im a 30 year old millenial white male (italian/irish/british/german/greek descent)..i only speak english..i know bits and pieces of other languages..but suck at becoming fluent in other languages not gunna lie lol...just working a commision solar sales job at the moment.. havent made sh*t yet..just started not too long ago (about last month)..can't even pay my phone bill at the moment..i got no money..but working with a crm app that all you need is wifi and no cellphone service provider which is good..i have no real good or fancy education..im just a trade school grad that didn't learn much from that school (i studied in the electrical program) and a college drop out with a hs diploma..i was a certified personal trainer for 2 years but not a very well paying job not gunna lie..served in the us military got an honorable discharge back in 2017..lived over in japan when i was in ..those were the good days..the mil sucked but japan was cool...but i like south east asia even more..ive been there a bunch of times..want to live over there..and it is quite cheap..but then again you can blow your money quickly if you don't watch what your doing and aren't responsible..i don't want anything to do with the us government..they couldn't pay me enough to work for them...been back and forth on jobs since i've been out of the military..especially from 2021-2023..it is a tough life when you get out of the military..not gunna lie..would love to collab with someone and start something to make money to survive and not scrape by..hopefully help/entertain/or w.e with the world and people..luckily i live with my parents..but i've had enough not gunna lie for years..wan't to be "free" on my own...what do i do..what should i do..im so burnt out not gunna lie..can't even think or operate..i can careless about having a woman or a kid at the moment..i know that sounds selfish..but just worried about makin it through the week without anybread at the moment...but still wanna travel really bad and to get out of the states and never comeback.

Hola mis amores! Les cuento un resumen de como me dejo mi ex pareja prácticamente en la calle.
Lo conoci cuando le compraba hamburguesas en su carro de comidas, hablamos y me invito a salir, yo acepte y salimos. Esto paso en el 2021, en esos momentos yo estaba buscando una relación estable y fue ahi donde salimos y planeamos muchas cosas juntos.
Cuando me separe que fue en el 2022, decidí no volver más, pero no me olvido lo que el me dijo: "Vos me dejas a mi y yo te voy a hacer la vida de cuadritos" y fue con lo único que cumplió, porque al separarme, se quedó con mi terreno, todo mi dinero ahorrado, me hostigaba por redes sociales, hasta contó cosas muy íntimas mías, yo no sabía como salir a la calle, ya que le contó a mis vecinos. Aún sigo pagando el divorcio.
Me humillo, físicamente y psicológicamente. Demás esta decir que el me pegaba cuando estaba conviviendo con el, todo era por celos y me queria tener encerrada, me alejo de todos mis seres queridos.
Cuando camino por la calle, se acerca con la moto o el auto y se detiene para ver que hago, yo lo miro, sin miedo y preparada para tocar el "Botón antipático" por si sale del auto o se acerca con la moto. Actualmente, tengo muchas pesadillas con el, que me va a matar o esta planeando matarme en cualquier momento. No salgo mucho de mi casa, más que todo para no preocupar a mi familia. Ya lo denuncie, tiene la perimetral, pero no se cansa de molestarme. Yo aún no fui a un psicólogo porque no tengo plata, pero apenas tenga algo, ire para sanarme por dentro.
Bueno, mientras iba escribiendo, se me cayeron muchas lágrimas de los ojos, solo espero que todo esto pase y pueda ser la mujer de antes, donde me sentia libre de caminar por las calles y segura de si misma.
¡Gracias por leerme! Cualquier consejo los leo a todos. Besitos a todos, muaaa.

FIA Formula 3 Spanish Grand Prix - Feature Race

F1FS Wiki: FIA Formula 3 Guide 2023 Drivers & Teams 2023 Calendar

Session Times

Friday-Sunday times are in CEST (UTC+2:00)

• Practice: Fri 02 Jun 2023, 09:55 (UTC+2)
• Qualifying: Fri 02 Jun 2023, 15:00 (UTC+2)
• Sprint Race: Sat 03 Jun 2023, 10:30 (UTC+2)
• Feature Race: Sun 04 Jun 2023, 09:55 (UTC+2)

You can convert the session times to your local time via Timeanddate.com.
A full time table of the weekend's events can be found here: Link

Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya

Montmeló, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
Circuit Diagram
Length: 4.657 km (2.894 miles)
Turns: 14
Distance:

• Sprint Race: 21 Laps - 97.797 km
• Feature Race: 25 Laps - 116.425 km

2022

2022 Pole Time: 1:33.516 ( Roman Stanek, Trident)
2022 Fastest Lap:

• Sprint Race: 1:36.788 ( Jak Crawford, PREMA Racing)
• Feature Race: 1:37.030 ( Victor Martins, ART Grand Prix)

2022 Winner:

• Sprint Race: David Vidales, Campos Racing
• Feature Race: Victor Martins, ART Grand Prix

2023

2023 Pole Time: 1:27.587 ( Josep María Martí, Campos Racing)
2023 Fastest Lap:

• Sprint Race: 1:32.054 ( Zak O'Sullivan PREMA Racing)
• Feature Race:

2023 Winner:

• Sprint Race: Zak O'Sullivan PREMA Racing
• Feature Race:

Provisional Starting Grid

Pos	No.	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	#23	J. Martí	Campos Racing	1:27.587	-
2	#27	T. Barnard	Jenzer Motorsport	1:27.837	0.250
3	#10	F. Colapinto	MP Motorsport	1:27.864	0.277
4	#2	D. Beganovic	PREMA Racing	1:27.930	0.343
5	#1	P. Aron	PREMA Racing	1:27.934	0.347
6	#5	G. Bortoleto	Trident	1:28.005	0.418
7	#14	S. Montoya	Hitech Pulse-Eight	1:28.072	0.485
8	#11	M. Boya	MP Motorsport	1:28.082	0.495
9	#4	L. Fornaroli	Trident	1:28.087	0.500
10	#8	G. Saucy	ART Grand Prix	1:28.105	0.518
11	#16	L. Browning	Hitech Pulse-Eight	1:28.141	0.554
12	#3	Z. O'Sullivan	PREMA Racing	1:28.189	0.602
13	#6	O. Goethe	Trident	1:28.198	0.611
14	#26	N. Bedrin	Jenzer Motorsport	1:28.256	0.669
15	#25	H. Barter	Campos Racing	1:28.324	0.737
16	#24	C. Mansell	Campos Racing	1:28.324	0.737
17	#12	J. Edgar	MP Motorsport	1:28.486	0.899
18	#15	G. Minì	Hitech Pulse-Eight	1:28.524	0.937
19	#9	N. Tsolov	ART Grand Prix	1:28.612	1.025
20	#17	C. Collet	Van Amersfoort Racing	1:28.624	1.037
21	#7	K. Frederick	ART Grand Prix	1:28.847	1.260
22	#19	T. Smith	Van Amersfoort Racing	1:28.874	1.287
23	#20	O. Gray	Rodin Carlin	1:28.909	1.322
24	#18	R. Villagómez	Van Amersfoort Racing	1:29.018	1.431
25	#28	A. García	Jenzer Motorsport	1:29.230	1.643
26	#31	P. Wisnicki	PHM Racing by Charouz	1:29.365	1.778
27	#29	S. Floersch	PHM Racing by Charouz	1:29.488	1.901
28	#30	R. Faria	PHM Racing by Charouz	1:29.601	2.014
29	#22	I. Cohen	Rodin Carlin	1:29.617	2.030
30	#21	H. Yeany	Rodin Carlin	1:29.716	2.129

Live Timing & Streaming

The FIA Formula 3 series has its own official Live Timing services.

• Live Timing: Here.
  
• List of Broadcasting Channels: Here
  

F1FS Guide

New to FIA Formula 3? You can watch our dedicated video guide that introduces the series HERE!

Twitter

For up to date information regarding this series, follow these Twitter accounts:

• FIA Formula 3 Twitter: @Formula3
• F1FS Twitter: @F1FeederSeries

Discord

We have a Discord server for the subreddit, check it out here: Link

On-Demand Race Replays

You can access previous races of this series here: 2022 FIA Formula 3 Championship Race Replays

Top 5

Drivers' Championship

Pos.	Change	Driver	Points
1	-	Gabriel Bortoleto	80
2	-	Gabriele Mini	56
3	-	Gregoire Saucy	47
4	-	Dino Beganovic	46
5	-	Paul Aron	44

Teams' Championship

Pos.	Change	Team	Points
1	-	Trident	139
2	-	PREMA Racing	127
3	-	Hitech Pulse-Eight	111
4	-	ART Grand Prix	54
5	-	Campos Racing	44

Full championship standings here: Link

What is the COMG! tracker?
COMG! is a videogame store in Japan which updates the pre-orders they sell daily with a "popularity score". This pre-order score can be used (with proper context) to gauge how a game will perform in Japan.
Why the COMG! tracker is imperfect
So people have been tracking the COMG! score's of FFXVI vs. FFXV to "prove" that FFXVI will bomb. For example, you may have seen this scary image of FFXVI tracking about 1/5th of FFXV's pre-orders. This should be discounted for many reasons

1. The pre-order landscape has completely changed. People simply pre-order less nowadays. Not only that, people order physical games at a much lower rate, opting for digital. Furthermore, people who buy digital copies are going to be less likely to pre-order, because there are less physical rewards, and no issue with product scarcity
   
2. The COMG! score is completely arbitrary. They kind of just throw out a number to my knowledge, we don't know how those "points" are calculated. You can compare games released close to one another, but not games from 2016 with games from 2023
   
3. The COMG! score is proven to be grossly inaccurate to actual sales when comparing across many years.
   

For example, here is the all-time leaderboard for COMG! pre-order points. In first, we see Monster Hunter Generations with a score of 2721, released in 2015. In fourth place, we have Monster Hunter Rise, with about 1000 points. So logically, one would expect Monster Hunter Generations to have sold 2.7x the amount of copies as Monster Hunter Rise on launch right? This did not happen. MH Generations launched to just under 1.5 million, MH Rise launched to just over 1.3 million.
For another example, Dark Souls III had a score of 247 by release day, and went on to sell 200,000 units on its release week on PS4. Elden Ring had a PS4 score of 100 by release day, and went on to sell 188,000 units in its release week on PS4. Once again, this is not close to the 2.5 ratio you would expect from these point scores.
So once again, comparing a game releasing in 2023 to a game that released in 2016 is foolish.
However, I think it is fair to compare Elden Ring's COMG! pre-order numbers to FFXVI's to try and guess sales numbers. Why would I do this after discounting the COMG! tracker?
Simple, because both games are/were heavily pre-ordered in Japan only a year apart, with both releasing "post-pandemic" and in the newest console generation. We also have pretty detailed sales data for Elden Ring.
Once again, this is a GUESS, but a somewhat informed guess. We are going to use the COMG! tracker in a fair and applicable scenario. Sceptics and haters of the system alike could both trust this guess, or completely discount it. I hope I have proven why previous examples should be thrown away, but this example should give us a somewhat decent GUESS.
On to the numbers...
Currently, FFXVI is sitting at 77 points on the COMG! Pre-order tracker. At this point in Elden Ring's build-up, it had 140 points. So FFXVI is sitting at around 55% of Elden Ring's pre-orders in Japan at 19 days from release. In two weeks plus a couple days, Elden Ring moved 1,000,000 copies in Japan
Video games tend to drop somewhere around 85% after week 1, and further after week 2 with that percentage going up for heavily pre-ordered games. For example, FFVII Remake dropped 88% after week 1. I'm gonna guess that Elden Ring moved around 800,000 copies in Japan week 1. If we apply the 0.55 ratio of FFXVI pre-orders to Elden Ring pre-orders, we get 440,000 units sold in Japan for week 1. For reference, FFXV sold around 700,000 week 1 in Japan.
So here's the tricky part- extrapolating what percentage of FFXVI copies will be sold in Japan. For reference, 700,000 of FFXV's 5 million launch copies were sold in Japan, about 1/7th or 14%. Since then, Japan's share in the global gaming market has further shrunk. I'm going to be conservative here and guess that 1/8th of FFXVI's launch week sales will come from Japan. Honestly I would not be surprised to see this number shrink to 1/10th, but let's be conservative.
So we take our 440,000 of projected FFXVI Japan week 1 sales and multiply it by 8 to get our worldwide launch week total, and we get 3.5 million copies sold. Honestly, this sounds about right to me. It's about 70% the launch sales of FFXV, but FFXV was multiplatform whereas FFXVI is PS5 only.

Just purchased a 2021 ILX A-Spec Premium with 12k miles sight unseen. White with black interior for $26,999. I wanted the red leather but they were all over 29k with low mileage. We were looking for small sedan with good mpg for city driving. We already have a Palisade Calligraphy. I’ve loved Acuras my whole life but never got around to purchasing one in my 48 years. There seems to be no aftermarket support for this vehicle so I guess I’m limited to throwing on some Continental or Michelin summer tires and calling it a day.

[TW] [TL;DR] I'm extremely helpless and lonely. I feel like I don't even have the strength to cope up w life for even one more day. I'm breaking inside and struggling with terrible anxiety and depression since the last 6 years. Everyday I thought it'll get better someday but trust me, it has only gotten worse. I'm an intern (doctor) and I'm working wholeday in the hospital. Being busy helps though. But I have no friends. There's nobody to call when I feel like I need to talk or I'm not okay. Had a few, they all back-stabbed me.. talked so much shit behind me that I couldn't take it being w them. My cousins who's been the closest to me and we live together since birth, took my phone, opened my whatsapp through web in my dad's laptop, and showed my dad my entire fucking chats with every person I know; including my sexchats w my boyfriend; i was sleeping and they unlocked my phone thru my fingerprint, opened vault and showed all my photos with my bf some of which were not even suitable for him to see... I have major TRUST ISSUES and I'm an introvert...
I'm in a relationship since the last 3 years and been bestfriends since 4.5 yrs. If there's any song, any phrase or any example that'd explain you enough how much I love that guy, I'd mention that. I've loved him with my entire might, soul, every last piece of anything to give was left within me, I've given that to him... in return I do have a lot of happy memories... happy days... sadly, story isn't that good. I've been abused. Emotionally, mentally and physically. (Physically, not sexually) I've been hurt physically, slapped, outside in public too and in closed rooms too, called names, told things that gives me chills to even think about. I was told "I wish your parents never planned to have you. You are their biggest mistake and now they live miles away but I'm the one tolerating their shitty outcome." I was also told "You should die. Nobody cares. I don't. Bcoz if you don't, I know I'll kill myself as being w u is a torture." I spent so many nights crying bcoz he'd treat my like this, I couldn't sleep but after all this, he'd sleep peacefully beside me. I get terrible panic attacks now and I'm hyper-defensive if somebody criticises me bcoz I have it enough already; he says "na shakal di, na dimaag diya, teri jagah main hota main ab tak sharam se hi marr jata but tu kaise muh utha ke jee rahi hai." I am underconfident but I try to be ambitious and trust myself; he'd say "tujhse kuch nahi hoga life mai."
He has PTSD, he lost his mom 6 years back and never recovered. But he refuses to take any therapy. But the same man also told me that he cannot imagine his life without me and he loves me.
I loved him so much. I did everything I had the ability to do. I gave him surprises bcoz he said he has never had birthday parties before. I cook him food bcoz he doesn't have a mother to do that and he says he never feels home at his home... so I tried my best to make his new flat very homely. I set it up... I respected him always... assured him as much as I could that however life's gonna be, I'll stand by you... in DKI's sense, totally loved him like I'd love a child sometimes bcoz my poor heart couldn't take that how much pain he had endured in his young age... i dont make enough money, rent, transportation sab mila kar barely khaane ka paisa bachta hai... but whenever I see a sale, I shop for him... the minute he says he doesn't feel good, I'd find ways to make his day better...
He lies to me. A lot. He's lied a lot in the past and that got me trust issues. Major major trust issues. And he hates me for the fact that I cannot trust him...
Guess what? I am the DOORMAT. and I know if you'll have read it so far, you guys have started hating me too probably... or feeling disgusted by my story
But I'm sorry... I dont have anyone to talk to and I feel like giving up on life.

June 3, 2023
Todays Chisme I Dryer Then Winds From Lobbock Tx.
Yesenia gave alive sacando las garras de even with basic questions . Se hace que le van a decir que se busque trabajo en serio muy pronto.
So apparently she will sale all her unwanted worn down clothing in the plaza de Sain Alto 🛑
Ma’am’s las del Rancho won’t fit into your clothes first of all. Second of all Ma’am’s you’ll be complaining about not having clothes cause According to you selling used clothes es un emprendimiento. Y eres bien movida.
No her wearing the depression Pjs that made her reddit famous . Lol 😆😂👍🏼
Not Annie making sure JULIAR accounts for her newest mini split that according to JULIAR la Annie scammed her followers for the other one’s already in her house during the hate campaign . Allegedly. “I SAID WHAT I SAID AND I WON’T TAKE BACK”
PSA ANNIE when doing your filtros don’t do to many head movements. It throws me off Cause I see your filtro lashes next to your temples. Just stay in one position when using multiple filters. Just an observation. 🤭🫣🫢
Not JULIAR doing a get ready with me in pink mode TIK TOK live . Going to get lit 🔥 with her beasties . Pa se acuerden todas la que le dicen Bestie . Is only the hook 🪝 so you can pay for PPV chisme de mexico 🇲🇽. She is already set with her bestie . No se hagan ilusiones por ni en el mundo 🌎 las haces solo cuando renovan las subscription. Allegedly
It’s funny because they say “we can do with her money whatever we want and we can give it to whoever we want.” Yeah you can. 👍🏼
So can we be gossiping here and there of who we want and when we want. Cada quien mi buen.
Not the neck La marca del tóxico.
Cringe 😬. Pa que digan los que anda detrás de la JULIAR . Tiene dueño here is my stamp lol 😆 asco 🤢 antes nos se lo iso a lado de la verruga . “I SAID WHAT I SAID AND WON’T TAKE IT BACK “
We had no Parientes make appearances today. Ni las primas 1.0 2.0 and last but not least 3.0.
Good night Roaches 🪳 Toxicas, Sin Que Hacer. Endeudadas Hasta Las Chanclas 🩴 Por Q Viven En USA 🇺🇸. Fan Club De La Yesenia.

Hey, hi, hello! ^{^}
I really need to get rid of some characters but I'm also saving up for a really big character!
Sooooo, EVERYONE outside of Main Mascots (a subfolder of mains) is for sale!
I am looking for (in order of most to least wanted)
Cashapp>art>character trades>physical items
https://toyhou.se/Dashireno/characters

Background info: 26F in TN, wrecked my old car in December of 22 and had to quickly buy a replacement car. I stupidly went alone to a dealership after finding a car on autotrader I wanted to take a look at. A 2021 Hyundai Elantra with 8600 miles.
I was talked into getting it that night. The car wasn't starting that night which the salesman assured me was due to the lights being left on. I bought it that night anyway. Yes I know I am stupid. I know in the future to get an inspection on a used vehicle before buying.
I took a loaner home that night. The salesman was texting me the next day saying that there were some "fuse" issues that needed to get looked at with Hyundai and they would schedule it but I could take it home in the meantime. I went and picked it up. Yes I know I am stupid.
I noticed the blind spot wasn't working and the reverse sensor wasn't either. These were the "fuse" issues. I scheduled an appt with Hyundai the soonest available in March. When I finally got it checked out by Hyundai (4 months after buying) they told me the car had been in a wreck (not on the CarFax) and there was no blind spot module and the bumper had bondo in it. Hyundai recommended replacing the bumper. That plus a new blind spot would cost $4,000.
I called the original dealership and spoke to them and they told me to take it to them to check it out. I brought it in and they had it for 3 weeks and they did replace the blind spot but that is it. I asked them to take back the car for what I paid for it (nicely) and he (nicely) said that they would not because it had been so many months. (This was because of scheduling issues with Hyundai)
I was okay(ish) with all that (except feeling stupid about the damaged bumper). Until I was cleaning out my trunk today and lifted the trunk liner and there was about two inches of standing water around the spare. I had noticed my stuff in the trunk kept getting moist but I assumed that I spilled something or a drink can had burst at some point. So there must be a leak somewhere, possibly in the damaged bumper?
Anyway, I don't feel like I should go back to the dealership because I feel like they are washing their hands of me and they won't fix it. (because they don't have to because it is an as is sale).
Here's the details of the sale: Purchase price: $25,500 Downpayment: $3,000 Taxes: $2,800 ish warranty: $2,500 (later refunded) Gap: $1,000 (refunded due to refinance) Insurance paid out on my totaled car: $8,000 Total financed in the beginning: $29,000 ish After the refunds and insurance money I now owe: $16,500 ish My monthly payment: $338.02
I don't want to keep the car any longer because of the sour taste in my mouth on the whole deal. I am wanting to downgrade cars and get something around $15k-$20k.
I want some advice on whether I should just keep my car or trade it in on something cheaper.
KBB says it is worth around 21,000. If I trade it in now, am I losing the original sales price (25,500) minus the current value (21,000) so 4,500? Or should I include the taxes as a loss too? Is this a lot to be out? My new monthly payment would be around $200, so would save $138 a month.
What are some other things to think about?

I owned a PS4 before, but it broke around 2021 after I played The Last of Us Part II. A few years have passed and my family found it appropriate to help me purchase a PS5 after completing my pre-medical education.
I'm definitely sure that I'm buying Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales ($26.60) along with Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered ($20.00). However, my family asked me if I wanted one more game. Of course, I said yes but am now stuck in decision paralysis. Here are my current choices, but I'm open to recommendations¹!

1. Ghost of Tsushima Director's Cut ($62.30)
2. Elden Ring ($42.75)
3. Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade² ($62.30)

In terms of the no-go's, I can't get God of War Ragnarok ($44.45) and Horizon Forbidden West ($35.52) since I haven't finished their prequels yet. However, I'm curious if their prices make them worth purchasing early. So... WSIB?
------------------------------------------------
¹ I like every genre, with the possible exception of sports and racing.
² For FFVII Remake, I'm definitely on the fence because I heard about the PS4 version having a free upgrade and only requiring $20 to get Intermission. This totals up to $50.17, which is much cheaper than Intergrade itself.
EDIT: I have decided on getting Miles Morales (+ the $20 upgrade) and Elden Ring! Given my existing catalogue from the PS4, I'm still holding out on PS Plus Extra for now. I'll sub to it come the next sale as it seems that it goes on sale quite often!

(I also posted this in /vegaslocals. If reposting here isn't allowed, I apologize, and feel free to take down).
Hey Everybody!!!
I just want to keep you in the loop on what’s going on with Oakland A’s owner John Fisher’s request to have the Nevada Legislature give him up to $380 million in public funds for a new stadium. The Legislative session ENDS MONDAY, which means that they will ram this through very quickly in the next 48 hours or so or call a special session.
NOW IS THE TIME FOR YOU TO SPEAK OUT!!!! I have put together a fairly well-documented argument below demonstrating that this is a bad deal and Fisher is a terrible partner. Please share this post and information as widely as you can! Most importantly, contact members of the Legislature and BE HEARD!!! Be sure to tell them that you live in Nevada!!!
Contact your Assemblyperson and State Senator!!
Assembly contact info: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/App/LegislatoA/Assembly/Current
State Senate Contact info: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/App/LegislatoA/Senate/Current
If you would like, you could use or modify this sample letter which contains URL links supporting the claims.

Dear Senator or Assemblyperson [Last Name], I am writing to express my strong opposition to the proposed public funding for John Fisher's baseball stadium in Nevada. I believe this project should be stopped for several reasons: Lack of transparency: Fisher and his team deliberately released funding details at the last minute and scheduled the only public hearing on Memorial Day evening, during a Golden Knights playoff game, limiting public awareness and participation. This is a shameful subversion of democracy and I hope you had no part in it. Neglected education system: Nevada ranks 49th out of 50 in educational attainment. Our focus should be on improving public schools, not funding a billionaire's stadium. Unrealistic economic projections: Expert analysis discredits the claim that the stadium will attract an additional 400,000 tourists, which, even if true, would only be a 1% increase on an annual basis. A Stanford economics professor expressed his belief that Fisher’s Stadium will result in the equivalent of a few hundred, permanent, long-term jobs. Fisher’s economic projections are detached from reality and unreliable. Fisher's history: His track record with the San Jose Quakes, another publicly funded stadium venture, raises concerns about his commitment to investing in player payroll and creating a competitive team. Fisher owns the Quakes. After he was given a public handout for a stadium, he did not change or competitively fund his soccer team. Troubled partnerships: Mark Davis of the Raiders, who shared the Oakland Coliseum with the A’s, has expressed frustration with Fisher's management group. MLB owners are also frustrated by doing business with Fisher. Nevada should expect to have the same experience if we proceed. I urge you to oppose public funding for John Fisher's stadium. Let's prioritize transparency, education, and responsible use of public funds for the benefit of all Nevada residents. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Please consider my perspective as you make your decision. Should you require further information or have any questions, I am available to discuss this issue. Sincerely, [Your Name]

Feel free to modify, expand or use as-is. You can also write your own letter too. I'm just trying to make this as easy as possible for everyone so that we are HEARD!
TLDR Bullet Points For Big Argument Below:

• Oakland A’s owner John Fisher, and team President Dave Kaval, strategically released details about stadium funding to minimize public awareness and participation. They released the legislation on Friday of Memorial Day weekend and the only public hearing was on Memorial Day during the Golden Knights playoff game.
• Fisher and Kaval failed to even show up at the Memorial Day hearing, demonstrating a lack of accountability and a disregard for public concerns. They have never publicly answered any questions.
• The prioritization of funding for a sports stadium over public education in Nevada, particularly the Clark County School District, is concerning.
• Economic projections presented by Fisher's lobbyists are questionable and disconnected from reality, as experts have pointed out.
• Fisher's history with the San Jose Quakes of Major League Soccer raises doubts about his commitment to investing in a competitive team with public funds.
• The low payroll of the A's compared to other MLB teams suggests a strategy of minimizing expenses for greater profitability.
• Mark Davis, owner of the Raiders and A's shared the Oakland Coliseum, expressed personal animosity towards Fisher and his management approach. Other MLB owners have expressed similar frustration about doing business with Fisher.
• Elected leaders should consider these concerns and prioritize the needs of the community over the interests of wealthy individuals.

PUBLIC FUNDING FOR JOHN FISHER’S STADIUM MUST BE STOPPED!!!!
1. They Don’t Want to Hear From You
Fisher and Kaval strategically waited until the 11th hour to release details about the handout. From USA Today:

The A’s, their cadre of lobbyists in Nevada and friendly politicians and tourist officials are doing their best to hide the sausage, introducing, finally, legislation for state funding of myriad projects on the Friday night of a holiday weekend, and then offering public discussion on the evening of Memorial Day. Pretty slick! And it sounds like Gov. Joe Lombardo’s signature would be waiting.

The only public hearing on giving away hundreds of millions of dollars occurred on Memorial Day. And not just on Memorial Day — it was in the evening during Game Six of the Western Conference Finals where the Golden Knights punched their tickets to the Stanley Cup Finals. A hearing at 4:00 AM on Christmas morning would have received a higher profile and greater public scrutiny.
They didn’t want you to know about the hearing and your opportunity to be heard. And if, by chance you did hear about it, they didn’t want you to be able to show up and be heard. They are not very subtle about their preference to not hear from you, the unwashed masses.
Guess who else wasn’t there? A’s owner John Fisher and President Dave Kaval. I am not making this up. They didn’t bother to show up to the Memorial Day hearing. They want us to give them hundreds of millions of dollars, but couldn’t be bothered to show up at the hearing and answer questions themselves? Where were they Monday night? What was so important they couldn’t be bothered to show up for a public hearing to answer questions in public? Fisher and his army of lobbyists have had weeks to meet privately with lawmakers behind closed doors. Are you telling me Fisher couldn’t give us regular folks two hours in public?
2. What Are Our Priorities?
There’s no way to sugarcoat it. Nevada, and in particular the Clark County School District, fail to provide adequate public education. Nevada ranks 49th out of 50 for educational attainment. Of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in the United States, Las Vegas ranks second worst for schools. This is unacceptable, yet real education reform is never a priority for the same politicians who are willing to pull the Memorial Day/Stanley Cup Playoff hearing shenanigans for Fisher.
If our elected officials can turn on a dime to hand out hundreds of millions of dollars to a billionaire for a sports stadium, why can’t they act with similar urgency for our disastrous public school system?
Our failed public schools, especially CCSD, are the most significant impediment to economic growth and diversification. The number one reason companies and individuals are reluctant to relocate to Las Vegas are our terrible public schools. If we want to create economic growth, we need to fund and fix our public schools, not build another billionaire a sports stadium.
3. The Numbers Don’t Make Sense. They’re Basically Fraud.
Whenever a billionaire asks the public to finance his stadium, the ask is always accompanied by a series of fantastical economic projections. If you watched the Memorial Day/Stanley Cup Playoff hearing, you saw a powerpoint presentation made by Fisher’s hired lobbyists. The numbers presented by Fisher’s lobbyists aren’t simply slightly embellished, they are disconnected from reality.
First, there is the claim that Fisher’s publicly funded stadium will bring an additional 400,000 tourists. John Mehaffey breaks down this non-sensical claim in the Nevada Independent:

The 400,000 number seems inflated to me. The A’s host 81 baseball games per year. This projection assumes 4,938 tourists at each game that would otherwise not be in Las Vegas. Considering only one American League market is within a reasonable driving distance, most of these tourists would fly to see their home team. Many or most of these tourists would go to two or three games in a series to justify this travel. If the average number is two games, that puts 9,877 visitors in the stadium per home game. If those fans go to an entire three-game series, that number is 14,815. If the 1.8 million locals attendance prediction is accurate, and visiting fans tend to go to a series as opposed to just one game, the A’s project that they will sell out the stadium's 35,000-seat capacity every home game. If visitors go to only two games, that is 90 percent of capacity. That is a bold projection for a team that was last in attendance in 2022 and at the bottom so far in 2023, especially since no MLB team comes close to selling out all its home games. The lack of flights makes 400,000 new visitors seem impossible Most teams that would visit the Las Vegas A’s stadium are in the American League. Most are in the east where nonstop flights to Las Vegas are scarce. For example, I found five or fewer nonstop flights per day from six of the other 14 American League cities. Four of those six teams had home stadium attendance below 20,000 per game in 2022. It’s hard to imagine that 10,000 or 15,000 fans will fly across the country for a series when that is around the average attendance for the 81 home games in their own cities. Some displaced fans may be within driving distance, but the point is one that needs to be considered. Las Vegas would need dozens of flights per series that don’t exist to accommodate this prediction.

Mehaffey also points out that Miami, which recently built a publicly financed stadium, also has 40 million visitors a year, just like Las Vegas. However, the Miami metro is substantially larger than Las Vegas. “In 2022, the Miami Marlins averaged 11,204 per game. A market with a much larger metro population that posts similar tourism numbers does not come close to the A’s projections. There is no reason to think Las Vegas will be different.”
Stanford economics professor Roger Noll agrees with Mehaffey that the attendance numbers Fisher projects are not credible. From USA Today:

“Baseball is different than the NFL,” Roger Noll, professor of economics emeritus at Stanford University, tells USA TODAY Sports. “This notion that of those 162 baseball games, I've got to see those three that are between the A's and the Royals in Las Vegas - it's just nonsense, right? It's not true, it's not going to happen. “That's the fundamental reason why economists, when they do research on the impact of sports teams, typically find that the effect on local incomes and employment is slightly negative.”

But what about job creation?

Noll says the hours that stadium workers put in – for 81 games a year – computes to roughly 15% of a full-time job. “So the 500 people who work at the stadium on game day, you got to multiply that by .15 to get the number of full-time equivalent jobs, which means it's less than 100. Wow,” says Noll. “You know, $1.5 billion to create less than 100 jobs, right? Wow.”

4. Grossly Underfunded Payroll
The total payroll for the 2023 A’s is just $59,630,474, just 37% of the MLB average payroll of $116,112,414 and just 17% of the highest-spending New York Mets ($345,474,042). To provide context, the highest paid players in the league, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander, will each make $43,333,333. Verlander’s salary, by itself, is 72% of the entire A’s roster!
This meager spending is by choice, not necessity. It’s a strategy that works. From Sports Illustrated:

The A's were a top-5 team in 2022. Not on the field. The A's finished with a 60-102 record, second-worst only ahead of the Washington Nationals. On the spreadsheets though, they netted $62.2 million according to a report from Forbes. The only teams they finished behind were the revamped Seattle Mariners who made the playoffs for the first time in two decades, the San Francisco Giants, the Boston Red Sox, and the Baltimore Orioles who had a Mariners-esque upswing and an A's-esque payroll.

When the A’s do develop talent, they quickly jettison those players to avoid paying them their true worth on the market. As Review-Journal columnist Ed Graney explained, when Fisher’s A’s have experienced success, the response has been to break down the team and sell off the parts. Graney concluded: “John Fisher is an owner with deep, deep pockets who (incredibly) has always acted in a way that he can’t afford to hand out exorbitant contracts to his best players. About him, an overwhelmingly popular opinion is that he simply doesn’t want to.”
Why do this? Wouldn’t a competitive team generate more revenue? In Major League Baseball, there is a revenue sharing agreement among the franchises, intended to help smaller markets field competitive teams. Fisher uses revenue sharing, and dumping talent, to be one of the most profitable owners in baseball. From the New York Post:

At least a few rival MLB club owners are annoyed at the Athletics for conducting a major fire sale to enhance their bottom line soon after being added as a new revenue-sharing recipient in a vote by owners. “The idea of revenue sharing is not to make money, it’s to field a competitive team,” one rival owner complained Thursday during the owners’ meetings at MLB headquarters in Midtown. “That money is supposed to go toward player salaries. [The A’s] took the money and put it in their pocket.” Yet another owner, also upset that the A’s didn’t use the money to buy new players, but instead did the opposite and sold three major stars and drastically cut their payroll, referred to the franchise generally as “a mess.”

Fisher will not fund a competitive team in Las Vegas if we give him a stadium handout. That would destroy his very profitable business strategy. Why would he do that? The payroll of the Las Vegas A’s will be 30th out of 30 MLB teams, just like the Oakland A’s.
5. History Repeating: Quakes Publicly Funded Stadium
There seems to be some hopeful thinking that if we give John Fisher a stadium handout, he will increase the A’s payroll to become more competitive. A’s President Dave Kaval stirred excitement when he insinuated that the franchise would bankroll a World Series championship team with a new stadium in Las Vegas. “But with more revenues, we want to turn a playoff team into a World Series team. That’s why we’re fighting so hard for a new stadium, whether it’s in Las Vegas or Oakland,” Kaval told the Review-Journal.
Many people, including our elected officials, want to believe this, in good faith. It would be awesome to have a Las Vegas MLB franchise win a World Series!
This isn’t Fisher’s first rodeo with a publicly funded stadium. Fisher is also the owner of the San Jose Quakes of Major League Soccer. From an Associated Press article in the May 25, 2006 Salinas Californian on public financing for a new Quakes stadium: “The Quakes won MLS championships in 2001 and 2003 led by former star forward Landon Donovan but attendance slid to an average of just 13,037 fans last season.” Sound familiar?
So what happened? Did Fisher increase player payroll once he obtained his publicly financed soccer stadium?
From the San Jose Mercury News:

Out of the 29 MLS teams, the Earthquakes rank 21st in guaranteed player compensation and base salary, both on a per-player and teamwide basis. The Earthquakes’ average salary came in at $434,079, nearly $100,000 lower than the overall average salary for an MLS player ($530,467). San Jose’s total spending ($13.022 million) comes in at more than $2.8 million below the average team spending across the league (15.822 million). It’s a continued trend for the Quakes, even after they moved into the state-of-the-art PayPal Park in 2015. The Earthquakes have consistently ranked in the bottom half of the league in spending, per Spotrac, even as the MLS has continued to add new expansion teams over the years. Earthquakes spending rank in MLS by year · 2015 (20 teams) — 15th · 2016 (20 teams) — 11th · 2017 (22 teams) — 16th · 2018 (23 teams) — 19th · 2019 (24 teams) — 19th · 2020 (26 teams) — 17th · 2021 (27 teams) — 24th · 2022 (28 teams) — 22nd · 2023 (29 teams) — 21st That has been reflected in on-field results, too. Since the Earthquakes moved into their new home, they have never finished a season with more wins than losses — the closest they came was in that first year, at 13 wins, 13 losses and eight draws.

Nevada should expect Fisher to act in the future as he has in the past. His business strategy is clear: spend as little as possible on player payroll regardless of venue. If Nevada gives Fisher a handout, nobody — nobody — can act surprised when his miserly payroll does not change.
The Raiders and A’s shared the Oakland Coliseum for decades. Aces and Raiders owner Mark Davis is very familiar with what it means to “partner” with John Fisher. Davis did not hold back when he spoke with the Review-Journal:

“I won’t forget what they did to us in Oakland. They squatted on a lease for 10 years and made it impossible for us to build on that stadium,” the Raiders owner said in a phone chat Thursday afternoon, referring to the stadium the A’s and Raiders once shared, the Oakland Coliseum. “They were looking for a stadium. We were looking for a stadium. They didn’t want to build a stadium, and then went ahead and signed a 10-year lease with the city of Oakland and said, ‘We’re the base team.’” … Davis was asked if he could envision an environment where the Silver and Black would cross-promote with the green-and-gold Las Vegas Athletics. “Not with that management group,” Davis said. “I just have, again, a lot of personal animosity toward the front office. But with a new management group? Absolutely.”

Mark Davis did business with John Fisher for decades. Davis knows Fisher. Nobody in Nevada has done business with Fisher as much as Davis. Davis’ reaction to Fisher, basically unfiltered instinctual revulsion, should be a massive red flag to our elected leaders who are being plied with sweet nothings by Fisher’s hired guns.
Sources:
“A’s Stadium Math Doesn’t Add Up.” The Nevada Independent, May 30, 2023. https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/as-stadium-math-doesnt-add-up.
Graney, Ed. “Graney: A’s Penny-Pinching a Reason for Las Vegas to Reassess.” Journal, March 18, 2022. https://www.reviewjournal.com/sports/sports-columns/ed-graney/graney-as-penny-pinching-a-reason-for-las-vegas-to-reassess-2547852/.
Gutierrez, Ana. “Nevada Ranks as the Second Least Educated State in America.” KLAS, February 17, 2022. https://www.8newsnow.com/news/local-news/nevada-ranks-as-the-second-least-educated-state-in-america/.
Jenkins, Bruce. “MLB Has Punished Other Owners. Why Is A’s John Fisher Getting a Pass?” San Francisco Chronicle, June 3, 2023. https://www.sfchronicle.com/sports/jenkins/article/john-fisher-mlb-oakland-18130516.php.
Katsilometes, John. “Raiders Owner Rips Oakland Athletics’ Likely Move to Las Vegas.” Journal, April 27, 2023. https://www.reviewjournal.com/entertainment/entertainment-columns/kats/raiders-owner-rips-oakland-athletics-likely-move-to-las-vegas-2765229/?xxyy.
Lacques, Gabe. “Why A’s Las Vegas Stadium Gambit May Be a Losing Bet: ‘It’s Just Nonsense.’” USA Today, June 1, 2023. https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/athletics/2023/06/01/oakland-as-move-las-vegas-stadium-gambit-losing-bet/70277528007/.
Lozito, Nick. “‘this Is Not Our Fault:’ Oakland A’s Fans Are Defending Their Image.” The Oaklandside, May 5, 2023. https://oaklandside.org/2023/05/01/oakland-athletics-leaving-las-vegas-john-fisher-dave-kaval-fans/.
“MLB 2023 Payroll Tracker.” Spotrac.com. Accessed June 3, 2023. https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/payroll/.
Oakland Athletics made over $60 million in 2023 - Sports Illustrated ... Accessed June 4, 2023. https://www.si.com/mlb/athletics/news/oakland-athletics-made-over-60-million-in-2023.
Shea, John. “Don’t Believe John Fisher’s Propaganda: A’s Fans Are the Best in Baseball.” San Francisco Chronicle, June 1, 2023. https://www.sfchronicle.com/sports/athletics/article/oakland-a-s-fans-aren-t-reason-team-las-vegas-18126429.php.
Simon, Alex. “Would New Oakland A’s Ballpark Lead to More Spending? John Fisher’s Other Team Shows That May Not Be the Case.” The Mercury News, May 17, 2023. https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/05/16/would-new-oakland-as-ballpark-lead-to-more-spending-john-fishers-other-team-shows-that-may-not-be-the-case/.
Wootton-Greener, Julie. “Las Vegas Area Schools Ranked Second-Worst in Nation for Quality.” Journal, December 9, 2021. https://www.reviewjournal.com/local/education/las-vegas-area-schools-ranked-second-worst-in-nation-for-quality-2493177/.

Let's make a list for the last 10 Years!
So I wanted to look at the last ten contests to draw out the essence from those shows, or at least what was the most enjoyable moments for me personally. At first I thought it was too big of a task to make one big mega ranking, giving points all over again to songs I've almost forgotten, but then I decided to do this a little methodically, so it became a little more doable. So first thing, I had to listen to all the songs. Or maybe not all songs, that would take weeks, but let's at least do the short version: recaps.
Nominating
My first task was to watch recaps from all shows to remember what songs were worthy and who was not good enough for such a list. I nominated X amount of songs from each year, depending on the quality of the songs. Then I ended up with 94 songs. The spread per year was as follows: 2014: 7 songs, 2015: 14 songs, 2016: 4 songs, 2017: 13 songs, 2018: 7 songs, 2019: 7 songs, 2020: 13 songs, 2021: 8 songs, 2022: 11 songs, 2023: 10 songs. Please note that since there was no contest in 2020 I was less familiar with these songs, so I had a lower threshold for nominating songs from this year. Also the number of songs nominated doesn't necessarily reflect my overall ranking of that contest as a whole.
​
Giving points
After finding what songs was nominated I watched each and every song (that I had nominated) once again in its entirety, then giving a somewhat honest score of how much I enjoy the song now. I used a 1-20 score, meaning I had more increments than I normally do when I score Eurovision songs on a 1-12 (-9&11) scale. That was to be able to make more distinctions between songs that were close to another, avoiding too many "point lumps". I also tried to avoid influence from how I initially rated the songs when they were released. I was actually quite happy to see that I both rated some songs higher and lower than what I did initially, meaning that my opinion on a song can change over time. I even found myself rating songs from 2023 different than how I rated them just a couple weeks ago. As for versions, I always try to find the best version, whether it's the music video, national final, semi final or grand final version. The lowest I ranked any song in this ranking was 9 points. Any song lower than that would not be able to make the nomination. Again most of the lower ranked songs was from 2020, since that was the year least familiar to me, with the most amount of songs falling outside my quality criteria. The average amount of points was 13,7. The median was actually right between 13 and 14. The spread was as follows: 9 points: 2 entries, 10 points: 4 entries, 11 points: 4 entries, 12 points: 12 entries, 13 points: 24 entries, 14 points: 17 entries, 15 points: 13 entries, 16 points: 9 entries, 17 points: 4 entries, 18 points: 3 entries, 19 points: 1 entry, 20 points: 1 entry
Fine tuning
Since this was about finding a top 20 list I then went back on all the songs I put up around 15-20 points and tried to split hairs between the different songs I had listed that high. This was the most enjoyable part, since the songs up there are so good, but it's also so difficult to distinguish different types of songs when you have a ballad, a medium tempo bop, an industrial techno song and a singer song writer folk song. I did end up with a list I feel good about though, so I will list it below from number 1-20 with a small text to why I like each song. I first make the list, then write a text to each below the list.
The List

1. Belgium 2017, Blanche - City Lights, 20 points
2. Estonia 2015, Elina Born and Stig Rästa - Goodbye to Yesterday, 19 points
3. Azerbaijan 2021, Efendi - Mata Hari, 18 points
4. Slovenia 2015, Maraaya - Here for You, 18 points
5. Serbia 2022, Konstrakta - In Corpore Sano, 18 points
6. Sweden 2014, Sanna Nielsen - Undo. 17 points
7. Iceland 2019, Hatari - Hatrið mun sigra , 17 points
8. Azerbaijan 2017, Dihaj - Skeletons, 17 points
9. Montenegro 2015, Knez - Adio, 17 points
10. Czechia 2023, Vesna - My Sister's Crown, 16 points
11. Italy 2015, Il Volo - Grande Amore, 16 points
12. Norway 2019, Keiino - Spirit in the Sky 16 points
13. Estonia 2017, Koit Toome and Laura - Verona, 16 points
14. Bulgaria 2016, Poli Genova - If Love was a Crime, 16 points
15. Portugal 2017, Salvador Sobral - Amor pelos dois, 16 points
16. Cyprus 2022, Andromache - Ela, 16 points
17. Ukraine 2021, Go_A - Shum, 16 points
18. Georgia 2015, Nina Sublatti - Warrior, 15 points
19. Austria 2016, Zoë - Loin d'Ici, 15 points
20. Spain 2015, Edurne - Amanecer, 15 points

​
Other songs that almost made the list: (Sweden 2022 Cornelia Jakobs-Hold me closer), (Ukraine 2016 Jamala-1944), (Denmark 2018 Rasmussen-Higher Ground),(Moldova 2020 Natalia Gordienko-Prison), (France 2022 Alvan and Ahez-Fulenn),(The Netherlands 2022 S10-De Diepte),(Finland 2023 Käärija-Cha Cha Cha), (Georgia 2023 Iru-Echo),(Latvia 2023 Sudden Lights-Aija),(Norway 2023 Alessandra-Queen of the Kings), (Spain 2023 Blanca Paloma-Eaea), (Ireland 2015 Molly Sterling-Playing with numbers), (Armenia 2017 Artsvik, Fly with me)
About each song

1. Blanche-City Lights. It was actually quite easy for me to put this on top, and it was the song I was the most sure about. I consider this song pure pop magic. Blanche's dark toned down vocals to the dark minor chords and the effective beat in a sort minimalist electro production is so effective on so many levels I don't know where to begin. I have listened to some of the other songs she has released after Eurovision, and she is a really gifted musician.
2. Elina Born and Stig Rästa-Goodbye to Yesterday. This almost cinematic singer songwriter tune with it's relatively trad arrangement reminds me of Lee and Nancy (Lee Hazelwood and Nancy Sinatra) who made some pretty cool albums back in the 6os and 70s. It almost has this road movie feel to it and is an ubercool feel and very melodic verse. Stig's toned down voice and Elina's emotional performance made it an instant hit. If you want to see where Elina got her idea from her Grand finale costume, take a look at Tura Satana from Russ Meyer's Faster Pussycat Kill Kill.
3. Efendi-Mata Hari. Actually everything about this song screams The Netherlands. It's song written by Dutch people about a Dutch spy performed in the Netherlands, it even charted in the Netehrlands. I wouldn't be surprised if Efendi actually has a Dutch grandfather or mother...;) Jokes aside, this oriental-ish bop is about as catchy and fiery and visually seductive as they come. There's no shortage of spice and sauce on this quality song or it's visual presentation. I still get thrown back in my chair everything I hear the "MATA HARI" opening.
4. Maraaya-Here for You. The opening suggests some sort of jazz ballad with Marjetka's vocal fry "When you're down down low..."over the minimalist piano intro. But then comes the drums and the key changes and the vocal sound and style changes just like that to a darker, more energetic melody before we get a more orchestrated version of the intro now as a chorus. The el violin, piano licks highlights this great song along with Marjetka's great voice. The bridge is not too bad either. There's actually a lot going on here so it's kind of hard to analyse, but the result is great. And you just gotta love Marjetka's head phone coupled with the wind machine with her ginger hair blowing in the wind.
5. Konstrakta-In Corpore Sano. This must be one of the more curious ESC songs of all time with it's relatively minimalist melody with Serbian lyrics about health and body fixation with its electronic choir like background vocals but it's the ultimate clap release chorus that makes us go "Biti zdrava" while we frenetically do a robotic golf clap that shows this strange song its appeal. It's just very cool and catchy, and it shows us all a side of ourselves we didn't know we had in us. Pure art, pure performance, pure magic.
6. Sanna Nielsen-Undo. A fantastic pop ballad with beautiful minor moods and a dramatic chorus, plus the archetypical modulation towards the end. One of those songs that simply stands the test of time and I can listen to over and over again. Sanna is a very good singer who focuses a lot on schlager type music in her repertoire. I prefer this over many other songs from Sweden. It might have to do with my preference for drama and sadness over joyful and cheery songs. If you look at the heritage of Abba and what made them good songwriters it had a lot to do with their knack for making these bittersweet type songs with both sadness and joyfulness to them. This is a good example of such a song.
7. Hatari- Hatrið mun sigra. How about sending an industrial techno song about how society will collapse? Why not? Iceland did it and they got away with it...;) At least almost as they got fined during the voting for showing a Palestinian flag during the voting. So the fine wasn't about the song. The song is very intense with it's hard electronic bassline with Matthias Haraldsson's distorted shouting in the verse, then to Klemens Hannigan's seductive and high, melodic singing in the chorus, making the contrast between the two singing styles extremely enjoyable and almost refined. The synth licks complementing the singing is also very well arranged. A true classic. Oh and I didn't even mention the visuals with the red blinking lights, the fire, the BDSM outfits that makes it look like some kind of alternative from East Berlin 1982.
8. Dihaj-Skeletons. 80s electro style pop tune with jet like bass synths backing an angelic voice and baroque like synth licks that comes in at the pre chorus part before it explodes into an energetic chorus. Very cool. Dihaj is also a very good singer with a good range. I never quite understood the staging at the contest though. I expected something completely different.
9. Knez-Adio. For me this is the quintessential Balkan ballad. The string arrangements, the soothing rhythm, the harmonic background vocals and the strong melody just blend together so well, and gives you images of mountains, rivers, waterfalls and works well into this mid tempo ballad with pretty minor chords and a pretty, sentimental delivery from Knez, who I think is one of the stronger vocalists the contest have seen.
10. Vesna-My Sister's Crown. So onto this year's only entry on this list. As much as I liked a lot of the songs from 2023, a lot of them ended around the 30th spot in this list. Vesna was my lone candidate actually ending up on the list. To me they were always this year's number one, with their anthem about sisterhood, whether it was about slavic sisterhood or not is not so important to me. It was the song itself that got to me. It probably hit at the right time since I've become very interested in Czech history, culture and language the last years as well. As someone who is into harmonic music with folk elements this really hit the spot for me. I was so happy to see their final performance with their long braids and pink jumpsuits, plus very good choreography. The dancing at the end of the song really got to me, and I still have to focus really hard not to get emotional everytime I see that part. Dobra prace, holky!
11. Il Volo-Grande Amore. Is it possible to get more Italian than this? And I mean it as a compliment. With great drama, big time forte this operapop schlager with grand voices hit big time in 2015 and won the popular votes of the contest. Some wondered if it would be too kitchy to send something so rooted in an ancient music style from the 17th century to a modern song contest that focuses greatly on visuals. The answer was an absolute no. I must admit that this was not among my favourites initially in 2015, but it slowly grew on me and now I really love it. The arrangement here is also interesting with a relativley monotonous bassline topped with the grand string arrangements that leads us to the crescendo.
12. Keiino-Spirit in the Sky. My own country's only entry for this list. Combing EDM and joik actually works, and it's mindblowing how catchy this song gets when all the voices come together in the chorus. The melody in the chorus is slightly similar to Saara Alto's Monsters from 2018, but the song itself is very different. The Sami culture is quite exotic and far away even for us Norwegians, and even though the song is not a Sami song per se, all the elements of joik, Northern lights and shaman symbolism sends us into this mystical journey into the far north of ice, snow and winter darkness.
13. Koit Toome and Laura-Verona. This pop love drama that uses Romeo and Juliet's city as it's background, was absolutely robbed of a place in the grand final when televotes gave it a 6th place in the second semi final while the juries only gave it 16 points, ending up 17th on the jury ranking, ultimately ending up only 14th on the combined list. As you can see, I have it higher on my Song of the decade-list than juries had it in that semi final. I also remember how bad the sound was, microphones not working, maybe even monitors not working when they were to perform in the semi final. For the best version of this song, watch the music video. The video of the semi final performance only makes me angry. Now, about the song itself, it's super catchy, almost anthemic in it's "o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o, we lost and we found our Verona" chorus. A great pop composition that has really stood the test of time.
14. Poli Genova-If Love was a crime. Another song that I didn't love at first, but that has really grown on me over time. A quite dance friendly pop tune with almost soul like elements in the chorus, with it's unison singing and that trademark dance that come along with the performance. The song starts with a piano backing track, drums and that flute like synth that plays some infectious riff that sounds like a bird whistle or something. The true genius of this song is the pre chorus when she sings the title of the song. That part has some fantastic harmony arrangements and a great melody. It also took me a while to understand that the chorus was sung in Bulgarian. I never really understood why she sang "All I'm in Luther, I'm in Luther"...;)
15. Salvador Sobral-Amor pelos dois. The only winner song on this list. When I made this list I didn't actually believe that this song would make it onto the top 20, but here it is! Some look at this as a sentimental journey back to old style Eurovision with no electronic music, no dancers, no smoke machines, basically nothing fancy going on whatsoever, and to some people, maybe even boring. I just look at this as a very pretty song about love that is sung in the prettiest and most heartfelt way possible. At the time of the final Salvador Sobral was due to a heart transplant caused by a weak heart, so at the time of the performance there where doubts about how long he could survive. Fortunately this looks like it has succeeded, and the performances I've seen of him since he looks a lot more healthy than he did in 2017. Thank god.
16. Andromache-Ela. My second NQ on the list. It's claimed that the reason she didn't go the final was due to a bad vocal performance in the semi final, but it was the juries that really put her down with only giving her 9 points, and juries don't go off the televised performance do they? Or was it only in the grand finale that there's an extra jury performance? Anyhow, this beautiful Greek-balkan style pop song really deserved a lot more than it got from the juries and should have been in the grand finale. Pretty and delicate strings opens up before a pop track emerges with Andromache's pretty voice singing a heavenly melody and the super catchy chorus sends us straight to the Greek gods of lush voices and soft femininity. Nice use of echo and reverberation in this track.
17. Go_A-Shum. Ukrainian techno folk sang entirely in Ukrainian is just one of these things I never imagined myself that I would enjoy, and going into then final I considered this song more of a curiosity than a song that I would thoroughly enjoy, but I was wrong. Folk music always takes a bit of a different ear to enjoy than "normal pop". The style of singing and the rhythm has a monotonous, almost chanting feel to it, and can sound off to many western ears. Yet this song really hit a nerve with me eventually. I just love what Ukraine has done to Eurovision, and I hope they keep sending great songs like this.
18. Nina Sublatti-Warrior. A very powerful song with great attitude. A bumblebee like synth opens up before we have tribal drums and Nina singing about fighting and something about "oximated". It doesn't matter cause I believe everything she sings anyway. The chorus comes in hard and powerful with Nina singing her heart out and again those big drums. A pretty straight forward angry war-pop song, but very haunting and no-nonsense. My ESC universe is better with songs like these. Arguably the best song from Sakartvelo we've had, even though Iru challenged her pretty good this year.
19. Zoë-Loin d'Ici. How many entries has there been that is sung in a language that is not a national language that is not English? I have watched the movie The Piano Teacher which is an Austrian movie where the dialogue is in French, but I've never had the impression that Austria had this thing about the french langauge or what? Nevermind, Zoë's tune Loin d'Ici is a dreamy, heavenly pop song with an amazing melody and stellar rhythm arrangement. I recognise her vocal style more as French than Austrian, but that could be the language. Anyway I'm not complaining, cause I'm a big fan of french vocals in the first place. This would fit in a movie I think with it's rich colourful style it could paint a faraway country in your dreams in a very nice way.
20. Edurne-Amanecer. The sixth entry from 2015, so I guess that year wins it for me. And even though this song sounds very Spanish to me it's actually composed by Swedish composers. It has an ethnic style with a big dramatic chorus and a melody in minor chords. This is the same year Grande Amore from Italy and even though the songs are quite different I do also see similarities with the big crescendo like chorus and the songs being sung in each country's national language. It didn't perform very well in the final with only 15 points, of which 8 came from neighbours France and Portugal. Big countries also have neighbours! However in my opinion this is the best Spanish entry the last 10 years, even though I both nominated 2022 and 2023 also, so it's safe to say that things are moving in the right direction.