Eirikur Hauksson, 47 years old, is representing Iceland at the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest with the song Valentine lost. At the same time he is, however, also doing the Nordic Preview shows, judging all the songs he will be competing against, as the Icelandic representative in a Nordic panel of �experts�. Esctoday.com has talked to him about this double role � and of course we also asked what we could expect from him in Helsinki.

It is rare that a participant in the Eurovision Song Contest talks about the songs he or she is competing against. What made you continue as the Icelandic expert in these preview shows now that you are taking part in the contest yourself?

For once I like challenges and often do things which I know I really shouldn’t do. Another thing is that I manage not to take the Eurovision Song Contest so seriously, though I love it in my own way. These programs are just guesswork and should be for fun.

Do you think about which reaction it might cause among your competitors that you have publicly spoken about all the songs and directly judged them by giving points?

Yes, definitely. Some might take it in a negative way, but it is important for me to make this clear: Everyone who takes part in this has either won by points from the local population or has been chosen by the TV company. Therefore I have 100% respect for them as artists though the music might not appeal to me.

I guess many had expected you would award yourself with the maximum 5 points, but in the first of the four preview shows we saw that you decided not to give yourself any points. Why?

I might be a bit “crazy”, but I am not so cheeky that I would give myself points. There is a limit!