Belgium: It’s Hooverphonic for Eurovision 2020
Belgium marks the first country to select its Eurovision 2020 representative! Flemish speaking Belgian national broadcaster, VRT, has announced that Hooverphonic will represent the country at the 65th edition of Eurovision Song Contest in Rotterdam.
As the preparation ofr the next Eurovision song contest are in full swing in The Netherlands country the first revealed Eurovision representative comes from the neighbour coutry of Belgium, as Hooverphonic have been officially announced as the country’s next Eurovision act.
The member of the group, Alex Callier, Raymond Geerts and Luka Cruysberghs, are working on their Eurovision entry this period. The song will be in English and will go public at the beginning of 2020.
A Few words about Hooverphonic
The Belgic band Hooverphonic was created in October 1995. Although initially it was known as a trip – hop band it quickly started to include alternative, electo, electro-pop and other sounds. The group started out as Hoover, a name used by other groups too, and switch to the name Hooverphonic αφού in orde to avoid legal complications.
On October 10, 2008 the band’s leading vocalist , Geike Arnaert , announced that she will leave the group opting for a solo career. Hooverphonic’s last concert took place on December 13, 2008 at Tele-Club in Ekaterinburg, Russia. This last concert was recorded by Russian MTV and was broadcast on Russian TV in 2009. In October 2010 Hooverphonic decided Noémie Wolf as Geike’s successor, a choice that was officially announced during the De Laatste Show on VRT. However on March 26,2015 the group revealed that Noémie will leave the group. On April 2018 the band found its new leading vocalist, Luka Cruysberghs.
The group’s major hit was the song entitled Mad About You, which reached high chart positions in European Countries and Australia.
The Eurovision Story So Far
Belgium is one of the countries to have participated in the Eurovision SOng Contest since its first edition back in 1956. After 30 years the country achieves to win the contest in 1986 with the 13 yo Sandra Kim and her entry “J’aime la vie“.
The country has finished last in the contest 8 times while in two of these occasions didn’t receive any point at all. In 2003 with the group Urban Trad and their song “Sanomi” it almost reached its second victory finishing in the 2nd place, only two points behind Turkey and Sertab Erener with her entry “Every way that I can“.
Although the country has managed to qualify to the final 5 times the last decade, with Loïc Nottet in 2015 and Blanche in 2017 achieving the best results coming 4th in the final, the last two years it hasn’t been that story. Last year with Sennek and “A matter of time” , failed to reach the final although the juries ranked her 9th in her semi final. In 2019 internally selected Eliot represented the country in Tel Aviv with his song “Wake up” which failed to reach the grand final.
