Daz Sampson took time out of his busy schedule to talk to esctoday this morning about his thoughts on this year's Eurovision Song Contest, breaking into Ruslana�s toilet� and his ambitions for the 2007 event in Helsinki!

Daz won the United Kingdom’s ticket to Athens at the 2006 Making your mind up competition at the BBC Centre in London, overcoming the heavily fancied Antony Costa and Kym Marsh amongst others. Following his runaway victory, Daz along with many others, fancied his chances of reaching a high position at the Eurovision Song Contest. The result at the end of the night was a surprisingly low 19th place, with only25 points on the board.

Looking back, Daz says:
"I didn’t do as well as I was saying vocally at the time, but wouldn’t change a single thing. I have looked back on my performance and I couldn’t fault it. My performance in the final was the best that I gave in my time in Athens. I brought a different angle for a UK entrant and I don’t regret a single moment. I feel that there’s unfinished business and I want to go back! I’m not making excuses for the result, I won’t stand here and say that it was all politics because it’s not although I was surprised at the UK voting 10 points for Lithuania!

Lordi genuinely deserved to win it. Underneath the masks, they were nice people and I wished them tremendously well. I embraced everyone except the Iceland girl, who took things a little too far."

Documentary Daz
Daz featured in a documentary aired on BBC3 in May, following his route to Athens, and a second documentary featuring the build-up to Athens and his time in at the Eurovision Song Contest has been prepared. There is no fixed date for transmission of the show as yet, although it is hoped that the BBC will show the programme at Christmas time, or if Daz is participating in Making your mind up 2007, in February or March.

Daz was proud to feature in the programmes, and says that it shows just how seriously the competition was taken my himself, his backing singers, the BBC team and everyone connected with the entry.
"There will be a clip of it going up on the net – people will see how affected I was by it – you can see the Romanians in the background getting 10 points, you can see the girls mortified. We were gobsmacked, I knew that maybe we wouldn’t win, but I at least thought we could make the top 10."

Breaking into Ruslana's loo
Since May, Daz has been concentrating on several other projects and performing across Europe. There have been some moments where he crossed paths with fellow former Eurovision performers."I was actually with Ruslana at a big beach party in Latvia this summer. She was the headline act and I was on stage before her. I did get a chance to speak to her a couple of times. As the headline artist, she had her own private portaloo, and I needed to go! I picked the lock because there was no time to get to the others! Then I shared her coach back to the airport because I missed mine!"

Daz was a confirmed and openly vocal fan of the Eurovision Song Contest long before he participated. He tried to enter for the UK in 2005, and his opinions about the contest have not changed after he realised his goal of representing his country in Athens and it’s certainly no secret that Daz is already plotting a return to the longest running television music show in the world! He told us:
"I loved it, it’s in my blood now and I want to do it again! I’ve done a lot in my career and the exposure that the Eurovision Song Contest gave me has opened up many new doors.

The BBC got fanatastic viewing figures and I want to put myself up again for Making your mind up. This time I’m enlisting the help of Carol Decker, and we’d love to get back into MYMU. If we can get through the UK final, which is incredibly difficult, we’ll give it our best shot."

Asked about how this exciting, if not slightly unexpected collaboration came together, Daz explained:
"In true Daz fashion… In the dressing room after Eurovision, everyone’s heads were down, but I said ‘I’m coming back’. I definitely raised the profile of ESC in the UK, because everyone from van drivers to grandparents got behind me.

This time, I’m going back to Eurovision roots, trying to maintain a current modern flavour. The song with Carol doesn’t have any rap. It’s more like The Streets meets classic Eurovision ballad. There’s an added incentive because it’s an unusual combination of a modern DJ and an 80s singer. There’s no gimmick this time, it’ll be brilliant but serious! Carol will get media attention at Making your mind up, which is something I didn’t have last time. It was all about Kym and Anthony before the night.Iwrote the song and thought it would be perfect for Carol. I got her email from her fan site, sent her an email with my idea, and she said yes. She said how much of an honour it would be to perform for the UK at Eurovision, and she definitely knows her Eurovision stuff, she knows the songs from the UK’s history."

But would it be harder to win MYMU a second time round?
"Of course! Last year I was the unknown quantity. This year people will know all about me. People may think that it’s the same old thing, and after last year want something different. If I get to do MYMU again, it could be another unknown that comes up on the rails and I’ll be the first to congratulate them. I will probably go to the contest anyway after experience in Athens, even if I’m not performing."

Esctoday would like to wish Daz the best of luck for his upcoming projects and we look forward to following his progress in Making your mind up 2007 if he is back on the show.