Editorials & Opinion

Xtra’s Pick of the 21st Century

It’s Friday so it’s time for a not so deep dive in Eurovision history. Today, Nick takes us back to one of his favourite entries from one of his favourite Eurovision years…

Latvia 2003: F.L.Y. – Hello From Mars (24th place)


The video above is the video with German commentary, a video I chose because of a comment made by the commentator, Peter Urban: “Latvia may well be the most successful Eurovision country of all.”
A comment that at that time seemed reasonable: Three participations and that included a third place for Brainstorm and a victory for Marie N the year before. She brought the Contest to Skonto Hall where the host country was represented by Mārtiņš Freimanis, Lauris Reiniks and Yana Kay.
Their song was seen as one of the favourites to keep us in Riga for another year and rightfully so. Nice harmonies, a great performance, some good vocals and the charm of being the host nation. Surely that meant another top five at least for the Latvians?
Well… Nope. This great entry finished in a miserable 24th place with just five points, all from their Estonian friends. To be quite honest, I still don’t get the score this got. Sure, 2003 was a great year. Sure, the competition was fierce. But 24th?
It’s no wonder the Latvians sort of lost hope after this and managed to send things like I Hear Your HeartProbka and What For? to Eurovision in the years after. I can only hope that Latvia hang on to Aminata’s great result in 2015 and send another song just like Hello From Mars, because Latvia have the ability to win Eurovision again, really soon.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Back to top button