Eurovision Song Contest: Five shockers from the UK
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Top five worst UK Eurovision songs
Mae Muller finished second from last at the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest in Liverpool with her catchy revenge track ‘I Wrote a Song’.
The Londoner scored just 25 points from the judges and voting public just 12 months after Sam Ryder had finished runner-up to Ukraine.
Muller probably didn’t deserve such a low ranking, but here are five UK entries from the past that were ‘nul points’ standard.
5th: James Newman
Song: Embers
Year/venue: 2021/Rotterdam
Position: Last
Nul points? Yes!
Newman’s dance track Embers broke into the top 40 in the UK charts and was certified platinum in Denmark, but Eurovision fans gave it the thumbs down on the big night.
🎺That was AMAZING🎺 pic.twitter.com/dv60KvAwSw
— James Newman (@JamesNewmanUk) May 22, 2021
The likeable Yorkshireman, older brother of pop star John, became the first act to score no points since the jury and audience televotes were split in 2016, although he put on a brave face, getting to his feet as the result was announced and lifting his arms in the air which got a wild reaction from the audience.
4th: Daz Sampson
Song: Teenage Life
Year/venue: 2006/Athens, Greece
Position: 19th out of 24
Nul points? No! 25 points
Sampson was a 32-year-old man when he surrounded himself with short-skirted women dressed as schoolgirls singing in Essex accents about life as a misunderstood teen.
The intro is irritatingly catchy, but the rap and naughty finger wagging that follows is a toe curler – just like the bright yellow PVC jacket, although true to form with UK Eurovision entries, this song turned out to be a top-10 success.
He has since become a football manager and scout, and has been determined to represent Belarus at Eurovision since 2019 without success.
3rd: Josh Dubrovie
Song: That Sounds Good To Me
Year/venue: 2010/Oslo, Norway
Position: Last
Nul points: No! 10 points
Cheesy 80s pop is given the very slightest of makeovers in this Pete Waterman-penned piece of dross which fully deserved to finish bottom of the pile.
IKEA shelving units may have seemed like a good idea as a stage set in Scandinavia, but it soon emerges that there are a few rawl plugs and allen keys missing in the song’s tool kit.
Dubrovie, doing his best Rick Astley impression, knocks out a few handclaps and bravely reaches the climax with a duff note from a song that went on to peak at 179 in the charts.
Three years later he changed his name to Josh James thinking we wouldn’t notice, but we did. His last single was called ‘Game Over’ and you can imagine the rest.
2nd: Jemini
Song: Cry Baby
Year/venue: 2003/Riga, Latvia
Position: Last
Nul points: Yes!
The night started well for the Liverpudlian duo with a nice bit of flamenco guitar in the intro, but as soon as the singing started it was obvious the UK were in for a long night.
Gemma Abbey and Chris Cromby were clearly off-key which they later blamed on a technical fault and meant they could not hear the backing track.
Vilified by the press and public, they were dropped by their record label and later split up, although they reunited in 2013 for a BBC 3 special entitled, ironically, How to win Eurovision.
1st: Scooch
Song: Flying the Flag (for you)
Year/venue: 2007/Helsinki, Finland
Position: 24th out of 26
Nul points: No! 22 points
It seemed like Steps had never gone away when Scooch, dressed as flight attendants, came up with the truly terrible Flying the Flag, a song with more innuendos than a Carry On film.
Suggestive references to nuts and blowing into air bags were bad enough, but it peaks when David Ducasse asks whether the passenger would like something to suck on before landing.
As a gesture of solidarity, the UK spent their hard-earned cash on the single to ensure it reached the top five in the charts.
