Sandie Shaw gave the United Kingdom their first victory back in 1967 when her song “Puppet on a string” convinced the jury. But it certainly did not convince the artist as Shaw recently said that the ‘uncool’ contest stopped her being taken seriously. This is according to her interview with magazine MOJO.
She was only 20 years when she took the stage in Vienna 47 years ago and insists that her participation damaged her career.
Shaw hated her song saying “When I got lumbered with singing Puppet On A String I knew there would be a lot of fans who wouldn’t want me doing it.” Now 67, Miss Shaw said that the only reason she agreed to take part is to improve her public image after being called a home wrecker. She received the reputation of “The Other Woman” in a high profile divorce case of TV executive Douglas Murdoch and his model wife Veronica Sands. The judge on the case even referred to her as a “spoiled child”.
Shaw: “At the time it happened, I was 17 and the man was 15 years older than me, and I wasn’t aware of his marital status so to be pilloried for that…everyone said, ‘Oh look what sweet Sandie has done,’ but I didn’t have the strength to argue with anyone, so I did Eurovision to readjust people’s views of me, you know, ‘She’s a nice girl really. The hypocrisy bound around women then was awful.”
The entire Eurovision was something Miss Shaw openly disliked and there were calls to have her banned from taking part in the contest due to the divorce case drama. After Puppet on a String was chosen as her song, Shaw continued to be unhappy “‘Then they gave me a German Oom-pah Oom-pah band as accompaniment, which was the worst thing ever, but was the right thing to do to win Eurovision. I went to Vienna, I sang the song, I was the first to win the contest for the UK, I got to number one, although some of my recording territories in Europe didn’t put the song out as a single because they saw it as uncool. ‘”
“‘Did I get back the control I’d lost over my career after the success? No, it had an adverse effect. I launched the Sandie Shaw fashion label in 1968, it had been agreed on before Eurovision and I nearly lost the opportunity because the manufacturing company thought doing Eurovision was so uncool.”
With the contest returning to Vienna next year, we’re hoping that the winner will be more excited about the experience than Miss Shaw was almost half a decade ago.
What about you, did you like Sandie Shaw’s winning entry? Watch it below and share your thoughts!!!
sources: dailymail, MOJO
Ka'a Kerr
November 1, 2014 at 22:52
She needs to shut up…it’s been almost 50 years and someone still wants to interview her after all these years? Get over it and move on.