(Warning: the following post may cause slight nausea in some readers, heart palpitations in others, and general feelings of déjà vu in most.  Please consult your doctor before reading.  Or at least post a status on Facebook.)

Well, San Marino, we meet again.  You think you could fool us by refusing to deny the various rumors spreading about the blogosphere about the return of Lys Assia.  You thought you could confuse us by posting calendars in Chinese on your Facebook page and not stopping the significant number of tweets sent out to Eurovision fans by a pair of (now disappointed) singers from Hong Kong.  But uh oh, uh oh oh, it appears that you had the last laugh in the end.

Returning to the ESC sphere only one year after her performance in Baku will be Valentina Monetta, the jazz-singer turned instant social media darling who blasted her way into our collective consciousness (for better or for worse) with the unforgettable “The Social Network Song (Oh Oh — Uh – Oh Oh)”, written by Eurovision legend Ralph Siegel.  According to the Sanmarinese delegation, Valentina was a last-minute replacement in 2012 for a singer who bowed out, and so the entry wasn’t properly suited towards her voice and style.  All of that will be amended this year, however, as Ralph Siegel and lyricist Mauro Balestri have tailored “Crisalide (Chrysalis)”, a song blending Italian style and upbeat pop, to Miss Monetta.  We should hear the song sometime in late February or early March. 

This will be Ralph Siegel’s twenty-first entry to the Eurovision Song Contest, and second for San Marino.  While he had the honor of composing the winning entry back in 1982 (Nicole’s “Ein bißchen Frieden”), his recent entries haven’t fared quite as well on the scoreboard.  He last cracked into the Top Ten back in 1999, when Germany’s “Reise nach Jerusalem – Kudüs’e seyahat” took home a bronze.  That being said, “The Social Network Song” is San Marino’s highest-ranked entry to date, even if it didn’t make it past the Semifinal stage.  Hopefully, a more appropriate song for Valentina’s age, style, and experience will do her talent justice in Sweden this year.  (For a sampling of pre-Eurovision Monetta, check out her track “Una giornata bellissima” below…)