Jemini

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This article is about the English pop band. For the rapper, see Jemini the Gifted One.
Jemini
Origin Liverpool, England
Genre(s) Pop, Dance
Years active 2003
Label(s) Integral Records (2003)

Jemini were an English pop group, best known for scoring "nul points" and finishing in last place with their song "Cry Baby" at the 2003 Eurovision Song Contest in Latvia. To date, it is the only time in the contest's history that a UK entry has suffered that particular indignity, most associated in the popular imagination with Norway.

Contents

[edit] Biography

Chris Cromby and Gemma Abbey (born 1982) met in 1995 at Liverpool's Starlight Stage School and toured Liverpool's pubs and clubs with the academy's kids' roadshow. At 16, after leaving college, they formed Tricity, named after the brand of electrical appliances. They formed Jemini ("Gem-and-I") at the age of 19. They spent the next two and a half years touring pubs and clubs in the UK performing Stevie Wonder, Randy Crawford, Motown covers and ABBA medleys, as well as their own compositions. Gemma says she has loved Eurovision since childhood and count previous Eurovision entrants such as Sonia, Precious and Dana International amongst her favourites.

[edit] Cry Baby: Their Debut-Single

Jemini and the song "Cry Baby" were selected to take part in Eurovision by a public phone poll in the BBC's A Song for Europe competition. However, given the novel voting procedure used in the selection that year, some people questioned whether they really were the popular choice in any meaningful sense, a question which obviously loomed larger after the outcome in Latvia. The new system was essentially a synthesis of the familiar popular vote, and the points system that had existed before telephone voting was first deemed feasible in 1988. Votes were tallied separately in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and three regions of England (North, South and the Midlands), and were then converted into points. What to many seemed the unsatisfactory nature of this arrangement was exacerbated by the fact that, due to a clash with football coverage, the competition was only televised in Scotland on minority channel BBC2, leading to the possibility of a very low number of votes from there.

Jemini won by netting maximum points from Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the North of England, but "Help Me" (sung by Emily Reed) topped the poll in the South of England and the Midlands. Given that the majority of the UK's population live in these two regions, and given that disproportionately few votes were likely to have been cast in Scotland in any case, it is perfectly possible that "Help Me" did in fact carry the popular vote. The BBC did nothing to dispel this suspicion by keeping those figures under wraps.

For their Eurovision appearance, Chris Cromby dressed casually in a white shirt and denim jeans. Gemma Abbey appeared in a waist length scarlet dress, and had curled her blonde hair for the Eurovision - when she performed at the "Song For Europe" competition in the U.K., it had been straight. They were accompanied on stage by three female backing singers in black, and a guitarist named Kirk, who was also in black. The song was a simple pop ditty about a woman telling her lover that their relationship is over.

[edit] Failure & Break-up

The Eurovision failure prompted a great deal of mirth and consternation in the British media. Jemini admitted that their performance was off-key, and claimed they were unable to hear the backing track due to a technical fault. Chris claimed that Terry Wogan had before the contest warned them that they would not get any points due to the Iraq War[citation needed]. Author and historian John Kennedy O'Connor notes in The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official History that with a record field of 26 entries, this made the UK's failure the most spectacular in the history of the contest. [1] No song from the Eurovision final has achieved "nul points" since.

The exposure the duo received after the contest at least gave them a No. 15 hit with the single "Cry Baby".

Due to their failure, they were immediately dropped by their record label (Integral Records UK), and as a consequence of this, their first ever album was never released. This was because they only made the Top 20 for one week with "Cry Baby", falling to #35 on the UK Top 75 in its second week. They split up as a duo. In his book Nul Points, Tim Moore meets the duo, finding Gemma working in a car showroom and Chris working in a clothes shop.

Nothing is known of Gemma since that interview took place but Chris Cromby is now working on a solo career as a singer and has posted two songs onto his new MySpace page.

[edit] Discography

Unreleased Album

  • Love Is Blind(2003) (Cancelled)

[edit] Singles

  • Cry Baby (2003) - #15 (UK), #73 (Ireland)
  • Try To Love (2003) - N/A (Cancelled)

[edit] References

  1. ^ O'Connor, John Kennedy. The Eurovision Song Contest - The Official History. Carlton Books, UK. 2007 ISBN 978-1-84442-994-3
Preceded by
Jessica Garlick		 UK in the Eurovision Song Contest
2003		 Succeeded by
James Fox