poptimists | The Pop World Cup: Group C (Reply)

Style, sex, skanking and shouty men are the order of the day in Group C, which seasoned commentators have already in the pub called the GRUPO DEL MUERTE. Argentina look to join Ecuador in the round of 16, Holland and Serbia and Montenegro look to buck the trend of European underperformance and the Ivory Coast is the first African team to take to the field in this competition.

You can find all PWC entries here. If you can't download or are having trouble let me know either in the comments box or at freakytrigger@gmail.com.

So here are the four Group C contenders, with exclusive team talks from their managers.

Argentina

Miranda! - "Yo Te Dire". Boss

carsmilesteve was keen to talk up his charges: "miranda! (yes, the exclamation mark is part of their name, just like WHAM! and ~~therapy?~~) are a magic argentinian !P!O!P! band, despite looking like ladytron on a bad day. they haf loads of ace songs that you can see the videos for on their website (which like all argentinian band websites i found is a FLASH NIGHTMARE, but not as bad as some of them). the song is "yo te dire" which haf DRIVING, SKANKING organ to push the track along and squidgy undefined instrument solo in the middle."

Cote D'Ivoire

Meiway - "Miss Lolo". Gaffer

poptasticuk gave us a candid interview: ""I didn't even know the Ivory Coast was a country until I was their manager, but I did find an interesting article about their music scene suggesting that Meiway "trades on style and sex", which was enough to catch my interest. Having now seen a photo I wouldn't let him have hisway (bad pun quota filled) with me, but Miss Lolo probably would, if only in thanks for him making this rather fun song about her."

Holland

Twenty 4 Seven - "Leave Them Alone". Manager

freakytigger told us: "All the finest elements of eurodance are present and correct in this 1994 smash - enthusiastic rapping, monster-lunged vocal hook, big attacking synths and a hands in the air beat. I'm confident our uptempo style will see us through and if it doesn't, well, at least we'll have got the crowds dancing. The song is a thoughtful meditation on the plight of Native Americans, not that you can strictly tell this by the lyrics. Good work Nance, Stay-C and their producer Ruud van Reijen."

Serbia And Montenegro

Vrooom - "Budjenje": Supremo

umlauts had this to say: ""Popular music in Serbia largely consists of this baffling genre called turbo-folk, which I don't get. They certainly lose out to the Croats if pop stars with great hair is what you're looking for. But lo, it's the preposterously named Vrooom, with a song whose chorus goes "ne ne ne ne ne ne!" shouted loudly by some blokes, while the verses have singer Vanja doing some mysterious stylings, asking to be your shelter, amongst other things. Lovely. It's all very primitive and tribal, while being quite acceptably shouty and noisy too. Smashing."

So how will matches be decided? HERE'S HOW.

You have 20 points to divide between the four teams, based on how much you enjoyed their tracks and on any other criteria you like.

No team can be given less than 1 point, no team can be given more than 10. If you fail to mark a team they will automatically get 5 points.

If that leaves a points total other than 20, or if you simply can't add up to 20, then the FIPA authorities will add or deduct points according to a highly complex system which can be explained in the pub by request.

Your votes should be in the following format:

"Argentina - 5. Cote D'Ivoire - 5. Holland - 5. Serbia&Montenegro - 5."

With the "5"s replaced by the points you allot to each team.

You can submit votes in one of two ways. In the poll below, or by email to freakytrigger@gmail.com if you can't vote in LJ polls. Any votes in the comments box will be disqualified. Voting closes at midnight GMT on Monday

The top two tracks, decided on total points, will go through to the next round. In the event of a tie the votes from the first 10 ballots received will be used to determine positions.

[Poll #665109]

Some indication of results will be given tomorrow.

Commence the mind-games!