Our condolences to the Dutch

The Dutch will select their entry for Düsseldorf tonight, which are to be performed by the boyband, or should we rather say manband, 3js. What's up with all these manbands anyways, we're starting to fear that Düsseldorf will end up as male thirty something clinging to their youth convention.

Like Blue in the UK, 3js was selected internally by the national broadcaster TROS, however the Dutch public will partly be allowed to have their say, as five songs have been singled out through some sort of reality-show or docu-soap, if we are not completely mistaken.

We have a really hard time understanding the Dutch and their taste in music. Having visited this otherwise lovely country at several occasions we have been constantly reminded of this fact when trying to find a decent bar or pub to hang out without having our ears raped with god-awful oontz-oontz beats or some horrific ompa-ompa yodeling. We mean, WTF is up with that? Get a grip and welcome to 2011, Stroopwafels!

Unfortunately this doesn't seem to happen anytime soon, at least not on the ESC scene. After listening to snippets of the five selected songs for tonight's final our ears hurt like hell and we kinda hope that the Dutch will come to their senses and just cancel this year's participation and stay at home. Because newsflash, none of these songs seem to have a snowball's chance in hell of ever making it past the semi-final.

Do you think we're being to harsh on the poor buggers? Well, have a listen yourself and you tell us:

What great expectations?! The Netherlands and their 3Js

We're approaching Eurovision season and GEE can't wait. What treats will be presented to us this year? Well, again we don't see them coming from Netherlands, that's pretty sure.

WTF are you looking at? Do you think we LIKE Eurovision?

Boybands have never been GEE's cup of coffee, but at least we know this much: They're supposed to consist of fresh boys, not depressed old men. We mean, who killed the cat and how close were you anyway? Apart from that, we guess the Dutch 3Js have everything that we hate so much from this genre: The pathos, the eyerape and the misunderstood notion of singing on top of each other. And yeah, then you would add that they seem to be singing in a rather undelicious language (Sorry, Dutchesses) and have hooked up with the most boring tailor on earth. They haven't picked their song yet, but what 3Js have presented earlier in their career,  is so gray and tiresome we're all lost in dreamland already, dreaming of all the better times ahead for The Netherlands. Once, after 2011.

Expectations this far:
Grumpy men trying to be boys trying to be amorous trying to be sensous? Oh, Lord. Expectations are approaching the bottom of the lake and disappearing fast. But hey, that means we will be easier impressed if they go ahead and prove us wrong.

Now, though, this is just sadder than Sad Sam and Dawson Leery combined:

Jump against racism

Well, this lad looks kinda familiar!

(pic from vg.no)



We can't quite make up our minds whether this Jimmy Jump is just bloody annoying or if he's actually kinda of cool... After all, he's harmless and we do like his message to the world this time. So we say, go for it!

The not so liberated Netherlands. In defence of Cornald Maas

The news of fabulous Dutch Eurovision commentator Cornald Maas being fired by the Broadcaster TROS just hit our holiday infected attention. Apparently Maas was fired over an ironic tweet saying the Dutch Eurovision participant this year, Sieneke was one of The Netherlands’ funny export products along with Joran von der Sloot and the PVV.

We are in shock, to say the least. When did The Netherlands become the country in Europe where the right to speak your mind isn't appreciated? In our somewhat naïve minds, we actually thought The Netherlands was a very liberal country, where you could smoke your pot and do what others could not. Now it turns out you can’t even do what others can.

Some people have taken this occasion to point out that personal messages in media such as Twitter and Facebook are not as private as one might think. Oh really? We’d kinda like to see it the other way around. Maybe it isn’t really the private sphere that is becoming public, but the public sphere that is being privatized? What if it's not the private persons that have to be careful about what views and opinions they share with the world in these so called social media channels, but instead the public that have to be careful about not letting it affect them? Do the people need social media training to make sure they don’t share their opinions with the wrong people or is it in fact the public that needs to get used to the private sphere being so much more accessible to them than before, without them having to access it all the time? We are moving away from a world where everything private was kept from the masses into a world in which the masses themselves have to decide what’s private and public, in our opinion. And where one has to deal with the fact that we are all people with minds and opinions of our own. It’s difficult for some, it seems. At least for the Dutch broadcasters. Maybe because it demands a little higher social intelligence?

Newsflash for you, TROS, social media is here to stay. It’s because people actually like to share their personal life and opinions and can handle others doing the same. We of course get the need to be professional and objective while on duty (except in GEE of course). But we cannot move into a world where journalists, PR people and their likings are shut out from what is rapidly becoming one of the most important social areas in society. Journalists are trusted with one of the most basic and important rights in a free society, the freedom of speech. This cannot only be applicable for their professional lives. Give them a break. At the moment it’s easier being a blogger than a journalist, and we are a bit unsure how healthy this is. But it does allow us bloggers to say this without anyone firing us: You are a couple of dickheads, TROS, and Sieneke's song and performance was so crappy it deserves all the shit it can get, even from her own people. And of course, neither ourselves nor Cornald Maas intend to make this a personal attack on Sieneke, who while in Oslo appeared to be nothing but a sweet and likable girl next door.

So, following our rather long line of thought there, we guess our main point is this: Firing Cornald Maas was very, very stupid, TROS. Please take a minute to consider the damage done by keeping this cool, funny fellow away from the Dutch people. In the meantime, we think back on meeting this man in Oslo after hearing about him from our friend Lex. We wish to catch up with Cornald in Germany next year. If TROS doesn’t take him back, we would love to hire him for NRK. He sure is a lot better than the various boring fellows trying to do the same job in Norway.

We support you, Cornald. Don’t you worry about your old fashioned, puritan, calvinist ex-employer. Just put a flash light under your chin and say you’re son of sin. And since TROS like to play kings, here’s a little something we thought might suit the situation:

Ik ben versmurfed

Seriously? Like, seriously Netherlands??? The clocks have ringed ding-a-dong more than a couple of times since 1975, but this seems to have gone unnoticed in Tulip Town. The Dutch used to rule in Eurovision during it´s early ages but that was then and this is now and since their last victory in the 70´s they have absolutely nothing to show for. Nada, rien, niente, niets, ingenting!

It makes you wonder why they even bother to participate, surely it must be better to be spared the humiliation. It´s just outright embarrassing to watch poor Sieneke on stage. She looks completely lost in the fairground and judging by her singing she has taken a ride on the merry go round at least a couple of times too many. Whoever came up with the bright idea of asking Vader "Smurf Song" Abraham to write the Dutch entry should seriously be sacked. Perhaps you need to smoke something to dig this shit?

It´s like the Dutch are in the process of refining the recipe for failure to perfection. We thought rock bottom had been reached by far with the granddads last year, but somehow they manage to top The Toppers, this year´s entry is even worse!

Seriously Netherlands, take a long, hard look at yourselves. To smurf or not to smurf, that´s the question. The answer is no.