I'm going to post this anonymously, 'cos I don't want to lose too much folkcred.

A few years ago I stayed in on a Saturday night and watched the Eurovision Song Contest. The first few songs were all recognisable musically (i.e. ignoring the words) as coming from their own countries - the Spanish and Portuguese songs sounded Iberian, the Cyprus and Greek entries sounded Greek.

Then came the British 'song' - a piece of sub-disco pap delivered by a prancing Australian bimbette. I really thought that the BBC were actually trying to make our country look bad. Then I remembered that the British viewers had actually chosen the thing as our entry.

Why can't people who sing in mid-atlantic accents go and do it in the mid-atlantic ?