The Music Thing

The Music Thing
Abbrev.	N/A
Founded	May 2017
Origin	United States
Editions	10
Specials	2
Countries	158
Songs	375
Channel	The Music Thing

The Music Thing is a small song contest about music from (potentially) any country in the world. The contest aims to provide a diverse variety of music in terms of country of origin, genre, mood, style, etc. The Music Thing shuns fast food music in favor of quality songs that accurately represent different areas of the world.

Rules

Entries

Any song that has not participated in Eurovision or a similar music competition can be submitted to The Music Thing regardless of year of release, as long as no artists have been in the contest before (with exceptions described below). No country may appear multiple times in one edition, except in a second chunce round, as long as at least six countries are represented in the second chunce round (e.g. two artists from the same country can be revived in one second chunce round, but only one may advance into the semifinals). In order to represent a country, the artist must have a STRONG connection to that country, which can include, but is not limited to, living there during their music career and making music in a style that very clearly reflects that country more than whichever country they live in. The overall mix of songs in any given edition must include the following:

A pop song
A rock song
A metal or otherwise hardcore style song
A comedic song
A song from a very nonwestern genre
A hip hop/rap song
A ballad
A song released before 1990 or noticeably reflects a retro style
At least five songs from nations that have never been in The Music Thing before

These genres are chosen because all have found success in The Music Thing, the genres can be found in a vast majority of regions of the world, and this contest has a high commitment to diversity, which includes a diversity of genres of music within every given edition, not just in geography.

The countries chosen must cover every region in the world as declared by the United Nations Geoscheme, with the following modifications:

Southern Europe is split into Southwestern Europe and Southeastern Europe depending on where each country lies with respect to the Adriatic Sea.
Cyprus (but not Northern Cyprus) is in Southeastern Europe instead of West Asia.
Russian artists who live East of the Ural Mountains count as Central Asia instead of Eastern Europe.

Rounds

Every contest consists of three rounds: Second Chunce, Two Semifinals, and a Grand Final. All voting is done in Eurovision style.

Second Chunce

Every player selects two artists who participated two rounds prior in The Music Thing to compete with different songs in Second Chunce. Each player chooses one artist to come back with three possible songs, and one with two possible songs. If two or more players pick the same artist to return to second chunce, the number of new songs becomes additive. A randomly selected artist from any prior round will be chosen by an algorithm to come back with one new song until there are eleven total returning artists in Second Chunce. Artists whose country scored in the top six the previous edition are not eligible for second chunce. Artists who got 16th place or higher overall are not eligible for second chunce. Artists who have competed more than once or been in second chunce before may not participate in second chunce. The six highest scoring songs from second chunce from non-repeating countries will move on to the semifinals

Semifinals

20 songs compete in each semifinal, the top ten of which will move on to the final. Semifinals must contain the following:

Songs from the countries that placed between 2nd and 6th in the previous edition
The six advancing songs from Second Chunce
One new song from a randomly selected artist who participated before

Grand Final

The winner of the Grand Final wins the contest. The Grand Final consists of the following:

The top ten songs from Semifinal 1
The top ten songs from Semifinal 2
A song from the country that won the last edition

Winners

Ed.	Country	Artist	Song	Points	Runner Up	Host
1	Brazil	Elaine Martins	Santificação	42	Denmark	New York, USA
2	Kazakhstan	Some Toir	Romantic Crap	39	Denmark	São Paulo, Brazil
3	Barbados	Shontelle	Battle Cry	39	Slovakia	Almaty, Kazakhstan
4	Singapore	The Sam Willows	Take Heart	40	Malta	Bridgetown, Barbados
5	Canada	Buffy Sainte-Marie ft. Tanya Tagaq	You Got To Run (Spirit of the Wind)	53	Jamaica	Singapore, Singapore
6	Kazakhstan	Mergen	Adaskan Zhan	36	Norway	Montreal, Canada
7	Australia	Tim Minchin	Rock and Roll Nerd	48	Yemen	Astana, Kazakhstan
8	Croatia	Učiteljice	Nisam Ja Tvoja Učiteljica	76	Mali	San Jose, USA
9	Ethiopia	Meklit ft. Samuel Yirga	Kemekem (I Like Your Afro)	68	South Africa	Zagreb, Croatia
10	Ireland	Hozier ft. Mavis Staples	Nina Cried Power	37	Israel	Sydney, Australia
11						Dublin, Ireland