First the vote.

The app crash.

Of the big words about a new voting system that would make the competition more exciting, nothing came of it.

The voices of 50-year-olds would weigh as heavily as those of five-year-olds by age-segmented heart voices.

It was a good ambition - to try to turn the voting out of the hands of the kindergarten children.

But the app was down.

Not just in the first but second round of voting.

It was bad.

Viewers got angry.

But the age representation may have been resolved anyway, when the children had to ask their parents for permission to borrow the phone.

That the old phone trumped the heart vote is also the only reasonable explanation for the fact that Scanian dance band reggae in the form of Danne Stråhed made it to the semi-finals.

Scanian self-irony

Så till programmet. Självironi är en viktig del av Melodifestivalens DNA, och Oscar Zia är klippt och skuren för uppgiften. Men med röstkaoset fick han en otacksam uppgift, och blev märkbart besvärad. Programmet tappade fart i början.

Första deltävlingen (som skulle ju ägt rum i Malmö innan turneringen ställdes in) bjöd annars på en riktig skånefrossa. Det skojades glatt om regionala uttryck och Oscar Zia spelade kränkt över att inte ha blivit utsett till årets skåning. Det mesta flög, faktiskt, och Zia och sidekicken Farah Abadi fick till och med en gammal norrlänning som mig att vilja ansöka om skånskt medborgarskap.

Halfway into the program, I thought I would write that this year's melody festival seemed a little less masturbating and nostalgically self-referential than usual.

But then Eric Saade came and made a medley of his old melody festival contributions.

This program really loves itself.

Faceless pop

What to say about the songs then?

It was expected that Cornelia Jakob's "Hold me closer" went straight to the final.

A critic's favorite with an indie vibe that - thankfully - also went home with the audience.

One of the few contributions that felt genuine, with a text that the artist actually bases in. And no Malou Prytz, I do not believe for a moment that you want to be wild and "go bananas" if you ask for a glass of milk when you come down from stage.

Theoz looked genuinely surprised to advance to the semifinals - he thought it was over when the app votes were out of play.

But fortunately, there were more than the tiktok generation who took Theoz number.

"As you want" is a life-affirming pop song that - I hope - will get an audience even outside the preschool disco.

Let him make it to the finals.

But Robin Bengtsson?

Bland faceless pop that makes it turn in your stomach out of boredom.

What is it in "Innocent love" that speaks to TV viewers?

I hope it was not the people of Skåne who sent him on, because in that case my new compatriots are the most boring people in the world.