Much Like Monarchy and Film Adaptations of Rebecca, America Should Really Not Attempt to Do Eurovision

There is one perfect thing on this Earth, and that single thing is Eurovision, the yearly song competition that allows an ever-in-flux number of European countries, along with Israel and Australia to attempt to one-up each other with pop music, to weird and delightful results. And just as Texas-style barbeque restaurants make absolutely no sense on the Continent, Eurovision in America is going to be tacky in a bad way, rather than tacky in the greatest way possible. Please, President Biden, let this serve as an official plea to keep the boring and bad pop competitions we already have, instead of giving Europe one more thing to hold over our heads as doing incorrectly.

Apparently, this Eurovision-backed project called American Song Contest will air on NBC in 2022 and feature one “incredible solo artist, duo, DJ or a band” to perform an original song from each of the 50 states, five U.S. territories, and D.C. But what concerns me is that America, as is its wont, will take this missive humorlessly, and every armpit of the country will try and send the closest it has to an Ariana Grande or Kacey Musgraves, when they should be giving us Yank versions of Jedward and A.B.B.A. We already have The Voice for this sort of search, and it’s boring! It does make one wonder if the whole of Europe isn’t doing this on purpose for their own mean little amusement, especially since its the brainchild of just a few people called Anders Lenhoff, Peter Settman, Christer Björkman, and Ola Melzig, who bought the rights to an American version off the European Broadcasting Union, which has fine-tuned the format for Eurovision over the past 65 years.

But I suppose I will be watching the American Song Contest the same way I consume Eurovision each year—day drunk and shouting at a television in a dive bar crowded with stranger friends, rooting for the weirdest act to win it all.