Best of the Bunch: Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan is one of the fairly newer nations in Eurovision, after debuting back in 2008. Since their debut, they have been consistently one of the most successful nations, having always qualified to the final, and scoring a win since they began their Eurovision journey. Usually in this series, we would look back to 2006 until 2015, however as Azerbaijan began in 2008, we begin our journey there.

In 2008, Azerbaijan began with a bang. The act was Elnur and Samir, the angel and the devil, and the song was Day After Day. The theatrics of the song was enough to impress audiences, ending up in 8^th place on their debut. Not bad at all!

The following year, the nation sent the duo of Aysel and Arash. The song was sung in English, like every single other Azerbaijani song in Eurovision history, but it seems to work for the country, as they ended up in 3^rd place with 207 points.

In 2010, Safura was the chosen participant to fly the flag for Azerbaijan, and she performed the song Drip Drop. The catchy pop ballad sailed through the final in 2^nd place, then in the final reached another top 5 result, with 5^th place.

Azerbaijan struck gold in 2011, with the duet of Ell and Nikki and the song Running Scared. The song won the contest with 221 points, although to this day, is debated whether Running Scared was a deserving winner! Well, you can decide by voting below in the poll!

As the host country, Azerbaijan chose Sabina Babayeva as their participant with the song When the Music Dies. The traditional ethnic sounds, and strong vocals gave Azerbaijan yet another top 5 position, the 4^th time in 5 years.

In 2013, the nation selected Farid Mammadov, who took the song Hold Me onto the Eurovision stage. The creative staging, having a dancer in a box mimicking Farid’s movements was a hit with audiences, and once again, Azerbaijan was top 5, this time, 2^nd with an impressive 234 points.

Dilara Kazimova performed her entry Start a Fire in Eurovision 2014, and for the first time, Azerbaijan’s qualification was a close call, ending up in 9^th place in the semi-final, and then 22^nd in the final, which still remains as Azerbaijan’s worst placing – still not a bad result!

Last but not least in our Best of the Bunch journey is the act from 2015, Elnur Hüseynov, who you may recognise as the Elnur of Elnur and Samir, the 2008 angel! His 2015 performance was definitely more subdued, and like 2014, he only scraped into the final at 10^th place, and then in the final improved on his result and ended up in 12^th position.

Now it’s your chance to tell us who you think is the Best of the Bunch between the years 2008 – 2015!