Worryingly, this year's Eurosong competition looks set to be one of the best in years. It'll certainly be one of the most popular as it contains all those elements traditionally beloved of the Irish - families, priests and, to quote Father Ted, "lovely girls". Indeed, when all the songwriters and performers gathered in the Westbury Hotel on Wednesday night, the whole occasion was rather evocative of a country wedding or one of those very knotty Shakespeare comedies. There were the Carter Twins with a song by Ronan Keating; the Vard Sisters with a song by Fr Liam Lawton and backing vocals by Liam's twin Gay and brother Tom, and Des and Danny Sheerin who will perform with five members of their family. Working the room posed all sorts of conversational problems: "So, are you a Carter twin or a Lawton brother? Are you a Vard sister or part of the Sheerin family?"
Poor Stephen Carter was showing the effects of a very busy month - he had completely lost his voice and had required "needles and everything" he winced. He still went on stage that night in Mother Goose at the Gaiety and seemed to think the most frustrating thing of all was having to let his brother Tony do all the talking. "It's all waffle," he whispered.
Their manager Louis Walsh is certainly fond of the Eurovision - it was previous Irish entrant Linda Martin who first introduced him to the twins who were singing a Johnny Logan song at a Eurovision cover night at the POD. Apart from the Twins and Louis, the other big media sensation of the night were the Vard Sisters who were looking good in shades of brown - one pundit suggested they should re-name themselves Hot Chocolate.
Whether or not hers is the winning entry, Wendy Vard should be given some sort of a medal. The Vard Sisters' first album, Heavenly, has gone platinum three times; they have another record out in March; they have a song as gaelige in the Eurosong contest, and Wendy also has her own communications business and two small children. She should probably give up the singing altogether and set up a consultancy to tell the rest of us how to manage. However, my vote will probably go to Des and Danny Sheerin for sheer effort. They have applied for the contest so many times that Des is automatically sent an entry form each year. This year, they didn't put their usual amount of work into their song - Des had half a song written and Danny finished it. So when the phone call came to tell the brothers they'd made it, they got the shock of their lives: "We took to the drink," laughed Des.