suzie

Let's see how many people actually buy it.

It does not work like that - luckily. It was a good indicator of the value of the UK entry (not even making it into the local top 100) but people outside Western Europe don't tend to buy music online and singles charts are based on airplay. 

Even if the majority of the audience was the same as the record buying public of Europe, in Eurovision it is the performance one votes for, so many different things, including the visual elements, the running order the songs, local commentators' comments...etc, influence the decision. 

In terms of entering the sales charts, it is songs like the Swedish entry that would get high - it already sounds familiar to many other trendy songs.

 

I was very disappointed that Ukraine won. The song is okay, as a song, but not as a Eurovision song. It isn't memorable. Doesn't have a good tune and I can't understand why anyone voted for it. It didn't belong in Eurovision. 

 

I understand what you mean but the fact that all the other songs practically sounded the same (catchy, memorable pop tunes, most of them written by the regular Eurovision songwriters from Sweden) made the Ukrainian entry stand out.  

There were so many well-performed, typical Eurovision songs stripped off of any charisma that the few that had it in one way or another, really stood out, in my opinion. For the Russian song it was the visual elements used that helped the performer (rather unfair, I must say) whilst for the Polish song it was both the look of the performer and also the fact that the song sounded grandiose. 

All in all, I am not surprised at all by televoting results and most definitely don't think it is only due to geo-political voting or conspiracies.

In fact, I am hopeful that in next year's contest there will be more performers inspired by their own cultural heritage  rather than trying to recycle Western pop tunes.

Congratulations to Jamala from Ukraine! Great song, singing and performance.

I never vote but if I had decided to, I would have voted for her as well, performing the most original song in the whole competition. She also came top in the televoting in my country, followed by Russia and Poland. What the jury heard was obviously different - like in most countries.

I have just had a look at results from all countries and the funniest results are from UK: jurors voting Georgia as No1, voters ranking  them as 19th best only. That speaks volume about the people running this industry and the way these 'experts' shape our musical tastes.  

 

Edit: Corrected some spelling errors. How useful it is to say anything if you make such bad spelling errors no one can take it seriously.   So sorry about my English! Oh well.  

And how useful is it to play the kind but misunderstood fan whose opinion is not considered because of nothing but language issues?

I know  my earlier post left open doors in interpretation, so I hope my recent response to Yang made it all clear: I was wondering about the strength of an argument in which a native speaker is asked to bring down the level of convesation so it pleased fans posting mostly pictures with 2-3 misspelled words. I have acknowledged that I have jumped to conclusion soon and, at the same time, I also recognize how it easily one can take it out of context and play the victim card.

So, this is my last attempt to explain what I meant and I am mainly writing this for the newbies so it is clear:  everyone is encouraged to post here, no matter what their level of English is

Thanks a lot for your explaination.

 

Let me explain why I stuck with Christine back then for these phrases. For a lot English words/phrases they can be interpreted more than one way. And by the first time of reading we would not know we misunderstand. You may or may not noticed here that but a lot times non-native speakers saying some posts are rude/mean and some find they're obvious not.  As I have pointed out before, one reason for this is because we can not hear the tougue of speaking, another reason is that these phrases can really easy to be misinterpreted in another way.

 

I've lived in US for three years, I can speak relatively fluent English with an Asian accent, because I also need to teach marketing in English. Besides communicating with my students I also talk with my colleges, friends, advisors everyday in English. I do not know the language difference between the places we live, because during the past three years I can't recall one time there're some words/phrases spoken by others are something like these phrases. It's not that they do not use similar words, but normally they use these words to describe the people they really dislike ( trust me, I hear "s**k up" a lot from my advisor when he describe someone in a really "I dont like that guy" tongue, Drump for example,we talked about politics a lot every Tuesday when he bought us pizza, he kept saying someone "s**k up" Drump, and he despised both sides in that phrase). I remember hearing people around me use "yapping" too, to describe someone ( let's call him A) talking too much or talking in an annoying way, again in that case the speaker really dislike the A, otherwise he would just say A talk too much instead of using the word "yapping" . Yet I remember one ( I dont remember who he/she is) MFCer here saying mika is "yapping" at the UK gig.

 

I hope you see the points here, a lot phrases used here are not neutral to me, these phrases in my understanding are normally used on people you dislike. The reason I picked these words to Christine, in the begining was to explain her why I was in a defensive mode for mika, since she said she did not know why the fans felt protective and defensive for mika.

 

I also believe these phrases mean bad things to a lot non-native speaker and even some native speakers. They asked me why some MFCers here talked about MIKA like he was our enemy, we discussed and we did not know why. Because obiviously these MFCers are also fans, they like MIKA, don't they?

 

The reason I showed these pics, which to you seemed ridiculous, is because the definition of "suck up" in dictionary is neutral, yet you can tell from these pics some people consider this phrase to really despisable behavior and only use this word to people they dislike. I do not think all of these people are non-native speakers.

 

I am not asking you to change your way of writing/speaking, that would be really hard I understand. I am simply explaining the situations here and why these phrases have pinched my nerve, as well as the nerves of people similar to me in some sense.  

 

I like to really consider my wording before I write it down, because I know people can not hear my tougue and all the motions in the words would be exaggerated. But this is only my habit. It's completely your freedom to do similar thing or not.

 

 

Hi Yang,

Thank you very much for your detailed explanation. I must admit I jumped to a conclusion too soon - I literally only checked posts from you for a few minutes when I 'jumped in' - also in someone's defence. I am really sorry for that. I understand your point now and also your explanation that it pinched a nerve. I often end up in similar situation and it happened to me as well this time: I have seen many similar debates on this forum with similar argumentation with Christine / a group of 'old fans' on one side and  another group who felt they were somehow excluded on the other.

I do believe no-one is excluded here by default. This is an ideal forum where any fan from anywhere in the world can find their safe place: we have topics for those who love to discuss music / lyrics, separate threads for concert discussions, pieces of news, artwork, foreign language threads...etc. A real diverse place.

When I first joined I remember I  felt that fans who did not know me hardly ever answered my posts and it was also a bit difficult for me to find friends. However, I did not give up and followed the conversation of the very talkative native speakers and just by reading those posts I understood a lot and eventually I made friends with a lot of people here. So if you could help make fans who currently feel excluded make understand that essentially all these talks actually are FOR Mika and not against him, that would be great...

I know it does sound like one big debate with some people slashing him but everyone on this forum likes him and we are just analysing his actions without even hoping anything will ever change. If we didn't care, we would visit this site.

@mariafrancy, 

I really liked your post, perhaps because I can totally relate to your point of view: if I were your age and a fan just joining, I would most likely have the same view and understanding of events as well as what Mika is all about.

I also have the same perspective on songs in other languages ( I do like them and to me it makes no real difference) but with a note that usually it is non-English native speakers who write pop songs in their own language. They do so partly because that is the best way they can express themselves and partly because their lingustic and cultural background will influence the rythm and the structure of the music itself. The way I perceive Mika's French songs is that they are essentially English pop songs with a French guy, Doriand, writing the lyrics. That  could pretty much be the reason they don't appeal to me as I can see no point in listening to a Latin-rhythm song in French and especially not at a concert with a predominently English speaking audience. Naturally, Mika has all the right to sing that song anywhere and in a way he did his best to explain it all in his own cheeky manner, so as far as I am concerned, it fitted the setlist.

Sorry if I offended someone with my opinions in my first post (I know I talked too much…) and sorry for my grammar mistakes. 

Opinions can't hurt anyone, no need to apologise for that. Long posts are welcome, especially if they make sense like yours

I didn't here anyone booing BBB at the Adelphi. It was a great gig. 

Exactly. That is why I was totally taken aback by his comments on the 'intolerant' reaction. There was no sign of intolerance witnessed by me, either.

It´s not worth writing more about this issue.

...

 

I don´t know why here we can´t stop turning it over and over again.

This is no longer about the 'issue', actually, just general discussion. I haven't checked when you joined but this type of conversation used to be the norm on MFC, whether the topic was a song, a gig, whether the colour of his jacket was blue or purple..etc - anything.

I believe many of us actually enjoy it but no worries, it will soon turn peace and quiet again as Mika is pretty inactive outside France and Italy, so not much to talk about - not for me, at least.

 

Whether I live in a English speaking country or not, you are in no position to point out I post misspelling comments. It's very impolite to classify people to groups based on the flaws in their figure. It's equally impolite to refer people to "a group with misspelling comments".   

 

.

 

  Like the way I realize it's none of my business if MIKA does not mind being harshly criticized by MFCers, in this case she does not mind, so it's none of you business.

 

Ok, so obviously my post did not make it obvious why I was using the words I did, so let me give it one more try and explain the background....

When I started to read this thread I found a string of funny comments by you, posting from the US and asking a native speaker not to use words you don't understand. I also found you engaged in some utterly ridiculous conversation about the meaning of a phase unknown to you that you tried to understand with the help of Google pictures ... At that point I was about to step in and recommend you refer to a dictionary or an online Thesaurus to figure out meanings of words rather than sticking to your interpretation that was based on some cartoon.

In the end, I didn't do that but checked your MFC posts in the news section to see who is the group (the  'WE')  you are talking in the name of. I did not get closer to the answer but the picure captions I saw from you did make me draw my conclusions. However, most certainly I would not have not pointed it out had I not witnessed a conversation on this thread in which you practically wanted other members to adjust their English to the level you understand.

I hope it is clear now. Any learner of a second language gets my appreciation by default (I am one as well) but preaching native speakers about the vocabulary they are meant to use when you also  have significant gaps calls for nothing but the urgent need for a reality check.   

I don´t know you, but I totally agree with what I quoted. 

 

Same happens in Spain. Aggravated with the fact that he forgot the spanish he knew in exchange for italian and just to get an easier success on TV shows. Everybody can ask how spanish fans would feel if he do a gig in Spain and talk to us in italian. I saw it time ago: people complained. Is not the language. Is not a country. Is the way Mika is doing things during the last years. So, he has to be more careful about what he does in concert. The same he never plays "Live your life" with spanish words out of Spain. It´s easy. If you provoke you can get a bad reaction. Fans are alive, they are not puppets in front of you only saying praises at you. They have their opinions. And it´s important to listen to them. Because they are your fans. And your career depends on them... or not?

 

I disapprove what Mika did. And think that this fan is the weak part on this. So I am on the side of her. 

Yes he needs to handle the national audiences really carefully as in some countries he clearly created an expectation already and it could be difficult to live up to that. 

No, you didn't just do that.

Please read the edited post with the quote and consider if people speaking proper English would need to apologize from others apparently also living in an English speaking country for using words that are outside a basic / beginner's vocabulary. 

I cant believe I missed this post, yeah we have a lot misspelled comments, and we may post more pics than words, sooooo?

 

Guideline : "Do not mock someone because of the way they speak/write, or the amount of time they spend on the forum.'

Well, I did not mock anyone, I just asked how you define the 'we' you are talking in the name of. So it is that group then, I see. Thank you.

So who needs to read guidelines?

Hell-o

I hardly ever posted here in the last few years but since I was at the Adelphi gig I did ask myself what I would have done if I had been the target of Mika’s unexplainable and unreasonable response.  

First of all, I would have sold my (also 2nd row) Palladium ticket to some random fan who is willing to pay 200 GBP more just to get 2 metres closer and laugh at people’s desperation in disbelief...  Jemma did not do that, of course. She was offended publicly two times already and in situations where she could not respond so she recoded an impromtu video response – one any professional speaker could envy for its coherent yet heartfelt message.

So where does this ’intolerant’ label come from? As you can see from the video posted here, he asked the audience if they spoke French and the response was yes / no mixed. That is all I heard as well, 12 rows back. My response was also a ’no’ but naturally, no one in their right mind thinks this question is more than just a warm up to the obviously French song he had already planned to sing. At the same time, anyone who has ever been to his UK gigs in the early days knows that  he does deliberately trigger all sorts of responses from the audience and engages in some kind of conversation that usually stays one-sided unless you are really loud. He typically laughs and talks back – sometimes even rude things, just because he can.  There have been many examples of this happening at gigs where front row was not merely  a line of standing statues / bio scenery. How he arrived at the ’intolerant’ label and being ’hurt’, I can’t understand.  He does know that a certain percent of UK fans can’t stand him singing in French for several reasons and in my understanding ,it is not merely the language itself but also the fact that it reminds them of Mika having practically abandoned the UK to succeed in two, also very large (and less competitive) European pop markets:  France and Italy, with the help of his language skills. Well done for him: he seems to have done a great job on these shows and it seems to have been worth it.  That view changes though when it is looked at from the perspective of fans in other areas. How he does not understand why his fans in the UK react like that when they are reminded of him ’leaving them behind’ is beyond me.  Even I can relate to that, despite not living in the UK.

Also, there seems to be a general belief that the French songs are not liked because they are in French. I can obviously speak for myself only  but I do like a lot of French songs, actually, just not Mika’s, with the exception of L'amour Fait Ce Qu'il Veut perhaps. They just don’t appeal to me the least. If I liked them I would travel to his concerts in France but instead I choose to fly to shows where the setlist is more likely to include songs I like and he will speak in a language I understand. So when I hear him say at a UK gig he’ll sing  a French song,  my first reaction is : oh no. I do get over it and enjoy myself ,  of course, just like when he sings WAG, Starting at the Sun or Talk About You -  songs I don’t really like, either, but that is my problem. I practice my ’tolerance’.    What I don’t tolerate is twisting stories and playing the victim. His only excuse may be that he is making it up for the press and not realizing it can be tracked in other places as everything is recorded and appears on  Youtube. 

No, Jemma is not a random fan with 3 Mika Tofu dolls on her shelf and posting ’I love you Mika’ messages on Facebook. To me she is the fan who I watched speaking highly of Mika’s music on Skynews back at the first album launch party, sounding really excited about him being a breath of fresh air in the pop scene that was lacking fun and creativity back then. And yes, Mika WAS that, at least the promise of it. He paved the way for Lady Gaga and all the other pop acts that followed and whom he saw rise way higher than him. Those days are gone and so is the Mika who he was back in 2006/7. And perhaps that is what hurts the most. 

I know you like to express yourself with all this sassy words, I understand they sounds very impressive. I'm just trying to show you sometimes they may be a little TOO sassy. And it provoke the defensiveness in other fans. It's not that we are oversensitive or anything.

I'm sorry, but who are the 'we' in your example? Those who reduce their forum activity to posting pictures only with some random and often misspelled comments?

Well sorry but I am not going to change the way I have been talking for the past 40+ years to accommodate every single person who may be reading my posts. I can't read the minds of thousands of people and perfectly adjust my words according to their English level and sensitivities. I try my best but there comes a point when the reader has to take responsibility for their own feelings and ask for clarification if they don't understand something instead of jumping to conclusions and getting angry about something that was never intended. If everyone sterilized their posts to the point where it couldn't possibly be offensive to anyone, we would not have any personalities at all and nothing more to say than "Mika is amazing!!!!!!"

... which is exactly what happened to MFC.

Hi everyone,

It was my first gig after 3 years (with the last 2 being only festival appearances), so I feel I need to post a short review as well. 

To be honest my expectations from the gig were more related to a kind of nostalgy and was more excited about meeting my friends than attending the gig. I still looked forward to it, of course, but not with great excitement. Someone even asked me beforehand: 'What if he disappoints? ' to which  I responded confidently: 'he would not - he can't do wrong with a live show'. He proved me right, of course. I can't say it was one of his best shows ever etc, but it was as enjoyable as most of the other nearly 20 I attended several years ago.

The reason it is always worth attending his shows are still the same: great songs, extreme energy, unbelievable stage presence and continuous effort to improve / change the performance a bit. For the old songs, like Lollipop and GK, I must say I appreciated the effort more than the end result, but still, I'd rather listen to him experimenting than being stuck with past sound. The most 'annoying' innovation I found was the acapella elements put at the end or sometimes even to the beginning of the songs. It's not that I don't like the idea, but it was just added to too many songs. Even if all those bits had been sung perfectly it would have been too much / 'too theatrical' for my taste, but as a couple of these went rather off, my conclusion  is that less is usually more.

Anyway, it did not impact my overall gig experience as I really enjoyed the show. For me, the way I measure the most outstanding songs of the night is to list the one I recall right after the gig and the ones that 'get played' in my head in the coming hours and days... So using these indicators, the best songs for me were Over My Shoulder, Promiseland, Hurts and Staring at the Sun. (The latter a funny choice as otherwise I never liked that song.  ) 

One change also noticeable for me vs previous years is his confidence on stage and interaction with the audience. It was a gradual change, I know, but most likely these tv talent shows he is doing must have added to it. (So one positive aspect of him becoming a tv star noted ​   ) Let me note, though, that when he split the audience into three I expected we'd sing in 3 parts, so after all that long preparation and just that simple task made me slightly disappointed  .

If I needed to take one song out to replace with another one, for me it would have been BBB as well, since I can't sing along to that. I really don't understand why he chose to sing it despite knowing right from the start it won't go down well with most people. Most likely he did that 'just because he can' and because he had no more other songs in his current repertoir to add. To me, it was still a better choice than EMD.

So, my overall experience reassured me it will be worth booking a ticket for the London show when album No 5 comes out , or, hopefully-  if his busy tv star life allows -, if and when he does something special sooner. 

It's hard to tell, isn't it? Might be an impersonator  Or a twin....or both 

you all are welcome    - says someone who hasn't visited this site for 1.5 years    

btw, hi Bexx!

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeey The old gang is returning 

Hello!! your face looks familiar! Is that you or your alterego?

The official singles don't seem to be the most popular among fans... 

Well, no surprise there, especially considering the lead single: It's been pretty much the same for his last 3 albums. Also, it may not only be his fans these songs are unpopular with.. Perhaps next time it would be a good idea for whoever (most likely record company) is choosing the lead single to pick one song and forget about ever releasing that one...  I have no problem with Talk About You, except that it sounds a bit 'dated' and rather unimpressive to be chosen as a single.

Promiseland would have been a much better choice. .. 

Anyway, I voted for Good Guys, Last Party and Ordinary Man as my favourites and another 3 added to a Top 6 would be Rio, Promiseland and Hurts. I must add I do like the rest of the album as well.

  this one is not for me... it's right up there with Eraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaase and Make you Happy 

 

That's a CD automatic skip! 

oh no, really? Make you happy was one of my favourites on TOOL and I find this one kind of eclectic and humorous - though obviously not understanding a single word other than l'amour and baby blue

edit: I have just put the lyrics into google translate and I'd sum up meaning as follows: he travels around the world but can escape from baby blue.... Is that correct?

I really like it although I always prefer songs in English this one is the first I really like in French. I hope it's not "morveux" though

I also totally get this 'erotic' feel to it. To me it is 70s French chanson with a touch of modern electro (Daft Punk) - something Sebasitien Tellier came out with a few years ago. Odd but I like it.

Someone asked me if "porcelain" was a euphemism for "toilet" and all I can think of now is Mika slitting his wrists over a toilet. I can't even listen to it. It makes me want to blow my brains out.  

 Sorry, I can't feel your pain as I love the song but now your comment made me think of a scene where someone is trying to smash the door of a china cabinet to make Mika stop singing

I think the only common thing, beside his falsetto is that he apparently wrote both at 3am in the morning and most likely feeling self pity.

I would personally love to listen to Porcelain in a more stripped down version but only because the production reminds me of this other song.

 

I do love this song : piano + Mika's voice (treble) + strings (even synthetic strings, I realized at second hearing) =       

 

The theme is so cute : fragile, just like his treble voice.

Actually, I've been thinking that the lyrics on this album are more sophisticated than on his previous ones. (I don't necessarily mean this song, just in general.) Maybe it comes with age .. 

Thank you @Melyssa and @Manon14 .. So one more thing I learned today, that there will be a symphonic album  with the Montreal Symphonic Orchestra... Pleased to hear that.

Suzie, there are some more French songs which are included in the Franch and Italian versions of the album, so you might need to include those as well.

 

In fact I've never seen an album with so many different versions and track listings - it's all very confusing .

I took the international deluxe version as the base as that is the one available for everyone/ known to everyone  (and actually, I am not even aware of more songs, just 2 more new French ones I found on Youtube last night but I have not yet listed to yet )  

Perhaps once the voting on the international tracks is done, there could be a poll for 'hidden pearls' that are basically bonus tracks on different versions..

Shall we do a poll on your favourite songs on No Place In Heaven?

Please choose no more than 3 songs you love the best and let's see the results

Off topic. This shows one more time that Promiseland kicks ass. So not a bonus track. 

This could be country specific though.. It would be a good idea to do a poll here.. Perhaps I'll do one. I did create one for the last album, I think

It is in my current Top 3 favourites from the album, along with Good Guys and Last Party. He sounds so humble - another perfect match of lyrics and music.

Funny as to me it was not OMS it reminded me of but a huge hit from over a decade ago  - mainly because of the piano riff. Most likely the whole instrumental part was added to the song by his collaborators though ...So I understand the comparison to OMS in a way (and he also said it), but to me OMS has classical roots whilst this one is 'just' a pop song - a really good one though. If I am to compare it to a Mika song, I'd say it is more like the version of  'Overrated' on the last album.

Yeah the (British?) "r" after every A... I've heard it quite often with "idear" too, my English teacher would always say that, though she has an Australian accent.

But as far as I'm concerned his pronounciation has always been a bit odd

I think Mika doesn't always do this after an A sound but because the next word is a vowel the R links them together. And yes he has had some weird weird phrasing in his songs for sure. I think this "sofar" for "sofa" though is natural for many Brits though, like you said unlike some of his other odd pronunciations that are Mika inventions.

I remember learning about it at phonology / morphology classes at the university: it is called and intrusive R and as I remember we were told that native speakers all talk like that, independent of their accent. Now I realize it may sound odd / old fashioned even to native speakers