My ranking:
16 - Josh Dubovie - That Sounds Good to Me
The absolute SHITTEST OF THE SHIT. A song so bad R JOSH changed his name and confessed to the murder of Suzy Lamplugh just so he'd be remembered for something other than this. When the other competitor in the national final threw her performance and gave up her moment of fame just so she didn't have to sing it, I knew we'd probably miss out on the top ten.
15 - Andy Abraham - Even If
Terry Wogan has done some terrible things - not least dying before he could ever stand trial for his hideous crimes - but rescuing this and thus depriving us of a glorious Michelle Gayle catastrofuck of a performance in Belgrade was surely the worst. DREADFUL.
14 - Jemini - Cry Baby
'LuUUrVe, lUuuUrVe's naAaaAaAht EnUuUrFf'. Iconic in many ways but still the main reason I wake up screaming most nights.
13 - Englebert Humperdinck - Love Will Set You Free
Feted at the time for his impressive eighteen decades in showbiz, E-Hump brought almost none of this experience to bear in 2012. I maintain that this could have been a lovely entry in the right hands.
12 - James Fox - Hold On to Our Love
Other countries were sending worse dirges to greater success around the same time, so I always feel like this deserved
slightly better. Still, it's very everything you expect a debut single by a Fame Academy contestant who didn't make the top five to sound like.
11 - Michael Rice - Bigger than Us
I loved this when it was picked, and then he took to the stage like a binbag full of semolina had won a phone-in contest to have Linda Pritchard shout in his face for three minutes. Lovely song, lovely lad, but quite honestly the most glaring void of star power we've ever sent.
10 - Scooch - Flying the Flag (For You)
Bawdy nonsense that I can't help but secretly enjoy. It found a second life as a club dance at foreign resort hotels, allowing Italian children to prance around with their arms out like aeroplanes, none the wiser about the subtle double-entendres in the 'tongue up your nipsy for landing, sir?' spoken word parts.
09 - Joe and Jake - You're Not Alone
The third-best offering from the 2016 national final (Behind Darline and Dulcima
), this was a shining example of a perfectly cromulent song and performance coming at a time when general competence was no longer good enough to bag a decent result. They gave it some welly and seemed to enjoy being there, although I can't imagine they still have each other's phone numbers.
08 - Electro Velvet - Still in Love with You
How bare was my larder that THIS managed to end up so high in my ranking? Listening to this is like picking at a scab that isn't quite ready to fall off. Yes, it's horrible and you know nothing good will come of it, but it's weirdly satisfying. The failed scatting and look of absolute contempt on woman Velvet's face throughout contribute to a mildly iconic disaster.
07 - Bonnie Tyler - Believe In Me
A very pleasant song, delivered with the easy confidence of that one drunk woman who sings Proud Mary at karaoke night every Thursday; this was never going to do well but it's enjoyable nonetheless. The scars of Bonnie's favourite drinking game, 'Fucking kick me in the fucking neck as hard as you can', were all too evident in the attempted vocal.
06. SuRie - Storm
Now THIS is how you handle a stage invasion - stand around absolutely FURIOUS until the Serbian delegation kicks the protester to death off-stage, then deliver a performance for the ages which your frilly pop song in no way deserves. No cowering in a panini press until the wetlands wanker is politely asked to sit down for R SU.
05. James Newman - Embers
It's a banger, a demon, but Europe didn't want to deal. I fucking LOVE this song, but the set-design of a year 7 assembly absolutely destroyed what would otherwise have been a guaranteed winner. James got to have his heartwarming, post-Covid celebration moment, though, when the camera touchingly lingered on him as Europe was told he'd not received a single point.
04 - Molly - Children of the Universe
'Yeah, I can see it's a fucking cake. What do you want? A fucking medal?' That outburst and brutal stabbing of the green room interviewer suggested a level of dynamism sadly absent from Molly's performance of her very, very good song. The BBC Introducing experiment died in-utero, but the BBC really should have given it another bash.
03 - Javine - Touch My Nuisance
Derivative. Reductive. Slaggy. Never has a song better suited its singer, the reality show they came from or the judges it featured. This was unfairly maligned on the night and I live in hope of it catching on as a staple of Euroclub playlists, because it's an actual banger.
02 - Daz Sampson - Teenage Life
Runaway bookies' favourite going into the show, this sadly fell foul of a glitch in the phone voting which left viewers unable to pick up their phones and dial the number. I'll hear no argument that this wasn't an auteurist tour-de-force and a statement of intent we'd shamefully take another sixteen years to capitalise on.
01 - Lucie Jones - Never Give Up on You
Fantastic song, fantastic staging, fantastic performance. As much of a jingoist as I am, I tend to be realistic about our final placings being, broadly, where we deserved to be. In this case, though, I maintain that those rotten bastards, jealous of our successful Brexit, robbed us of what should honestly have been our glittering return to the top ten. That this happened in the same year that PORTUGAL won with a real-muzak sociopath leads me to believe the whole thing was an experiment designed to test the limits of my temper.
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It was a decent song, and still nice the same year that Salvador Sobral's song won 
