Today she released her eighth studio album Soulsville and celebrated with a performance on The One Show.
And afterwards BRIT Award winner Beverley Knight found the time to chat with wiwibloggs outside of BBC Broadcasting House in London.
In May the West End diva watched Eurovision for the first time in three years and had plenty to say about this year’s results — and our suggestion that she sing at Eurovision for the United Kingdom.
Scroll down for video
Beverley, who has made critically acclaimed turns in the musicals The Bodyguard and Cats, says she was a bit confused about Australia’s participation.
“I was like, ‘Australia?’ I thought Australia was great, but the last time I checked I’m sure my geography teacher told me Australia is not in Europe,” she says.
“But anyway Australia had a great entry. I wasn’t so sure about the winner. And Sweden were brilliant hosts.”
Would the “Shoulda Woulda Coulda” hitmaker have a go at Eurovision if the BBC asked her to compete?
She nods her head no.
“We wouldn’t win, so what’s the point? Because no one wants to vote for us.”
“They ain’t gonna try and vote for us. They don’t like us. Whatever we come with they’re not going to vote for us. But I still watch because it’s a good laugh.”
What do YOU think? Would you like to hear Beverley’s soul stylings at Eurovision? Let us know in the comments box below.
Im so done with this “they don’t like us so they won’t vote for us” thing, the UK just simply doesn’t take the Eurovision seriously enough. If they’d actually put more effort into their entries they’d have a bigger chance of being successful at esc.
First the professional jury’s voted for Dami, then Justin Timberlake praised Dami and now Beverley knight says Dami was the best! It shows deep down most people (putting their own agendas aside) thinks Dami from Australia was the real winner in Eurovision 2016. Her voice is so beautiful, effortless and pure, it’s incredible. She is also so down to earth and caring. Instead of cashing in on her fame, she goes to Uganda to do charity work! There’s no one else that can sing like her in Australia and I don’t think I will ever see someone like that again… Read more »
@Darren
I totally agree, Israel was in my top 3 in 2014 🙂
RIGHT WAY OF THINKING BEVERLY LOL bye felicia we dont even need u in eurovision
Israel should have qualified in 2014! That was such a farce that they didn’t. Not only did the stunning Mei not qualify, she came like dead last.
“Same Heart” will always be my favourite Israeli entry. How come that failed but “Golden Boy” made the Top 10?? “Golden Boy” was good, but Mei was so much better I think. :/
Mei Finegold was in my top 10 in 2014.
@James
it is sound funny
@Glorious
Yes i guess 🙂
@OR
I think Israel is one of the very few countries broadcasting the contest that has no commentators.
@James
Exactly. Israel’s failure to qualify in 2014 remains a mystery for me though. I understand why fan favorites like Croatia 2010, Slovenia 2012 and even Iceland 2016 failed to qualify but Israel 2014 was a big shock for me.
Well I think tradition is a big part…it’s Saturday night ( or tues/thurs) night entertainment and they make fun of it in order to pull in drunken viewers…in turn the drunken viewers keep coming back because of the commentary. I can’t deny sometimes it’s funny and I actually watched the youtube feed without commentary for this year and it did seem strangely flat just because I am waiting for graham’s comments. On the other hand I felt more like I was watching a contest instead of just an entertainment show.
@James @Glorious
I do not understand why the u.k. still have Commentators to the eurovision … its like Old Tradition or something??… its strange for me .. eurovision is not like football game..
There are no rules in music just different taste …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIuK7vCVM34 At least in 1983 the British Commentator said good things about Israel entry 🙂
@Glorious
I totally agree unfortunately the BBC make it very clear who they feel you should vote for…casual viewers are unlikely to vote for songs that were ridiculed before they were even heard. I remember in Israel 2014 Scott Mills laughing about the line in skinning you our and basically ridiculing the entry. It was odd given it was a big favourite.
@James
Commentators mustn’t be subjective so that they don’t influence the final result of the televote of each country. Here in Greece, the commentators don’t express their personal opinion or if they do, they don’t make it too obvious. For example, they say “I don’t really like this song” but they don’t (and they shouldn’t) say “I hate it, it’s awful”. The UK commentators should be careful on what they say…
“Same Heart” was good, but a very boring performance , and it was cold, unenjoyable, and forgettable in that semi. If you already knew the song, it’s hard not to be biased , it’s a good song. But it’s one of this things where people who never heard the studio version and only saw what they saw on the night were simply not going to remember it. For me, it was not a surprise it didn’t qualify. And rightly or wrongly (and in keeping with the British attitude for this topic), the UK commentator made fun of the lyrics and… Read more »
@OR
Nice to hear that 🙂
@Glorious
I do not hate anybody, you just exaggerating yesterday with harsh words you wrote.
I hope you learn from that a very big lesson.
I appreciate the maturity you are showing now 🙂
I appreciate the maturity you are showing no
@OR
Thank you, Israel is one of my favorite countries at Eurovision. Please, let’s stop fighting. I’m glad you don’t hate me anymore 🙂
Glorious I’m glad that you love those israeli songs… And good for you to have a dog
@OR
I love animals, my dog is a wonderful creature <3<3<3
@Charles You take my comment some steps forward, first of all, it is clear that victory of singer from the lGBT community will not change the political situation in the world, let’s not get carried away, we see that Russia is a strong competitor every year even though it is not a democratic state and legislate against gay … but I think that its important that in every international event that will be a representation of different people as well as people from the LGBT community , and for me its enough that small child suffering because he is In… Read more »
rarely*
@OR
“Rak Bishvilo” and “Same Heart” are excellent! I give both of them a 10/10 (I rearly do that).
@James –
I agree with you about the song “time” and the second song of Dana,
But There were other Israeli songs like IN 2014 or 2013 who deserved at least to qualified…
I respect your opinion too
@OR: You wanna take the dramatic path? Think of what is happening not far away from Israel on a daily basis and in Russia about the LGBT community then we can talk … Winning Eurovision for being trannsexual may have had in impact on LGBT community in Israel, cuz that is what you feel happy about, but it just transformed Eurovision into another gay club that lasts 2 weeks and during 2 weeks you can pretend nothing is wrong in the world. In the meantime in the more conservative America we see what we see and in the Arabian countries… Read more »
@Or Israel definitely didn’t deserve to qualify with Time or Dana International for sure they were both terrible. But now they have got a top 10 last year and a qualification. There are tons of eastern Europe countries with neighbors that struggle with qualifying. Latvia missed far more than Israel and again only came back the very moment they had a great song again. I don’t Molly and Nadal are comparable as Nadal had a fun party song which is easier to hide a couple bad notes in whereas Molly was a serious song that needed to be sung perfectly.… Read more »
@Charles
While we write to each other, yesterday 20 people from the gay community were Killed in gay club in America … and this happens in the United States in 2016, now You can understand how Dana’s victory was important for the LGBT community ??
@James I can give you opposite example : like Israel before 2015 did not qualified to the final For 5 years and also this year Only the judges saved Israel..So I dont think all of the song’s Israel sent on those 5 years are so bad to not qualified … and as for Ireland i think that Molly deserved to be in the final , Many other singers on stage get nervous Nadav guedj also was nervous and excited on stage so that is not a reason not to vote for Molly , her song was great and better then… Read more »
@William Lee Adams
Sorry for the blank comment (can you please delete it?). I wanted to say thank you for deleting our angry comments 🙂
@William Lee Adams
@Robyn well said. BBC needs to continue doing these song selection shows & improve its stagings. Also try & engage with Europeans fans not just the British public. Introduce online international votes like Latvia has been doing for the last 2 years
@darren
It’s personal opinion of course but I can’t agree Molly deserved to qualify last year. .she seemed very nervous and some of the notes were out of tune . Coming 2nd was probably a big disadvantage too with a fairly quiet simple song.
Also, Russia did not reach the top 10 for three years in a row in 2009, 2010 and 2011.
Azerbaijan two years ago came 22nd which isnt really something to be proud of, and last year the televote would have qualified Malta over them.
@or the point I was making was most countries have some neighbors so the fact countries with just a couple can suddenly win and do well after years of doing badly means yes it does mean something that several countries have won who don’t have neighbor support. Of course more countries in “blocks” have won because statistically there are far more of them anyway Plus if the suggestion is countries always do well regardless of the song…well Greece and Bosnia both put in entries that were generally considered their weakest for many years and not deserved of a qualification. ..and… Read more »
It rather looks that persons like Beverly are afraid of obviously high expectations for UK from other countries while being confident in their originality and leadership in musical world overall. Songwriters just should take it more seriously, otherwise majority of both Europe and UK will only remain to whine about swedenization of ESC.
Hello, hello mtr danger, ya estan los acosadores de siempre dando por…a quien no piensa como ellos y manifiestan aqui sus ideas…siempre hacen lo mismo atacar con lo del idioma, orientacion sexual o gustos musicales VIVA la diversidad.Diva
@James: I agree with every word of your first comment. Leave the obvious has-beens alone (although I thought Bonnie Tyler’s song was excellent). They seemed to be on the right track when they picked Molly Smitten-Downes in 2014, with 2 exceptions: The way they presented it on stage, and the fact that she had to sing last, with Denmark and the Netherlands singing in 2 of the last 5 spots before her. The momentum they built with her (4 spots away from finishing in the top-half), went completely to waste when they sent Electro Velvet, and a lot of us… Read more »
@Charles I’ll skip over your sarcastic remark about my “free time to” or whatever you meant I read only the last comments you wrote … Dana is not my ” beloved ” and her personality is sometimes too provocative for me… to make it clear for you i’m a Straight Woman.. but i cant ignore the fact that Dana victory was so important to the LGBT community back then in 1998… i mean look today the LGBT still Struggling for recognition and Fighting homophobia and Transphobia, So can you imagine how it was back in 1998 for Dana to win… Read more »
Beverly, one of the reasons why “no-one wants to vote for us” is because “us” is represented by a pop-up act, and not an established, experienced performer such as yourself. I really think that Europe punishes us for not sending the bigger acts which they all know we have.
@OR: And I appreciate the time you waste following all my words here .. I don’t see a point for you to do it, I think you should have better things to do … but nonetheless I thank you … I just wish you really understood that being gay does not mean worshiping BS … and that is all I can say about your beloved Dana 🙂 WE are better than what the cliché says. And I still don’t see you understanding sarcasm but again… keep trying 🙂
@Darren
XO have a good weekend 🙂
Aw thanks so much @OR yeah I am sorry for that too, but I guess it was just a disagreement but at least we are mature enough to put it behind us and move on 🙂 thank you for the offer, if I visit Israel I will surely look you up 🙂 x
Darren Thanks you are very sweet guy…i cant beleive i fight with u a month ago…sorry for that 🙂 and I’m serious if you ever come to israel you have a place to stay 🙂
Off Top…
Dear Wiwibloggs,
I have a feeling that you would like to place an article about someone who won 2 plates from MUS TV yesterday night but feel awkward to do this for some reason=)
So welcome, do it please, people are wayting=)
@OR: And clearly sarcasm is not a language that you’ve been able to master in the understanding domain … unless the hat fits your head …
Deben has the right to agree with her… and nothing is wrong with the u.k attitude…
lets not forget that the u.k. is one of the funding of the eurovision though u.k. d’ont have to do that because u.k. (along with u.s.) have the best music industry in the world..
The bad thing with this kind of interview is that interviewer just smile and nod and agree because she famous. It’s because of things like this that UK attitude won’t change. No one is pulling people up on the usual rubbish.
I have a feeling if UK will ever win again it would be a non-famous singer=]
People can say that we, the UK, need to send something that people will really like. However, the opinion of acts such as Beverley Knight is why we can’t – no established name is gonna risk their career on this, be it as a performer or songwriter. Given the recent trend in UK entries, it’s no wonder no singer group or songwriter is gonna want to participate for us. Until the UK can send a few decent acts, re-enter the top ten with them a few years running or maybe win, then maybe some better names will put themselves forward.
@OR
You’re right, I agree with you 🙂
@Darren
Again i agree with every word you wrote,but unfortunately things will not going to change… i guess when you bring states together politics and subjective feelings conquers on objective feelings.. it is what it is… and to make it clear i too did not like all songs Israel sent , if i sound too patriotic on that blog is only because i comment to people who are racist /antisemitic/ homophobic or hate Israel with not true reason..
@OR Ireland should have at least qualified last year, Molly was amazing, I still listen to her song, and compared to Montenegro, Cyprus and Poland she definitely should have. I think the staging, as usual by RTÉ was the big let down for her. Just Molly and her piano (one that didn’t cover her face) was all that song needed. But other countries are favoured too much, like Azerbaijan shouldn’t have qualified in 2014 and 2016 or even won in 2011. Ukraine always qualifies regardless too, they shouldn’t have in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2014 and they shouldn’t have won… Read more »