Hungary achieved one of its best results ever when András Kállay-Saunders came 5th in last year's Eurovision final with his song Running. The Hungarian national final, A Dal, remains a huge local success even in 2015. Will its winner, Boggie, manage to reach a similar...

This year, Georgia returned to using a national final again after two years of internal selection. Erovnuli Shesarcevi konkursi happened already a while ago, and memories of the daytime show are very vague, but I remember we didn't get to see any full live...

France are struggling to make an impact in the Eurovision Song Contest of late. Since Patricia Kaas snuck into the top ten in 2009, they have entered a televoting favourite that was screwed over by the juries, a bookmakers' favourite that was largely ignored, a...

It's easy to think of Finland as one of the more successful Eurovision participants in recent years because of the huge impact of Lordi's victory in 2006, but you have to go back as far as 1989 before you find another top ten result for the Nordic nation. As such, the...

The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, as we're supposed to refer to them in a Eurovision context, have a patchy history in our beloved competition. They've never reached the top ten on the scoreboard - indeed, the left-hand side is fairly unknown territory for...

Estonia has struggled throughout most of the last decade, but in the last six years, the country has at least managed to qualify for the final more often than not. Two top ten finishes within the last ten years isn't a great record, but many countries still dream...

Last year's host, Denmark, is one of those rather unstable countries. On the one hand, the country recently won twice within 15 years. On the other hand, there have been bottom-5 placements and failures to qualify at all. After a few years with mostly good results,...

2015 marks the return of the Czech Republic after sitting out for the last five years, and there are many things to be learned from this return - for example, the importance of context. One could say that the Czech effort for the 2015 has the potential to give the...

For ESC fans of a certain age, Cyprus probably still feels like one of the "newer" participating countries, having made its debut as late as 1981. However, this year's 60th edition of the Eurovision Song contest will feature the 32nd entry from the island in the...

In the last ten years, Belgium has only qualified for the final on two occasions, in 2010 and 2013. Indeed, it has only achieved one single top five placing (Sanomi, 2nd place in 2003) since winning with Sandra Kim in 1986. This year, it's RTBF's turn again to select...

Belarus is often one of the earliest countries to select its Eurovision entry, and the national final staging - and the quality of the webstream! - isn't always the best. Coupled with the local producers' propensity for changing the selected song after the...

Azerbaijan has still only a short history in Eurovision. However, it's a very successful one: Seven participations so far, of which six resulted in a top 10 placement, including one victory. It was only at their latest ESC appearance, in Copenhagen last year, that...

It still feels strange to be writing it, and it's going to feel even stranger when we're actually in Vienna, but here goes: It's time to take a look at the home entry that will be representing Austria. After it won the Eurovision Song Contest. Still crazy, right? But...

It was the breaking news of the season: Australia will compete at the Eurovision Song Contest. Allegedly this will be a unique occasion, but nevertheless, this headline caused some controversial debates among Eurovision circles, including the justified question: Will...

This time last year, I was writing about Armenia as the bookmaker's favourite for victory in ESC 2014. What a difference a year makes: This year's entry from the Caucasian nation would be flying completely under the radar if it wasn't for the controversy surrounding...

Albania hasn't reached the final since 2012, when Rona Nishliu achieved a remarkable 5th place, the best result for the country to date. Albania has been in the contest since 2004, and has always used its traditional Festivali i Këngës as its national selection...