Today NBC have announced that Wyoming’s Ryan Charles and ‘New Boot Goofin’ has earned redemption to the Semi-Finals. Meanwhile tonight will see the Live Qualifiers Part 5 episode of the inaugural American Song Contest take place. Earlier the 11 songs taking part tonight were released ahead of the show that will see eleven acts compete for more places in the Semi-Finals, as well as the full televote results from Part 4!
‘New Boot Goofin’ all the way to the Semis!
Earlier today in a special announcement during The Kelly Clarkson Show, Kelly and fellow host, Snoop Dogg announced the first of two acts from the Non-Qualifiers, that will receive redemption and advance to the Semi-Finals. As the artist currently with the highest number of streams, Wyoming’s Ryan Charles has earned redemption for ‘New Boot Goofin’.
It’s amazing. For everybody that, you know, they didn’t want to hang up the boots yet and for me to come back, it’s a blessing for me.
Ryan Charles, (The Kelly Clarkson Show)
American Song Contest – Live Qualifiers Part 5
Tonight the fifth qualifier round from the Universal Studio Lot in California takes place with the help of hosts, Kelly Clarkson and Snoop Dogg. In total 11 states/territories will compete. Below are the states and territories participating and their songs. Once again the jury will save their favourite to advance to the Semi-Final. Meanwhile the remaining acts have to wait to find out which three will advance in the combined jury and public televote. The latter consisting of TikTok, online voting and the NBC App.
- American Samoa – Tenelle – ‘Full Circle‘
- California – Sweet Taboo – ‘Keys to the Kingdom‘
- Guam – Jason J. – ‘Midnight‘
- Idaho – Andrew Sheppard – ‘Steady Machine‘
- Illinois – Justin Jesso – ‘Lifeline‘
- Maryland – Sisqó – ‘It’s Up‘
- Michigan – Ada LeAnn – ‘Natalie‘
- Missouri – HALIE – ‘Better Things‘
- New Mexico – Khalisol – ‘Drop‘
- North Carolina – John Morgan – ‘Right In The Middle‘
- Vermont – Josh Panda – ‘Rollercoaster‘
Originally Brett Seper was the Missouri representative with, ‘Can’t Stay Away’, however it was announced this week that HALIE would be the replacement act for unknown reasons.
Live Qualifiers Part 4 – Recap
Last week the show kicked off with the remaining results from the Live Qualifiers Part 3 episode. Also advancing to the Semi-Finals are, Riker Lynch – ‘Feel The Love‘ (Colorado), Ni/Co – ‘The Difference‘ (Alabama) and Grant Knoche – ‘Mr. Independent‘ (Texas).
At the end of the show Washington’s Allen Stone and his song, ‘A Bit of Both‘ was put forward to the Semi-FInals by the jury. Later tonight we will find out the fate of the remaining acts! In a change to the format, the jury results were revealed in a live scoreboard after each performance. Below are the full jury results ahead of being combined with the televote tonight. Get to know all the participants further in our deep dive here.
| State | Artist | Song | Jury Result |
| Washington | Allen Stone | ‘A Bit of Both’ | 1 |
| Massachusetts | Jared Lee | ‘Shameless’ | 2 |
| Nevada | The Crystal Method | ‘Watch Me Now’ | 3 |
| Pennsylvania | Bri Steves | ‘Plenty Love’ | 4 |
| West Virginia | Alexis Cunningham | ‘Working On A Miracle’ | 5 |
| Georgia | Stela Cole | ‘DIY’ | 6 |
| Utah | Savannah Keyes | ‘Sad Girl’ | 7 |
| New Hampshire | MARI | ‘Fly’ | 8 |
| Hawaii | Bronson Varde | ‘4 You’ | 9 |
| Arizona | Las Marias | ‘De La Finikera’ | 10 |
| Washington, D.C. | NËITHER | ‘I Like It’ | 11 |
The American Song Contest will air on NBC, and begins at 8pm Eastern US time or 1am GMT, 2am CET and 11am AEDT.
Format
The American Song Contest premiered on March 21 and runs for eight weeks on (local) Monday nights. Atlantic Records will publish the songs at midnight in batches during each week. With 56 competitors – spanning the 50 states, 5 territories and Washington D.C, the acts will take part across five qualifying rounds. Each round will contain 11 acts with one round having 12. Following the qualifying rounds, 20 acts plus two wildcards will see a total of 22 acts in the two-part Semi-Finals and the 10 song Grande Finale. There, one state or territory will receive the crown of Best Hit Song on May 9th. Yes, during Eurovision week!
American Song Contest
With the American Song Contest confirmed, the Eurovision brand has crossed the Atlantic in a massive way. Of course, Netflix released a surprise hit film about the contest, titled Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga in 2020. You can read our team’s thoughts on the movie here. As well as this, Logo TV aired Eurovision across the pond from 2016-2018.Plans for the contest were in the making for a while, with Christer Björkman announcing in March that talks were ongoing.
The first reports about the ideas came out in May 2019, with both Björkman and Ola Melzig hosting a press conference. Ola Melzig is also involved in the first edition for 2022. Soon after the first announcement, organiser Peter Settman confirmed that multiple broadcasters had an interest in the rights, before NBC eventually secured the rights. Meanwhile 14 international broadcasters are showing the contest, including SVT, RTVE, NRK, among others.
Who are your favourites so far in the American Song Contest? Let us know! Be sure to stay updated by following @ESCXTRA on Twitter, @escxtra on Instagram and liking our Facebook page for the latest updates! Also, be sure to follow us on Spotify for the latest music from your favourite Eurovision acts. As well as YouTube to see our reactions to the news in the run up to the 2022 contest in Turin!
