Bring on the final!
Slovenia brings us a decent song in headphones. Nothing more, nothing less. So not a lot of points then.
France has an evil version of Dawn French. The trees have no leaves. It's raining. It's utterly depressing. So is the final score.
Israel is a sofa favourite. He's our golden boy! He's the king of fun for god's sake! He's gonna show us Tel Aviv! The dancing settles it: we LOVE it!
We're pretty sure Estonia sent a serial killer with a guitar, with the female singer as the sociopathic mastermind behind all their schemes. I'm so on to them. Fabulous song though. Scarily distant, but fabulous.
The UK does something niche-y. That's never a good thing. You'd think they'd know this after 60 years of contests, but apparently they need reminding. It's not that it's bad. It's just not good either. And the lights... urgh, the lights. No.
Armenia. I have one thing to say to you:
Apparently the artists from Lithuania took quite a risk with their same sex snogging. I don't know if that's true, but if it is: kudos to them. As it is, this is an ok-ish song (bad outfits) about what appears to be bisexual polygamists. Nice one.
Second sofa favourite is Serbia. The wife actually thinks this is really good, though that might be the Marija Serifovic factor. I start loving it when the beat starts and the singer goes crazy. Way to go girl! Incredible retro 90s staging with the flags and the masks and -gulps- even the sign language! AND the dramatic clothes reveal! What a flashback.
There's a lot of white for Norway. And Merida from Brave. That's all I remember.
Ah, Sweden. "Quite possibly brilliant" is all I wrote on my scorecard. Because it was. A song you can't get out of your head, fantastic act. A deserved winner if you ask me. Though I'm not sure the Swedes are happy at the task of having to organise the contest once again. Hey, can we get Petra Mede again? And I for one wouldn't mind the funny interval thingies again. Doesn't matter if they're the same, who will remember?
I suppose Cyprus brings us quality. Apparently that's a pseudonym for boring.
You'd never have guessed it the first 100 times they were mentioned, but Australia's also taking part. Now I was sceptical about this, as it's a EUROvision (with Israel and Azerbaijan) song contest (and we never win as it is, let alone if we invite some 70 other countries to the party), but anyway. I love the Aussies, they love the Eurovision, so why not. If they're crazy enough to get up at/stay up till 3am to watch the damned thing, good for them. But really, Australia? 60 years you've been waiting and *this* is the best you could come up with? I'm pretty sure there wasn't even a wind machine! No flags! No-one dressed in white! No ballerinas coming out of pianos! Just lamp posts and fist pumping. And a decent song. I'm disappointed in you.
But happy you didn't manage to knock us of fourth place!
And there we were: Belgium. Love it or hate it. I loved it. I really did. I loved the staging, I loved what he did. Kudos to Loic Nottet, to manage that at 19. Super proud! From now on we're only sending Walloons to Eurovision!!
Apparently Austria set their piano on fire. That's all I remember about that song. Bleh.
After that things went pretty quickly, because even for me 27 songs is too bloody much:
Greece and the cleavage that ran all the way to her thighs. (also all I remember about the song)
Balkan! Balkan! Balkan! Montenegro brings us the BBB (Bombastic Balkan Ballad) of the evening. For which I thank them. Even though the outfit was very reminiscent of bad child magician.
Germany was not bad. Apparently that means you get 0 points... Then there was Poland ("meh"), Latvia ("ooh. Special in a scary way.") and Romania, with an astounding lack of wind machine.
Some enthusiasm on the sofa for Spain's little red riding hood with her muscular Loreen-esque shirtless wolf. Especially the shirtless part was well received. Finally some wind machine!
Hungary reminds us that war is BAD. In case we didn't know. Hilariously followed by Georgia, who sent a goth vampire WARRIOR reminding us that they're taking no-one's crap and they'll gladly start a fucking war if you dare cross them. Only at Eurovision! And as we're on the topic of wars, there was Russia (yes, I know Azerbaijan was there as well, but then I'd be interrupting my own flow - short version of Az: I preferred him when he was that angel to the other guy's devil back in what... 2009?), so yes, Russia singing a bloody good song incredibly well about peace and love and understanding. At least I think that's what it was about as she was dressed in white and looked very earnest.
I thought they were going to win. If I'm honest, it would have been interesting to see how the EBU was going to tackle the organisation there. Or the Russians themselves. Good song, great singer. She looked terrified though. And yes, booing is not done. It's not professional, she's not Putin.
I may be the only one, but I loved the Russian spokesperson's joke (or was it a joke...? ;-)) about awarding themselves the 12 points. If only because we'd made that same joke three minutes before. Ha!
I was completely numb by the time we got to Albania ("whatever") and all I can say about Italy is; really? People like this crap? Really? Urgh. So glad this didn't win. Long live the jury system! They looked like three cute babydykes, but apart from that... no. Just no.
And then Conchita Wurst came on and reminded us why she's the Queen of Eurovision. For possibly the first time in Eurovision history, the old winner promoting their new song was NOT cringeworthy but actually very entertaining.
I'd buy that album!
I wouldn't have minded had she won again.
A lot (LOT) of voting later Sweden won. Yay! Apparently it was close but I think I need a bigger TV because I can't make out the numbers that well as there are so many damned countries on that board they have chosen the smallest font size.
Belgium came fourth! Double yay! (though it would have been better had Our Eurovision Queen André Vermeulen not said beforehand that we were going to win. Anyways....)
And China might take part next year! Ya..... What???
Small tip to the EBU: less participants in the finals and how about investing in Asiavision or something? Not everything has to be huge. Sometimes less is more.
Unless of course we're talking about wind machines or that Austrian stage! (Wow!) In that case: more is more.
Can't wait for next year! Bring on Petra Mede!
And bring on Brussels 2017!
(or well... sometime in my lifetime please)
