Sandie Shaw sang her way to victory for the United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest 1967, with her sweet little song “Puppet on a String”. It was the United Kingdom’s first win at Eurovision, and the first time a song in English won the contest. Despite reportedly disliking the song, Sandie captured the hearts of Europe with lyrics such as “If you say you love me madly, I’ll gladly be there, like a puppet on a string.”
Well, it appears that recently Sandie has cut those strings—and by doing so she lost her clothing as well. In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Sandie talked fondly about her Caribbean vacations with her third husband.
“The first thing I do is I take all of my clothes off and have a spiced rum and fresh coconut water with my husband on the outside deck of our friends’ house in Secret Harbour,” she said.
From what I can tell, Sandie seems to enjoy showing off her “Secret Harbour” after a nice little drink. Perfectly understandable: the combination of spiced rum and tropical weather is best enjoyed by being completely naked in an outdoor setting.
Her actual revelation was relatively low key, or as low key as one can get when talking about nudity. When asked about the best place to stay in the area, Sandie replied, “With me! But be warned: we’re nudists.” She certainly gets points for directness, and it’s polite to give a fair warning. That sight might be quite the shock to a newcomer. From her interview it appears that it may just be a “vacation thing” with her hubby, but whatever the case may be, I applaud her for being herself and “letting loose”, if you know what I mean.
However, this story leads me to ponder one serious question. Would a nude performer in the contest today qualify for the Barbara Dex Award? Or are clothes a prerequisite? Let us know your thoughts with a comment below!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfeiCaRJgMY
It seems to have started with just her shoes, but gradually more clothing (and strings) came off.
Photo: The Guardian
Zachary Thomas is Wisconsin-based correspondent for WiwiBloggs.com. Follow him on Twitter @CheerZach. Then follow the team from wiwibloggs.com on Twitter at @wiwibloggs to keep up with the latest Eurovision news and gossip!
@ Padraig – Not at all, if you apply sunscreen all over your “very sensitive areas”.
@Alex: Live instruments, yes, maybe; so long as it isn’t a house band/orchestra. If the artist is a band or has a backing band, let the band play live. Is it just me, or does anyone else think it is long overdue for the ESC to move the time limit to 4 minutes? The 3-minute limit was imposed at a time (1950s and ’60s) when most hit records hardly lasted much longer than 2:30. Nowadays, 3:00 is a radio edit time length for a song that might be longer than 4:00 (or longer than 6:00 if it’s a dance tune).… Read more »
@Bogdan but do you not run the risk of getting sun burn in some very sensitive areas if you go sunbathing in the nip? A sun burnt back is bad enough, but a sun burnt … it doesn’t bear thinking about!
I don’t see the issue… Once you go sunbathing nude, you’ll understand, Zachary.
It’s still fair to give a warning, but to those who don’t leave the city very often, TMI, lady, TMI.
Watching this clip reminds me of my sentiment that we need to bring back live instruments to Eurovision… Bulgaria 2007 vs. Bulgaria 2013 is a good example of why: in 2007, the drums were very much mic’ed while in 2013 this wasn’t really the case, and the authenticity of the performance suffered as a result. This is a “song contest,” not exclusively a “singing contest” – elements of a song other than vocals are quite relevant, and we shouldn’t be judging every entry as though it were a performance by Witloof Bay. Slovenia 2009 (Quartissimo) is another obvious example. Also,… Read more »