Eurovision 2022 thread

Bah. Like most things, Eurovision was better in the 80s:

 

Not sure what the rules are, but maybe Sam the Brit will be given a second shot next year. He should be sentimental favorite, unless Moldova or Poland have been invaded by then.

 

Fact is that Eurovision is increasingly all about the song again in recent years but combined with a good performance. Both should be of high quality otherwise you are not gonna make it. Last year Switzerland had a gorgeous song and it was well sung but the staging made no sense at all. Sam Ryder had everything going for him: good song, stellar vocal performance and interesting staging that kept you glued to the screen. Portugal also ticked all these boxes albeit on a much more intimate level. I was surprised they did so well considering they performed so early in the show. Both U.K. and Portugal’s song are the ones that have stayed in mind like an earwurm, which is usually a good indicator for me personally that I really like a song.

 

So is the Tartan Army going to invade Ukraine?

 

Uggh. Eurovision is far more entertaining than anything 'real' musicians in a 'real' band could rustle up these days.

 

It's actually being played in Scotland.

 

Stumbled on that site today looking for a breakdown of the public votes. Very interesting stats. And the graphics were really satisfying to play with...

 

Maybe she was subconsciously fantasising about enacting the famous 'Pies 50p, w***s £1' (or is it the other way round?) joke?

 

Thanks all for filling me in on what I missed. I have perused the thread and have noted the following takeaways:

- the UK entry was better than usual
- it is well worth looking up the Spanish entry to watch on YouTube, but with the sound down.

 

All the positivity about Ukraine is almost enough to make me give up on boycotting Eurovision.

 

I mean, that pretty much sums it all up. You could even lose the first point and still be on track.

 

Aaaahhhh Eurovision! One of the highlights of my year. I absolutely love it but I do know it divides opinion.

I know everyone says “it’s all political” and whilst there is an element of politics at play, it’s way more complicated than that.

We (the UK) have such a crap attitude to everything we compete in - be it music, sport etc. We have this over-inflated opinion of ourselves and think we’re brilliant and should win, even when we don’t really try. For the last 20-odd years we’ve either sent dreadful entries (Scooch, Daz Sampson) or completely unmemorable entries (James Newman, SuRie, Michael Rice). When you’ve got 25-26 songs all competing you have to stand out. James Newman last year was instantly forgettable.

Remember lots of countries send singers who are already big stars in their homeland - Italy’s winning song last year had been a number 1 for 6 weeks in Italy and got loads of airplay all over mainland Europe, so people were voting for a song that they already were familiar with. That happens a lot. Songs that are big hits in a certain country tend to also be hits in neighbouring countries.

Strangely the politics is usually at play with the jury vote, but we won the jury vote last night. The televotes got Ukraine to the top spot, that was definitely the people showing their support.

We got everything right this year - a really likeable artist who put the work in the promote the song across Europe, he’s super talented and can really perform and his song is a really solid entry, which is why we did well.

Let’s not forget why the Eurovision Song Contest exists….to unite countries in light entertainment. Everyone has fun. I always find it very emotional seeing all of the different countries celebrating together. And the amount of walls the contest has broken down over the years is truly amazing - the first time Israel gave 12 points to Germany, the first trans winner. And I love that some countries really objected to Conchita’s participation and told the EBU that they wouldn’t broadcast her performance - the EBU told them all that they would broadcast the whole thing or not at all. And they all caved.

 

I hear this a lot, especially around Eurovision or any footy finals, but I must hang around with completely different British people than the rest of the country, as I've never met another Brit who seriously expects us to win anything. Our usual chit-chat is how we're rubbish at everything and are going to lose - most likely in the most embarrassing or godawful way possible. Where these Brits are who expect to win anything, I have no idea! Everyone I know is miserable as sin - no positivity approaching any tournament or song contest! Just a resigned and morbid acceptance that we're **** at everything.

 

maybe that’s equally the problem - we think we won’t do well anyway, so why bother trying?

Sam scoring our best result since 1998 is proof that if you put some effort in, we get a good result.

 

Absolutely. I think that he did us proud. And you are quite right that we can whinge about never winning anything, but we won't win unless we put the effort in, and show that we care about winning. And it was good that we did put the effort in this time, and hopefully that's given the sign that it's worth doing again. I hope that whatever consortium that puts our acts together looks long and hard at this and recognises that putting on a decent show with a good song and a talented singer can - *shock horror* - score points!

Maybe , just maybe, there isn't some grand, continental conspiracy to haze the UK from Eurovision - maybe we've just been putting out half-hearted efforts and mediocre songs for far too long.

 

Well, we had 30-odd years of Terry Wogan sniggering at Eurovision and treating it as a joke so it's no great surprise that people don't take it seriously in the UK and established artists and songwriters in the UK don't want to get involved in it. Politics definitely does play a part in voting, but its influence tends to get over-emphasized by the chippy xenophobic UK media which ignores the fact that not everyone in Europe lives on an island and that there many cultural connections between European countries. The one country in Europe the UK has especially strong cultural similarities and connection to is Ireland and Ireland and the UK have given each other maximum points plenty of times - is anyone going to argue that's political too? Pop stars in one European country are often famous and successful in other countries - which is especially true in countries which are neighbours and have similar languages and cultures - unlike the nonentities we wheel out every year. The thing about this guy, Sam Ryder, apart from him having a decent song and singing and performing it very well is that he was already well known outside the UK via TikTok. That might be a way forward for the UK in Eurovision in the future.

 

I think that's going to be key in the future of the contest. In a way, we've always had a similar advantage, as pop music from the UK has long been marketed effectively abroad and is much better known in other countries than their respective music might be to us. A connected world relies even less on traditional social constructs such as land borders, and establishes new constructs which will play their part. That's bound to have an impact.

 

You're seeing that already with the popularity of K-pop. I believe. I admit my knowledge of modern popular music trends is negligible though!

 

My impression, watching the show, was that there seems to be a predominance of what I'll call "The X-Factor" factor (or Britain's Got Talent, or any other of those dreadful shows), in that the performer starts off singing quietly, then suddenly erupts into full power which for some reason triggers an orgasmic response from the audience.

 

Hah, mine too. But this isn't about us - we've had our day. It's about what happens next. And yes, K-Pop is a perfect example of something achieving a level of popularity that could not have happened on these shores back when we were kids. Purely due to physical distance and the physical nature of music, as it was then. I thought I was being exotic if I picked up a record with an "Import" sticker on it - it was like a hidden treasure from far away lands. That means nothing now. All the old rules are off - and that's absolutely for the better.

At the same time, it might result in a dilution of traditional music. One of the things that made Eurovision fun was hearing the diversity of sounds from different places - going forward, global access to the same music might impact that, as the musicians of the future, wherever they are in the world, are all listening to the same thing (or watching it on TikTok more likely). But I think we just have to accept that the world is changing and we can but observe it as it pans out.

 

Speaking of albums with import stickers, Virgin Record shops were full of them in the early days, except they weren't really imports. Branson exploited some sort of loophole were he could take van loads of regular releases "offshore" then bring them back in and get them stickered as imports thus avoiding tax duty, something like that anyway iirc.

 

I agree with your comment about records with import stickers on, reading it transported me back to my youth and experiencing those same feelings.

 

I note that you're from Gloucestershire - I was born in Cheltenham and grew up in Gloucester and Stroud, so you would probably have bought those imports from the same shops that I did.

 

I noticed that too except none of those songs did particularly well in the voting.

 

If you can find it, the interview with Maneskin after their performance is worth a watch. I'm quite surprised that the phrase "wardrobe malfunction" hasn't appeared at all on the internet. Perhaps I was the only one paying attention