia 2017 - Alexander Plato - Faust Cantata

(Click here for a trip to the dark side...)

Our new Armenian best mate, Alexander Plato, took his final bow at the constantly excellent Depi Evratesil the other day - and oh boy what a bow it was! He strode upon the stage to a wash of fiery red light and curious camera angles, while the pianist whacked at the keyboard like he was teetering on the brink of a massive staircase. Then when our lad finally began to sing, his throaty tenor and intense stare left the judges, and indeed the audience, shuffling uncomfortably in their seats.

It was as though Lucifer himself had popped up from the depths for a bit of a singsong. It was quite simply one of the most gloriously confounding things yet seen in the battle to tread the Eurovision boards anywhere on this globe. Splendid work old boy - I hope this isn't the last we've seen of you, because I for one would love to see this beautiful, confusing racket squeezed into a big three minute chunk to confuse the heck out of the viewing population of Europe on Saturday night in May some time soon.

Who cares about results, this is art, love!

Georgia 2017 - Trio Mandili - Chryzantemebi

(Click here for a delightful breath of fresh air...)

There's a list of Georgian acts doing the rounds. Twenty seven artists of varied repute, and not a single Sopho among them. At this point it is unclear whether it's a shortlist or just the list of people who applied, but there's a couple of pretty interesting names among them - and few more interesting than Trio Mandili here.

About as DIY as an act can get, TM are simply three teenaged girls, a rattly mandolele (I think) and a selfie-stick. Their videos are all of the girls just walking around their neighbourhood, singing folk-tinged tunes and mugging to the camera, and somehow they're absolutely teriffic.

Just imagine this on the big stage in Kiev. They'd start off on stage, then wend their way about the hall entirely filmed through their stick as the crowd go bonkers behind them. It would sweet, simple and absolutely engaging, and could cause quite a stir in the middle of all the usual flash bang business.

Come on Georgia, you've got be bold, and take a risk with this lot. It would be utterly fabulous!

Hungary 2017 - Peter Kovary & The Royal Rebels - It's A Riot

(Click here for a bit of a bar room boogie...)

Them Hungarians like to mix it up a bit. Every year they deal us the usual fine and frothy pop confections, and a fistful of decent balladeers, but they also manage to squeeze in a small sprinkling of other stuff for the grown ups. We all know that they'll never make the further stages, but we're so glad that they're there to mix it all up a bit.

This year is no exception. So far we've uncovered the Satanic doom crust of Leander Kills, the worldsy beats of the tough lad gypsy man band Roma Soul, and this little bar room belter from Peter Kovary (and what looks like a band made up of his considerably younger relations).

OK, so it's some cheesy-assed pub rock shizz from a bloke who's clearly got a few too many Rival Sons, Black Spiders and Georgia Satellites records in his man bag, but heck, in this context it's like a new dawn of riff-heavy singalong nonsense. It's not great, but it's great fun, and it'll do us just fine until Leander Kills release their video!

Switzerland 2017 - Ginta Biku - Cet Air La

(Click here to see all Eurovision distilled into a three minute concentrate...)

You mention Eurovision to your average man or lady in the street and a very specific image springs instantly to their mind. Generally it's of a lusty lady in a swirly frock and touselled hair stamping about in front of a couple of lithe male dancers wearing almost no clothes to the sound of an insistant Europop beat. A little like THIS, in fact.

Fair play to the Swiss for trying something outside of their regulation mid tempo plod, but really, this is silliness by numbers. From the big build to the face reveal right through to the showbiz end, it's got the lot. I can almost see its trajectory now...

Instantly becomes a fan favourite, storms to a hometown victory early in the season and nudges the top of the betting from the early adopter money. Gets drawn in a relatively easy semi and everyone puts it in their top ten. Then come the big night, everyone at home totally ignores it in favour of something a bit better or a bit funnier and it comes an accidental last but one in its semi, with everyone wailing "How could this happen?!!" in complete and utter surprise.

It's written in the stars, so enjoy it now before it all gets too depressing. Unless one of the balladeers in black beats her in the local final, that is. Then it starts to get properly funny.

Belarus 2017 - Pavel Pashko - Be Better

(Click here, but blink and you'll miss it…)

Never before has there been a more self-fulfilling prophecy of a song (unless you rather unkindly suggest Don't Play That Song Again, you wrong 'un!). It all looked promising to begin with. A decent-looking spooky lad with a massive quiff, beflanked by a pair of eyeballs-on-legs, looking every bit like a car boot Residents (look them up, pop fans), with a witchy lady looking menacing in the background… what could possibly go wrong?

Oh, the singing bit.

The man in charge of the microphones didn't give them so much as a minute-and-a-half. Boy they're getting stern - they allowed any old kak the full three minutes last year! I'll bet that it meant we missed a massive bit of showbiz in the middle eight too, curse them! Bah!

Still, all this underlines the fact that I really must be visiting Belarus one of these days. They look like my kind of people…


•••Stop Press•••

Young Pavel and his pals must have been reading my mind, because they've done a video to fill in the end of the performance!

See it by clicking here!

Spain 2017 - German - Fiesta

(Click here for an ear disease of the highest order…)

Spain are treating us top some rare delights this year, and every one of them is doubtlessly more fun that the shortlist they'll inevitably foist upon us.

Take the big gurning grin of German here. OK, so he may sing like a bricky after a long pub lunch, and the song itself does drift off into nowhereland from about the halfway mark before it just kind of fizzles out with a showbiz whimper at three minutes, but it's absolutely packed with charm and singalongability, and dare I say it, fun! What a terribly old fashioned concept.

Belarus 2017 - Vitaly Voronko - What's Your Name?

(Click here for some unnecessary strangeness...)

***STOP PRESS***
The vids are back!

Forget all that Swedish business. The real Eurovision action was going down in Minsk today with the now unmissable live auditions. The last couple of years have thrown up all kinds of joy, so you'll be delighted this this year's bunch are every bit as unhinged, and that our unseen cameraman still prefers to zoom in on an attractive lady when there's all kinds of other action going on.

Case in point here. Vitaly's song man have covered all four major Eurovision food groups - bearded man in a superhero outfit playing the accordian; nice lady in a flowery frock strumming coyly on a dulcimer thingy; annoying mime artist in a kilt dancing like a berk; and, a ten foot polar bear playing a massive balalaika. You know, the usual stuff.

But while our gruesome foursome were stamping about wackily for all they were worth, letcherous cameraman got whiff of the nice lady and started to slowly zoom in, totally ignoring the other three as they gave their all elsewhere.

Although to be honest, in this instance I think he had a point...

Spain 2017 - Joan De Son Rapinya - Ole Ole

(Click here for some fun you won't want to admit to having...)

This is what they want! The Spanish, gawd bless 'em and love 'em, are having another one of those open access qualifying berths that they're so excellent at, and it's brought out all the crazies and bedroom droners that this blog lives and breaths for. So far I've seen several pairs of beautiful bears walking hand in hand on the beach, a fair bit of flamenco bellowing, and some of the most ill-advised lyric videos you'll ever come across.

But this fella in particular has stuck in my memory - partially because he looks a bit like my mate Nik, but more because he's utterly batshit bonkers. Actually, I suspect that this fella is more of a character comedian than someone with genuine mental health issues, but like a car crash or a bad wig, you just can't stop staring.

The sad thing is, as naff as this is, it'll be a darned sight more entertaining than a good 60% of what they pick for the final 30, I'll bet you - and you'll certainly be singing it in your head for longer!

Finland 2017 - Zühlke - Perfect Villain

(Click here for a sub-editor's living nightmare...)

Last entry from Finland for now - but which do I choose? Should I go with the slightly sex pesty My First Band, who appear to be proud in their claim that they can kiss a lady's paradise so hard that they'd actually be paralysed afterwards. I'm not sure that you'd get too many positive swipes if you used THAT line on Tindr, lads.

Or maybe I should go with little Lauri Yrjölä, if for no other reason than that he's used the rather snappy epithet 'vastuuntunnottomuuden' in his song (it means 'irresponsibility', language fans). Would this make it the longest ever word in Eurovision history?

But no, in this instance we're going to pick the somewhat terrifying eyebrows of Zühlke. To be fair she makes a decent bat of a pretty dreadful lyric - all staccato delivery and powerful beltings in the chorus. But oh that chorus - it's a shocker!

"What would the X Men do?" she shouts, which is fair enough, I suppose, if not a little cheesy and awkward in a strong woman love song like this. But hold hard, it gets worse. "Would they lose their powers too, if their kryptonite was you?" Well, no would be the obvious answer, because they're a Marvel property, and from a completely different and unrelated universe to DC, which spawned the concept of Kryptonite. So unless the X Men are all quite unexpected relations of Kal El (which they're not), or Stan Lee has lobbied for some serious cross-code crossovers (which he never would), this is such appalling attention to detail on behalf of the songwriters that they deserve to lose all their shoes in a house fire.

And the saddest thing is that I bet they're really proud of that line. I can just picture them high fiving each other when they came up with it. These people!

Finland 2017 - Club La Persé - My Little World

(I'd make sure you're sitting down first before clicking here...)

So then, if you thought the last couple of days of postings were a little off piste, you wait until you hear this one. Like four baby Leigh Bowerys after an explosion at the Wacky Warehouse, this high camp art collective are going to look nothing less than eye-melting on stage - it's just a shame that the song's a bit weak.

OK, so some of the more insistent catwalk techno is pretty damn good, but the constant 'dit-dit-doo-doo-doo' refrain and the over-arch proclamations don't quite make up for the world beating song I was hoping for to match their lively look.

However, I would advise a little further investigation into this mob, because some of their videos are absolutely cracking, they're a dab hand at catty interviews, and the fella with the blue pig's nose is called Mr C*nt. Only with a 'u' instead of a star, obviously. Well, think of the children. Although to be fair, most children swear better than me these days.

I'm also reliably informed by my Finnish friends that Persé relates to something more arse-shaped than its more familiar meaning in the West, so I reckon we're going to be in line for one heck of a show come UMK night. I just wish the song was good enough to match the look!

Finland 2017 - Günther & D’Sanz - Love Yourself

(Click here for a new breed of schlager vogueing...)

Oh yes, Finland is the gift that keeps on giving (at least for the next few days), and there is no bigger gift than that deadpan internet sensation Günther (from Sweden) and his (Spanish) mate D'Sanz.

You'll know Günther, even if you've tried to extinguish him from your memory, as the deadpan pout in leather behind the internet smash Ding Dong Song. More sharp-eyed reader may recognise D'Sanz from Operación Triunfo - we think. But together the pair make a strange brew - especially as there scarcely seems to be a Finnish follicle between them. But let us not complain, because dressed up on a big stage this could be a thoroughly splendid three minutes.

First up the G-man gives it his sexy porn star growl over some lively techno, before the D-man kicks in with the chorus and it all goes a bit BWO. Indeed, there's much less Günther than you would have hoped for, but of course, this gives him much more time to wander off about the place vogueing and posing, as he confessed to in this here video.

My Finnish pals tell me that they fear this is the hot favourite to win their ticket to Kyiv, and I must say I wouldn't be too disappointed - well, the Finnish delegation party is going to be a decadent belter if nothing else!