Eurovision

As usual, simply fabulous!!! And I mean fabulous! For those who don't know what that glorious European institute is, click here!

I missed the first contestant (Bosnia-Herzegovina), but after that I think I can give you a fairly good run through of the acts that stood out.......Haha.

First up Spain, and what better than a wildly gyrating boy-band clad in white lycra to start things off? Classic Eurovision style! The song was rather disappointing though....

Finland were the next band who stood out. A fierce goth-like singer gave a hearty rendition of quite a rocky number, and it was actually (please remember I'm judging by Eurovision standards here) pretty damn good. I had it down in my top 3.

Ah, F.Y.R Macedonia,pretty girl in a slinky dress, and a poppy song. Also in my top 3. Had a high-quality Eurovision sound to it, I thought it might be just the ticket.

Serbia were, BRILLIANT! A short, rather butch lady, dressed in a man's suit, with her all female (dressed in army uniform) backup singers. Not a promising sight, and not very EuroGlamour, but she could actually sing. Very well. Beautiful voice.. I marked her down as my favourite.

France. Oh dear. If it wasn't the scary bald man in the all pink suit with the toy cat around his neck, it was the strange fact that the singer appeared not to be French. He didn't have a French accent at all...... It was most bizarre. A lot of countries seemed to be going from the traditional "English lyrics=votes" idea, to having most of the song in their language, with the final verses in English. Fairly effective compromise, and an interesting trend. But the French song was dire beyond belief.....

Oh Ukraine. You truly entered the spirit of Eurovision. Picture the scene: a rather large bald transvestite, wearing extravagant make-up and sunglasses, with a formidable chest, in an all silver glittery shiny costume, the crowning glory of which was an enormous silver star attached to his head. Just beautiful. And he had two exuberant back-up dancers in all silver uniforms. It was in one word, spectacular! Here he is.....in all his glory.



Ireland was a hideous embarrassment. Dreadful Celtic themed crap, with some awful woman who could not hold a note, in a ghastly "I am a poetic but poor peasant Irishwoman, whose soul roams free upon the mountains, and whose spirit is entwined with the Celtic mysteries" type outfit. It was so shaming.

Britain didn't do much better, and it was probably, thanks to its inappropriately sexual nature, the most embarrassing song. The theme appeared to be Mile High Club, with pretty girls and overly camp cabin boys strutting around in luminous blue outfits. The cabin boys kept making suggestions such as "would you like something to suck on?" while holding a mock boiled sweet. The song seemed to be some vaguely patriotic dig. It almost seemed Empire, the refrain being "We're flying the flag, all over the world". Pretty terrible and very questionable in its messages.

Romania did its song in numerous languages, and as Terry Wogan said, it did seem "a desperate attempt to win votes", but it was actually a very good performance, and the Romanian "Frenchman" sounded much more French than the real one.

Bulgaria. A bit banshee-wailing-on-speed-with-drums-thrown-in-for-good-measure. Quite interesting though, and a nice "Europe we love you!!!" at the end.

Kenan Doglu sang for Turkey. Funny, 'cos he's actually one of their biggest pop stars. The song was ok, good and dancy, and he had some bellydancers which livened it up. Ironically though, they were all British.

Russia were definitely on the Tatu side of things, with 3 girls in nun-outfits singing saucily. Not great though, although bloc voting was probably going to put them in with a chance.

Sweden did a lovely David Bowie-esque number. Lots of glam rock.

Another thing that I love about Eurovision are the strange video clips they put in between the songs. This year features were heavily snow and children orientated. But some of them were downright bizarre, like the kid snorkelling in a puddle, or Moomin and Santa playing chess.

Speaking of Santa, he appreared at the end to introduce the voting. Was that not a bit odd in May??? Also, he was a very sinister Santa, his best line being "Hoo Hoo Hoo, I veesit your homes eveery Chreestmas, heh heh heh" Creepy.

To entertain us before the voting we had some death-metal cellists, a man in a bubble who hatched out wearing plastic knickers (and looking well gross), fire drummers, a trapeze artist and some acrobats. Trust the Scandinavians. And of course there was a lovely little announcement reminding us that we could get Eurovision 2007 on CD, and DVD. Hold me back lads.

Voting was, as usual, waay too long, even though they had streamlined the process slightly. And, as usual, it said more about politics than the actual songs. E.g Norway gave Sweden 12 points, Cyprus gave Greece 12 points, Belarus gave Russia 12 points, and Russia gave Belarus 12 points. It seemed we were going back to the cold war, with none of the Western European countries getting a point in edgeways. Funnily enough, Ireland gave the UK 7points, and ended up kicking themselves in the teeth, because UK did not reciprocate (Irlande, Zero points), and beat us. We came last in the end. We deserved it.

I wondered did the fact that the French point announcer was black say anything about modern France, or the changes that will come with Sarkozy. What do you think? I don't think that before now France would ever have had a black presenter.

Someone should do a song in Esperanto, that would really throw them!

In the end, Serbia rightly won, and their man-woman singer got rather over-excited. I was happy though, they deserved it. Apparently the song, "Molitva", means prayer. Not sure if I agree with that, but it was the best damn Eurovision in a long time.

Here is the winning song. (Fraid I can't get the actual performance)