Friday, May 28, 2010

Eurovision Shock: Sweden out as ten go through in second semi-final

Bloody Hell! I didn’t see that coming! Anna Berghendahl’s This is my Life was my favourite to win the whole competition! Clearly it’s a mistake to overestimate the taste of the European public.

jonwillchambers: The last time Sweden were absent from a #Eurovision final? 1976.

jonwillchambers: How much are those fated Swedish #Eurovision glow-sticks worth on eBay? Hope they're recyclable.

edwardclarke@efan78 How can SWEDEN go out??! Abba must be spinning in their graves! #esc #eurovision

edwardclarke: Message to Sweden: I *do* know Abba is still alive. I was being *ironic*. I share your pain in falling out of Eurovision. #esc



Seriously, this does make me fear for the future creative direction of the competition. For Pete’s sake, Azerbaijan went through - I suppose it is one of the bookie’s favourites - a dreary dull song in my opinion. The Azerbaijanese have gone all out to win this year, hiring Beyonce’s All the Single Ladies choreographer. Pity they didn’t watch the recent Channel 4 programme on the best 100 pop videos of all time: they would have learnt that Beyonce’s dance routine was copied step-for-step, shimmy-for-shimmy from Gwen Verdon's Mexican Breakfast from The Ed Sullivan Show (1969). Here is Azerbaijan's Drip Drop, sung with joyless intensity by Safura:



While Sweden may have had the most musically sophisticated song of the evening, The Netherlands were very brave with a retro-tastic little diity by the creator of the Smurfs, sung by Sieneke. Again, creative daring divided the audience:

justgarance: Oh. No. We're up. #eurovision. Get your earplugs.

AngryBritain: The Netherlands: Your song roughly translates as 'There are some fucking excellent drugs available in Amsterdam' #eurovision

thoroughlygood: OK .. Look I'm really sorry about this .. but I actually quite like this. Is that bad ? #netherlands #eurovision #esc

edwardclarke: Me too! :-) RT @efan78: Yay! Shakin' Stevens' Dutch cousin! I like this one, it's very retro-#Eurovision

_irissa_: Dear other people in Europe. We’re sorry for sending Sieneke. We didn’t want to send her, but Papa Smurf made us. #songfestival #eurovision

thoroughlygood: VOTE #NETHERLANDS ... she's gorgeous #eurovision



Well, The Netherlands never made it either :-(

Through to the finals are:

Armenia
Israel
Denmark
Azerbaijan
Ukraine
Romania
Ireland
Cyprus
Georgia
Turkey

For me, Ireland (Niamh Kavanagh: It's for you) is the clear best out of the above. Most surprisingly improved in performance was Georgia - Shine sung by Sofia Nizharadze was heartfelt and charming. Cyprus appears to be a stealth UK entry (sung by a boy from Wales - Jon Lilygreen & The Islanders: Life Looks Better in Spring) - it actually stands a better chance than our official entry!


thoroughlygood: PLEASE DON'T CALL NOW .. YOU'LL CAUSE A RIFT IN THE SPACE TIME CONTINUUM. CHILDREN WILL DIE. #eurovision #esc

orbyn: These tweets almost make me wish I were watching Eurovision. Almost.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

you make some interesting points, however I do believe that the core problem is the voting system as it does support regional bullying.
Sweden was one of the most viewed entries in Youtube so one cant say their entry was out of touch with Europeans.
What is out of touch with the modern world is the voting system.
A simple solution would be to place entries in regional groups, of 6, and you cant vote for an entry in your own region.
Well done Anna, you were brilliant
ET
Australia

Hedgie said...

"the Big Four" would unfortunately probably scupper regional voting too, given that German, France, Spain and the UK would most likely be in a single regional group by themselves! Otherwise, I agree with you, the voting system needs reform.