Bundesvision Song Contest 2009 coming soon
Monday, February 2nd, 2009
Our European readers are probably more or less familiar with the format, but for everyone else, do you happen to know what the Eurovision song contest is? It’s an annual, Europe-wide search for the best performer in the whole of Europe - although here the best performer means the cheesiest and kitschiest goddamn pop artist you can find on our continent. Just about all the performances in the contests are beyond horrible, gimmicky eurotechno or pop groups, that are comparable to in-your-face insults to some music lovers and cringe-inducing, hilarious and boombastic comedy spectacles to others. For some reason, this show enjoys huge popularity and significant audience, so much that it’s even aired outside Europe and has spawned numerous spin-offs in other parts of the world. Anyways, after all the artists, one from each participating country, have
presented their song in some huge stadium in the country where the contest is held this time, points are awarded according to the votes of the audience (conducted via SMS), and it all concludes in a wild, apocalyptic celebration of the winner who’ll go on to sell tens of millions of records all over the place. But what’s this got anything to do with German music anyone seriously cares about?
Well, the biggest single music event in Germany, Bundesvision Song Contest 2009 is right around the corner. On the 13th of February, a total of sixteen bands from each of the German states (Bundesländer) compete against each other for glory and fame in Metropolis-Halle in Potsdam. In execution, the contest is identical to Eurovision, and it also got its start when the German musician, entertainer and an all-around celebrity Stefan Raab held a contest to find the contestant for Germany’s 2004 Eurovision song contest. He then became bored with the insanity of Eurovision, and decided to devise a Germany-only competition of his own in 2005.
However, that’s where the similarities thankfully end. The greatest difference is that just about all of BuViSoCo’s contestants are really good, proper artists who one might very well listen to without seeming risible. For example, germaniac favourites like Subway to Sally, OOMPH! and In Extremo have participated in the show. In other words, it’s an actual music competition rather than a celebration of everything that’s wrong with pop music, like it’s completely bananas big brother Eurovision.
This year, www.germaniac.com is set out to cover every single one of those sixteen bands entering the competition. In the next couple of weeks, you can look forward to seeing introductions to all of the artists and their songs, and of course ways for you to listen to them and where to buy their records. I’m sure you’ll be able to find a lot of great music and even new favourites from such a large selection of music from all around the country. So, don’t forget to tune in! We should have our first post up in a few days or so. But before that, here’s a list of the contestants:
BUNDESVISION SONG CONTEST 2009 ENTRIES
Baden-Württemberg: Cassandra Steen
Bavaria: Claudia Koreck
Berlin: Peter Fox
Brandenburg: Sven van Thom
Bremen: Flowin Immo et les Freaqz
Hamburg: Olli Schulz
Hesse: Fräulein Wunder
Lower Saxony: Fotos
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern: Marteria
North Rhine-Westphalia: Rage
Rhineland-Palatinate: Pascal Finkenauer
Saarland: P:lot
Saxony: Polarkreis 18
Saxony-Anhalt: Angelas Park
Schleswig-Holstein: Ruben Cossani
Thuringia: Chapeau Claque

















