The Retro 1974 Second Chance competition is now entering its final phase after being announced late January. But before I explain what has transpired over the last few months, here’s a brief reminder of what this competition is all about.

The Second Chance Retrospective Contest started in 2003 with the purpose of looking back at songs from Eurovision National Finals that were not selected to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest (thereby giving the songs a “second chance” to represent their country), starting with entries competing for Eurovision 1986. The eventual winner of the 1986 Retro Second Chance crown was Deedee singing Fata Morgana from The Netherlands.

Each year since, the Retro Contest has gone back 1 year further, so 2004 voted on the 1985 entries, 2005 on the 1984 entries, and so on. However, not all currently participating countries and OGAE clubs participated in the Eurovision Song Contest back then or held a National Final, so as of 2004, the Guest Jury Hits category was introduced, which allowed entries from these countries without National Finals to choose another song which were released in the same Retro year, but were not affiliated to Eurovision. Each Retro year therefore has a Eurovision Retro winner and a Guest Jury Hits winner. OGAE Rest of the World won the Guest Jury Hits category last year for the 1975 entry, Only Yesterday by The Carpenters, and we are now looking to defend our title with a 1974 entry.

So where are we at….
On 28 February 2015 OGAE Rest of World members voted for their favourite 10 songs from one of three categories (Rock, Pop and Easy Listening), each containing approximately 40 songs. Based on the results of this round of voting, a total of 24 songs were short-listed, the top 8 from each of the three categories.

Another round of voting then took place and a winning song was selected to represent OGAE Rest of the World in the Retro 1974 Second Chance competition.

The winning entry was KUNG FU FIGHTING by Carl Douglas of Jamaica.

While we have been in the process of selecting our song to represent us, other OGAE fan clubs have been doing the same.

Next step
Soon we will get to vote for our favourite 1974 retro song from all the finalists. All the songs will be posted to a website and you’ll be able to listen to each one and cast your vote. Stay tuned for further voting details.