Intro Post

< 2007 Semifinal | 2007 Final | 2008 Semifinals >

Happy leap day 2024! Today begins a three-day storm of new songs for Eurovision 2024. On March 3, the day after the song storm ends, I’ll probably write “Unorganized predictions and hopes for Eurovision 2024 (Volume 3).” Here is volume 1 and here is volume 2.

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Introduction

The grand final of Eurovision 2007 was dominated by eastern Europe, both in participants and in points. Aside from the Big Four and the host country of Finland, the only other western European finalists were Ireland and Sweden. The highest scorer of these seven was Finland, at 17th place out of 24. To me, these results show that western Europe needed to wake up and take the contest more seriously, but a lot of viewers took the results to mean Eurovision had deteriorated to bloc voting hell.

The top three in this contest were all Slavic countries. Serbia won the contest with a native-language song, continuing the streak of new countries winning but breaking the streak of winners in English. The winner is renowned among fans, but not as iconic as the runner-up from Ukraine which might be my favorite Eurovision song of all time. (EDIT: After finishing this blog post series, I’ve decided “Dancing Lasha Tumbai” is in fact my favorite Eurovision song of all time.) Russia continued their strong streak with third place, no doubt helped by their overpowered bloc voting.

We don’t have an exuberant opening act this time. Lordi simply reprises their winning song, first with an opening film then live on stage, then the hosts give a snappy introduction and the contest begins. We’ll be guided by Terry Wogan’s British commentary, in his second last year of the job.

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Bosnia and Herzegovina: Rijeka bez imena

Artist: Marija Šestić

Language: Serbo-Croatian (Serbian)

Key: B minor, C♯ minor, D minor

Even though I keep mentioning that I love Balkan ballads, that doesn’t mean I love all Balkan ballads. This is unquestionably a Balkan ballad in style—expressive singing in a Slavic language, Balkan guitars and string riffs, dreary romantic lyrics—but unlike Bosnia’s masterpiece last year, this totally bores me. The reason why is because Balkan ballads work best when they’re oriented upon buildup and this song doesn’t have any of that. It gets a bit more dramatic after the first key change, but loses the drama in the second key change shortly after.

I do like the usage of guitars in this song, but it fails to click with me otherwise. Also, the singer’s dress is hideous. I don’t understand why anyone thinks puke green is a flattering color to wear under any circumstance. It’s Barbara Dex award material, but the award went to Ukraine’s Verka Serduchka which isn’t fair because a song like that needs a disco ball outfit.

Spain: I Love You Mi Vida

Artist: D’Nash

Language: Spanish, plus a few phrases in English

Key: B minor, C minor

Argh, this would have made a way better opener than Bosnia. It’s upbeat Spanish pop with some good vocal harmonies, so it would have fit well at the start. But I’m really annoyed that this song keeps the same level of energy between the verses and chorus. A song shouldn’t have one degree of intensity throughout, it should have buildup and push/pull. Plus, the lyrics are inane.

Belarus: Work Your Magic

Artist: Dmitry Koldun

Language: English

Key: G minor, A minor

Finally Belarus has made it to the final! This song scored sixth place, so it’s the only time Belarus ever reached the top 10. I can see why it scored highly, since it’s got the same flashy personality and gimmicky staging that Russia loved to do in the 2000’s. I quite like the instrumental sections before each verse, because they sound like a villain’s theme song in a movie, but the rest is just regular Eurovision pop that scores well but doesn’t click with me. Maybe this song would have been better if the singing was integrated with the movie-sounding sections.

Annoyingly, the lyrics have an incorrect rhyme: feeling and willing. Maybe you could pass it off as a slant rhyme, but the songwriters probably thought these words really did rhyme, and he pronounces the latter like “wheeling”. Why not say “thrilling” in place of “feeling”?

Ireland: They Can’t Stop the Spring

Artist: Dervish

Language: English

Key: C major, D major

This song frustrates me because I want to like it so badly. It’s as Irish as a leprechaun playing a fiddle in a pub and I wish Ireland sent folk music like this more often, instead of being so fixated on Irish ballads. But the band was more focused on making their song scream Ireland than making it sound good. The lead singer of this band sounds drunk, which is not an exaggeration or figure of speech. She genuinely sounds like she guzzled three bottles of beer right before arriving at the Helsinki Arena.

One thing I liked about “The Voice”, a masterpiece of a song that’s just as Irish as this one, is that Eimear Quinn sang every single word crystal clear. In contrast, in this song I can barely understand a word Cathy Jordan is singing. Even in the studio version, Cathy doesn’t come close to the crisp vocal purity that makes me really love a song.

The instrumental of this song is nice for the most part, and as I said thoroughly Irish-sounding. But it would’ve been better with a recognizable beat to keep the audience engaged, and annoyingly it ends abruptly as if the composers ran out of ideas. The instrumental is dense throughout, so it’s not well-suited to a solo singer. It would have been better suited to multiple singers harmonizing.

42 years after their debut in Eurovision, this was Ireland’s first time scoring last place, which I’d be sad about if the vocal performance didn’t sound drunk. Ireland’s Eurovision history won’t look much prettier after this. I am praying that Bambie Thug this year will be Ireland’s redemption arc. I might even bring an Irish flag to the Malmö Arena and wave it in support.

Finland: Leave Me Alone

Artist: Hanna Pakarinen

Language: English

Key: F♯ minor

Finland is showing all the other countries how to do a hard rock song. Unlike so many other rock songs this year, this is properly rousing and has a really good 6/8 beat, plus a rich variety of guitar riffs that vary between each verse and chorus. I don’t like the abrupt ending—why did it cut off right before an obvious final chord? But other than that, this is a song I’d happily listen to and I’m surprised it only got 17th place.

North Macedonia: Mojot svet (Мојот свет)

Artist: Karolina Gočeva, returning from 2002

Language: Macedonian and English

Key: D minor

Karolina is back with another Balkan ballad and I quite like it as a composition. It’s got an unusual 7/8 time signature and alternates between quiet intrigue in the verses, and drama in the chorus. But there are a few things about this song that annoy me. For one thing, the lyrics are weirdly inane for this genre. I can’t speak Macedonian or any Slavic language, but I did pick up on the words “muzika” and “balkanska”, which made me suspect the lyrics were about the joy of music. My suspicions were confirmed in the English section, whose lyrics are totally out of place in a Balkan ballad. “Music is the only world for me, in my world we live in harmony”?! The switch into English annoys me in general—I liked it better last time, when she sang entirely in Macedonian.

Another thing that annoys me is the abrupt ending. It may seem petty, but when a Eurovision song ends abruptly it weighs the whole thing down for me. And there’s way too much going on in the stage too. I almost like this song, but all these annoyances mean it’s not something I want to come back to.

Slovenia: Cvet z juga

Artist: Alenka Gotar

Language: Slovenian

Key: C minor, C♯ minor

In terms of composition and lyrics this is a characteristic Slovenian entry: dreary lyrics about lost love, heavy use of minor key chord progressions, and dramatic singing. But in terms of genre, it’s a little unusual: it combines elements of Balkan ballads, Eurodance, and opera singing. It blends the genres well and has some good musical ideas, but I just don’t like the opera style of singing.

Hungary: Unsubstantial Blues

Artist: Magdi Rúzsa

Language: English

Key: D♭ major

When a song contains “blues” in its title, it had better be a damn good blues song or else I’ll be pissed. Fortunately, this song is as blues as it gets! The trick to composing blues music is to balance the predictable with the unpredictable. This technique applies to many genres of music, because when a song sounds too predictable it comes off as boring, but when a song is too unpredictable it seems disjointed and chaotic. A good blues song combines mainstay jazzy chord progressions with musical curveballs, so that it sways between familiarity and surprise. That is exactly what this song does!

This song was originally written in Hungarian under the title “Aprócska blues” (a bit of blues) but was localized to English for Eurovision. Fortunately, she’s quite good at singing in English (except when she pronounces “believe” as “beliewe”). She sings the song full of conviction and I don’t even mind when she gets shouty, because I can tell it was written about her own personal experiences.

The lyrics are about a man who ditched the singer like it was no big deal and has no idea how nasty it feels for her. I see some inexact rhymes in the lyrics, like sober/over and unasked/past. Since the inexactness is in consonants, these rhymes demonstrate a good command of English songwriting. No rookie mistakes like mixing up the vowels in “willing” and “feeling”.

Some might be annoyed that Magdi didn’t dress up for the contest, but it actually fits the song that she didn’t. The song is staged like a real-life music video, where the singer waits at a bus stop with a suitcase by her side. The visual effects on stage show a road, very much like “Calm After the Storm” seven years later. I like that this song takes advantage of the visual effects of this year’s stage, in a more subdued way than most others. The instrumentalists on stage blend well with the staging. The bus stop is mentioned in the Hungarian version but not in the English version; maybe that’s why the stage shows a sign labeled “Bus Stop”.

Hungary was on a roll in 2000’s Eurovision! They scored ninth place with this song, their second last time making the top ten. Even Terry Wogan was positive about this one. Songs like this and “Forogj, világ!” make me wish Hungary would rejoin the contest.

Lithuania: Love or Leave

Artist: 4Fun

Language: English

Key: C minor

Hey, it’s that one song with the memorable silhouette staging! Well-suited to a song about romantic troubles, I’d say. The staging looks gorgeous and it’s very calming to listen to. It’s particularly got some lovely guitar work—shame it got only 21st place. It didn’t benefit from being in a year filled with campy upbeat songs. The biggest problem with this song is that it lacks a climax. It repeats the same musical ideas in the last minute, then trails off at the end.

After this song ends, you can see a group of people holding up a sign labeled “Where is Andorra?” I hope someone told them that it’s a tiny patch of land between Spain and France. And I hope they responded with “shut up smartass, that’s not what I meant”.

Greece: Yassou Maria (Γειά σου Μαρία)

Artist: Sarbel-Michael Maronitis

Language: English. Don’t let the title fool you.

Key: E minor

Greece is continuing their momentum of danceable Greek bops! They knew exactly how to score well in 2000’s Eurovision, which is why they had a top 10 streak from 2004 to 2011. Eventually Greece got sick of this formula, but not before they sent the absolute best Greek entry of all time in 2013.

As cheesy as this song may be, it’s loads of fun to listen to and just as fun to watch on stage. It’s got an ultra-catchy chorus, instrumental sections that indulge the Greek sound, and strong use of Greek instruments. My favorite part of the song has to be the bridge, because it’s so heavy in Greek guitars. I can sense a lot of Britishness in Sarbel’s voice, which makes sense because he was raised in London.

Georgia: Visionary Dream

Artist: Sopho Khalvashi

Language: English

Key: A minor

Welcome aboard the second Caucasus nation, the “we don’t care, we do whatever we want” country of Eurovision! I would call Georgia the wildcard country, but that label is better suited to San Marino. Georgia had a decent debut with 12th place but hasn’t qualified to the final since 2016. We’ll see if Nutsa Buzaladze will change that this year, but we haven’t heard her song yet.

It’s hard for me to describe this song, which I fear will be a recurring problem for Georgia in Eurovision. It’s well-composed for sure and has some nice violin riffs and synths, but it’s a bit trippy for my tastes. Still, I’m pleased Georgia qualified on their first try. It sort of makes sense that Georgia is an oddball in Eurovision, because they speak an oddball language with an oddball writing system. As of this writing, Georgia has sent three songs with Georgian lyrics.

EDIT (Feb 18, 2025): My opinion on this song has shifted completely and now I think it sounds totally majestic and awesome. It just took a while to grow on me; I credit Erica’s 2007 review for making me give it another chance. If I ever review every Eurovision song all over again, my review of this will look completely different.

Sweden: The Worrying Kind

Artist: The Ark

Language: English

Key: A major, B major

Yay, Sweden took a break from swedo-pop this year! This time they sent a 1970’s sounding rock and roll song in swing rhythm. It’s pleasant enough, but it’s a bit underwhelming and doesn’t wow or rouse me. I can see why it scored 18th place: it would have done much better in 70’s or 80’s Eurovision, before flashy songs became the norm. It did become a big radio hit in Sweden, which proves it’s the kind of song that does better in radio charts than in Eurovision.

France: L’amour à la française

Artist: Les Fatals Picards

Language: A mix of Ingliche visse euh Frènche aquesènte and fronsay aveck un acksont onglay. Or in other words, Franglais.

Key: C major

After sending so many ballads and safe pop songs in the 2000’s, France has had enough of even pretending to take Eurovision seriously. This is the first of two back-to-back French joke entries, and boy is it a doozy.

This is a punk rock song in a mix of French and English, sung in each other’s accents. I don’t care what anyone says, this song is fucking hilarious. I laugh so hard when I hear French sung in an English accent. I love that the lyrics are about over-the-top romantic desperation, which parodies the stereotypical perception of France as romantic. It also cracks me up that the lead singer runs around like crazy when he sings “et je cours, je cours, je cours, I’ve lost l’amour, l’amour, l’amour” (and I run x3, I’ve lost (my) love x3).

Most people would probably say this song is intended to make fun of French people’s obsession with protecting their language. It does, but the satire goes deeper than that. One thing you need to know about the French is that they love making fun of Paris. While the rest of Europe pokes at the French for being snobby, the French go narrower and poke at Parisians. That’s why the first verse namedrops so many places in Paris: it parodies the mindset that Paris is the greatest city in the world and the rest of France doesn’t exist. The singer’s English-accented pronunciation of French phrases symbolizes the distorted perception that others have of France, especially English speakers. By parodying how the rest of the world sees France, Les Fatals Picards tell us that this isn’t what France is actually like.

Beyond any specific topics that it parodies, the fact that this is a parody song gives an important message to the rest of Europe. It proves that France makes comedic music too, not just serious ballads. Going by the various French people I know, I’d say this song is accurate to the French sense of humor. Les Fatals Picards have a huge discography full of satirical songs, almost all of which are in French, but they decided the best one for Eurovision would be in Franglais. You could argue that they chose English lyrics just because they were afraid nobody would understand a song in French, but the language mixing has a genuine meaning about how the rest of Europe sees France.

Latvia: Questa notte

Artist: Bonaparti.lv

Language: Italian

Key: B♭ major, B major

Next up, we have another linguistically unusual song. It’s one thing for Latvia to send a song in Italian—that shouldn’t be any weirder than them singing in English. But this song isn’t just sung in Italian, it’s musically as Italian as pizza, tiramisu, and gelato ice cream combined.* It’s a waltz ballad sung by a choir of six men with the alternating “DA-da-DA-da” rhythm of Italian lyrics in the verses, a rousing melody and chord progression in the chorus, and a fair amount of opera singing for good measure. It’s a good song for sure—I especially like the chord progressions in the chorus. But I’m also confused about this song.

I get that a lot of people back then wanted Italy back in the contest, but why is Latvia of all countries sending a song that’s essentially a plea for Italy to return? Why not a country culturally closer to Italy, like Switzerland or Malta? Is it because most of Europe doesn’t know what Latvian music sounds like, so Latvia felt they wouldn’t lose anything by pretending to be Italy? Or did Latvia just want to show what all was possible with the language rule gone?

Holy shit, I just realized I only have three songs left before Dancing Lasha Tumbai! I’ve been waiting for this moment so much, you don’t even know. Well OK, if you’ve binged all of Eurovision too, you probably do know.

* Italy makes the best ice cream, seriously. The one time I went to Italy in 2016, I had tons of Italian ice cream and it was richer and more flavorful than anywhere else.

Russia: Song #1

Artist: Serebro, a girl trio

Language: English

Key: C minor

Just as the UK and Ireland had the advantage of singing in English in 20th century Eurovision, Russia had the advantage of more bloc voting partners than anyone else. This contest had eight other former Soviet countries to give Russia free points, and Azerbaijan next year was the ninth. Out of this song’s 207 points, 74 of them came from former Soviet countries. Basically this means it had a decent amount of appeal but was disproportionately boosted.

This song tries to be a sassy girl trio song akin to t.A.T.u and it has a catchy chorus, but it doesn’t seem that sassy to me. The girls don’t seem to understand what they’re singing at all. Yet the televoters ate up this flashy dance song anyway, just as the juries used to do with Irish ballads. This song has a Russian version called “Песня №1” and it sounds a hell of a lot better, not to mention more sassy. I think it would have been bloc voted just as much if it was sung in Russian.

Since recent years (including a large portion of confirmed songs for 2024) have shown an increase in native-language songs, I think that if Russia ever returns to Eurovision, they’d gladly hop on to this trend.

Germany: Frauen regier’n die Welt

Artist: Roger Cicero, who died in 2016

Language: German, plus English in the final chorus

Key: B♭ major, B major

Before I can review Dancing Lasha Tumbai, I have to review two absolute doozies. This is a bittersweet one for me, because it is STILL, after 17 years, the last German song in Eurovision to be performed in German. Every single German entry after this point is entirely in English. No, the spoken sentences in “I Don’t Feel Hate” (2021) don’t count. As someone who’s been to Germany many times and strongly associates the country with the language, this doesn’t feel right to me at all. Eurovision is supposed to be about countries showcasing what makes their musical cultures unique, not countries all trying to blend in with each other. Even during the language rule era, songs blending together was an issue—remember the ballad soup that was 1980’s Eurovision?

Some countries that favored English-language songs still maintained a musical style, like Sweden and Russia. But when Germany sends this many radio pop songs in English that could be from any country, it leaves the rest of Europe with the impression that Germans don’t care about German-language music. Which is not true in the slightest!!! I mean sure, there are some Germans that prefer English-language music, but it varies from person to person and it isn’t fair to keep shafting the native-language side of German music.

This insistence on sticking to English might also lead viewers to believe that Germans are ashamed of their own culture and prefer to blend in with everyone else. Which is, again, not at all true. But this impression matches the stereotype that Germans are never patriotic, so how are fans of the contest supposed to know any better? In Eurovision it doesn’t matter how patriotic a country normally is, because watching the contest will awaken the patriot inside everyone. And if they don’t live in a participating country, they’ll choose a country they have ties to and call it theirs, which I do with Germany. That’s why I wrote this whole rant.

Anyway, let’s talk about this song already! This is something totally new from Germany: a jazzy big band song (mostly) in German. I’ve always liked jazz myself, except when it gets extra pretentious and doodly, which this song doesn’t. The title means “women rule the world” and the lyrics say that men may think they’re in charge of the world, but by getting charmed in the right way, they will succumb to the wills of women. Some people might find the lyrics old-fashioned or sexist, but I find them more playful than anything. I’d slightly prefer if it was kept all in German, but none of the German lyrics have same punch as “they are making us think that we’re kings / guess who is really pulling the strings”.

As a composition this is totally splendid and jazzy in an accessible way. It has common jazz tropes like a walking bass, trumpet and sax flourishes, and slight variations between each verse and chorus—all three are big pluses with me. It delights me when the second verse of a song does something that the first verse doesn’t, because it proves the song isn’t just copy-pasted. In terms of structure, it doesn’t go wild like jazz tends to, because that’s hard to do within three minutes. It follows the formula of verse, chorus, verse, chorus, final chorus, which suits this song well.

Overall this is a delightful song and I wish it scored better than 19th place. Terry Wogan correctly predicted that it wouldn’t stand a chance against eastern European bloc voting. It’s exactly the kind of song that I wish Germany sent more often: not necessarily jazz, but any unusual genre in their own language. This is exactly what frustrates me about Germany in Eurovision. Most of their entries blend together for me, especially the peace ballads and radio pop songs, but occasionally they send amazing memorable songs that they never replicated afterwards. Other than this song, examples include the delightfully hectic “Dschinghis Khan” (1979) and the disqualified techno song “Planet of Blue” (1996). It’s a shame Germany never sent anything similar after “Planet of Blue”, because techno is one of the first things that comes to mind when I think of German music.

Now we can say “auf Wiedersehen” to the German language in Eurovision. We’ll hear some bits of it here and there, including a dialectal joke entry in 2012 that no one likes that much, but next year the German language drought begins. “Auf Wiedersehen” is translated as goodbye, but it literally means “till we meet again”. Fitting, because I hope that someday, Germany sends to Eurovision a song in their own language that turns out to be a huge fan favorite. If Finland did it with their exotic language (they gave us “Cha Cha Cha”), then so can Germany. They just have to believe in themselves.

It’ll hurt not getting to review more German-language songs from Germany, but it won’t all be bad. I’m looking forward to “You Let Me Walk Alone” (2018), “Blood & Glitter” (2023), and of course our winner by the queen herself, “Satellite” (2010). The German language may be absent from Eurovision, but my rants about German entries have only begun.

Serbia: Molitva (Молитва) (the winner)

Artist: Marija Šerifović

Language: Serbo-Croatian (Serbian)

Key: D minor, E minor, F♯ minor

Before I started reviewing this song, I jumped around in excitement because this is the last one remaining before Dancing Lasha Tumbai. This is the most excited I’ve ever been to review a Eurovision song!!!!!

I am in two minds about this song’s victory. On the one hand, it’s absolutely lovely that the pattern of English-language winners has been broken, and that a Balkan ballad won the prize. On the other hand, this is nowhere near as good as the runner-up this year, which is Dancing Lasha Tumbai. But if the winner really had to not be Ukraine, then this is the best alternative. It’s a Balkan ballad, it’s entirely native-language, and most importantly it’s a damn good song. If this song wasn’t as good as it is, then I’d be in only one mind about this song, which is that Ukraine was robbed.

“We don’t have a song for you this year, but we promise that next year we will give you the best one.” When the Serbian spokesperson last year said these words, this is what she meant. How fucking badass is it that Serbia won Eurovision on their first try??? They’re the only country to ever accomplish this, barring Switzerland who won the first contest. This song is awesome, or dare I say, fucking awesome. In fact, it is totally fucking awesome.

When I reviewed the last two Željko ballads (Lane moje, Lejla), I praised them for starting off calm and building up as they progress. This song wasn’t composed by Željko, but it follows many of his tropes. From start to finish, it progresses through the full gamut from quiet to aggressive, all the while keeping the same verses and chorus. The key changes are cleverly done because each of them accompanies a new addition to the composition. It begins just with piano and strings, then the first key change provides a beautiful flute interlude before the verse. The second key change elevates the song with dramatic string and guitar riffs, then after what almost sounds like an abrupt ending, the song concludes with a lovely piano part.

This song stands out among 2000’s winners, not just because it’s in Serbian. Also because the staging sticks to simplicity: there’s no complex choreography or flashy gimmicks. Just a woman with a damn powerful voice, plus five backing singers, and subtle fiery visual effects. Plus a little gay moment at the end where Marija locks hands with one of her backing singers, the paint on their hands forming a heart. There is no two ways about it, Eurovision is extremely super gay. It’s been gay ever since Jean-Claude Pascal won in 1961 and it gets gayer every year. I’m not at all gay myself, but you don’t have to be gay to be obsessed with Eurovision, not any more than you have to be a girl to be obsessed with My Little Pony.

Overall, Serbia’s winner represents the first half of what I love about Eurovision: the well-composed classy songs that catch listeners by surprise. The songs that don’t try to be crazy and gimmicky, but let the beauty of music speak for itself. The other half of what I love about Eurovision is represented in the very next song.

Ukraine: Dancing Lasha Tumbai

Artist: Verka Serduchka, drag persona of Andriy Danylko

Language: A hearty nonsensical mix of German, English, Russian, and Ukrainian

Key: E minor, F minor, F♯ minor

FINALLY, WE ARE HERE!!!! THIS IS THE SONG THAT I HAVE BEEN WAITING TO GET TO EVER SINCE I CONCEIVED OF MY EUROVISION BLOG POST SERIES!!!!!!!! Which was April 30, 2023 (the date I created the Word document for my introduction post), or perhaps a few days earlier. Unlike certain other projects of mine, it took me less than a year to get to the number one part I was most excited about. I can pat myself on the back for this.

Remember way back in my 1975 review, where I said “Ding-a-Dong” might be my favorite Eurovision song of all time? The only reason I said “might” is because this song might also be my favorite Eurovision song of all time. If I were to make a video compiling my top 100 favorite Eurovision songs (which I kind of want to do when this project is finished), I’d probably put “Ding-a-Dong” at number one just because it’s responsible for getting me obsessed with the contest. But “Dancing Lasha Tumbai” deserves some credit too.

In the introduction post for this series, I said that “a certain YouTube channel” released a lot of Eurovision mashups on the day of the 2022 finals. That YouTube channel is SiIvaGunner, a channel I am involved in that pretends to upload video game music but in fact uploads mashups and other musical edits and calls them “high quality rips”. The channel is an absolute rabbit hole that’s complicated to explain. What’s most relevant to this post series is that sometimes the channel hosts event days dedicated to a particular musician, video game series, or other media franchise. One such event day was SiIvaVision, which you can read about here.

When SiIvaVision was initially proposed to the team behind the channel, one team member made a document serving as an introductory guide to Eurovision, which listed a handful of songs that would go well in mashups, plus descriptions and recommendations on how to use them. I didn’t know much about Eurovision at the time, but something about the contest intrigued me. The first song listed in the document was “Dancing Lasha Tumbai”, which he described as “the ultimate Eurovision song” and said “anything We Are Number One goes with, this should too”. I listened to “Dancing Lasha Tumbai” and was instantly hooked, and even recognized it from a video called “mr fucking patches”.

Indeed, this song is frighteningly similar to “We Are Number One”, which is commonly used in SiIvaGunner mashups. Both songs alternate between goofy lyrics and a catchy saxophone hook, both songs are in a danceable ska style, both are full of mashup potential (check this totally unedited Super Mario 64 song for instance), and both are total bangers. Oh, and both have a key change near the end accompanied by “bah-biddily-bah” lyrics. The guide document intrigued me to dive into the earlier history of Eurovision, as I discussed when reviewing “Ding-a-Dong”. I didn’t make much for SiIvaVision, but if the channel ever did another Eurovision event I would absolutely pour my heart out. I should note that I didn’t care enough about Eurovision to watch the 2022 contest live, but the next year I excitedly followed the contest as it happened, and this year I’m going to Malmö to see it in person. And that, my friends, is how I became obsessed with Eurovision.

I thoroughly agree with every single word Erica said about this song. This IS a joke entry done to perfection! It’s ludicrous in looks and consists of nonsensical lyrics in multiple languages, and it’s an absolute banger. All the synths and saxophone hooks and accordions are such a joy on the ears. It’s thoroughly well-composed and meticulously staged to get the audience as hyped as possible. It’s impossible to watch this performance without imitating Verka and her backing singers’ gestures. When I got to this song in my review, I stood up and sang, danced, and clapped along all the way through, as all my sorrows and worries disappeared.

The lyrics have no meaning aside from telling the listener to dance, but I’d argue it indirectly has a message that music transcends language barriers, particularly in the passage “Me English nicht verstehen. Let’s speak dance!” Much like “Sanomi”, this song tells us that no matter what language a song is in, a banger is a banger. As I said when reviewing “Dschinghis Khan”, out-of-the-box bangers like this are what defines Eurovision. “Dancing Lasha Tumbai” in particular, I’d say is the number one song that defines Eurovision. It has absolutely everything I could possibly love in a song and represents everything I love about Eurovision… well OK, the second half of what I love about Eurovision.

This and “Molitva” are a fitting top two for this year. The songs complement each other very well, because the winner is a serious song that lets the beauty of music speak for itself, whereas this is one of the goofiest songs in Eurovision history but also an unironic banger. Both songs are absolute genius, and both songs are extremely gay. When put side by side (as was done in this grand final), these two songs combined represent what makes Eurovision so goddamn special.

If you’ve read any of my other blog post series, you can probably see where this is going. This is one of those points where I get all sappy and discuss how much the work of media I’m reviewing means to me. This song means a lot to me because it always cheers me up when I’m feeling down, and because it’s exactly the kind of music I love the most. I always get baffled when someone ranks Eurovision 2007 and doesn’t put this song at or near the top. To me, this is the definitive Eurovision song, the first song that comes to mind when I think of Eurovision, the absolute peak of the peak.

Whew… I finally did it. You have no idea how satisfying it was for me to finally review this masterpiece. I knew I would say a huge amount about this song, but this review went in directions I never imagined it would! That right here is why I love making blog post series so much. I discover reasons to love works of media that I never thought about before analyzing in depth. I think the rest of this blog post will go by quickly.

(Obligatory: This is my third longest review behind “Guildo hat euch lieb!” and “Hard Rock Hallelujah”.)

United Kingdom: Flying the Flag (for You)

Artist: Scooch

Language: English

Key: E♭ major

And of course the momentum had to be killed by this godawful attempt at a joke entry. This is just tacky, annoying, discomforting, and not even that interesting as a piece of music. It’s just a bunch of excessively patriotic sexual innuendo, from a country that’s already over-the-top patriotic. Oh, and it namedrops place names, almost as if the singers know that annoys me. This got twelve points from Malta and seven from Ireland for some reason, apparently to protest about bloc voting? The UK’s approach to Eurovision was completely broken by this point, but they’d get a bright spot in 2009.

Romania: Liubi, Liubi, I Love You

Artist: Todomundo

Language: English, Italian, Spanish, Russian, French, and Romanian

Key: C♯ minor

Now this is how you do a multilingual song! It’s more of what “Follow My Heart” from 2006 should have been, since it’s easy to tell which language is which and each one gets an equal amount of time in the spotlight. It starts with a verse in English, then the same melody sung in the other five languages, and then a rapidfire language section that repeats twice. It’s cheesy but it’s so much fun. This is also a rare “everyone gets a turn to sing” song that I actually enjoy, because each one sings in a different language so there’s actually a point to it.

I love that the music changes to match each language, particularly in the Spanish and Russian sections, and I love that this song gradually speeds up. Music that gets faster as it progresses is fun to listen to and a joy to sing or play on the piano, because the faster the song gets, the more I focus on the music and tune out everything else around me. It especially makes sense to feature gradually speeding songs in Eurovision, because it helps the song fit inside three minutes. The rave section at the end is the best part.

Terry Wogan said the language gimmick was an attempt to get votes from as many countries as possible, but if that was true then Todomundo would have sung in more unusual languages like Ukrainian or Finnish, instead of sticking to easily recognizable languages. I find it a bit odd that four of the six languages are Romance, but it also makes sense because that’s what Romanians can most easily replicate. And because they mostly chose the six most recognizable languages in Europe, except they replaced German with Romanian.

Bulgaria: Water

Artist: Elitsa Todorova and Stoyan Yankoulov

Language: Bulgarian, although the title is in English

Key: F minor

For Bulgaria, this song is an oasis of success amidst poor results. It scored fifth place and is the only time they qualified to the finals from 2005 to 2013. It’s also the first ever Eurovision song in Bulgarian, which is yet another Slavic language that I don’t know well enough to describe how it sounds other than, well, Slavic.

I almost want to call this a Bulgarian counterpart to “Quién maneja mi barca”, a song I find notoriously unlistenable, but that would be harsh, wouldn’t it? Unless you like both songs, in which case you probably took that as a compliment. The instrumental is actually pretty great, a techno electronic tune full of exciting drum solos. But the white voice style of singing is just too much for my ears. I can enjoy songs with this ethnic Slavic singing style, but they have to be melodious like “Shum” from 2021, one of my favorite Eurovision songs of all time. This doesn’t have enough of a melody to keep me hooked and sticks to a narrow range of notes, so while I appreciate the instrumental, it’s really not something I want to come back to.

Turkey: Shake It Up Şekerim

Artist: Kenan Doğulu

Language: English

Key: C minor

Before I let my brain bubble with thoughts about how awesome “Shum” is, I have three more songs to get through.

This scored fourth place, really??? I normally love a good Turkish bop, but this just sounds cheap and repetitive and I don’t like that the singer keeps yelling at the audience. I’m also distracted by the repeated title which sounds like “shake it up, shake it in”. I think it benefited from being near the end, both in the semifinal (where it scored third place) and the final. Otherwise it wouldn’t have done as well.

Armenia: Anytime You Need

Artist: Hayko (Hayk Hakobyan)

Language: English, plus a bit of Armenian at the end

Key: G minor

This time Armenia went for a ballad, which isn’t bad as far as ballads go. It sounds a tinge ethnic and stays in minor key, which is nice—if this song was in the 1980’s or 1990’s it would have had the chorus in major key and that would have pissed me off. But I’d like it better if it was entirely in Armenian, because the singer’s accent is distracting. The Armenian section feels like a peek at the kind of songs Armenia would’ve sent if they participated in the 90’s.

Moldova: Fight

Artist: Natalia Barbu, who will return in 2024

Language: English

Key: D minor, E♭ minor

Yet another one of those Eurovision songs that makes me think “I like that it’s dramatic, but I won’t remember it otherwise”. Sometimes these types of songs win me over when they’re on stage, but in this one I’m distracted by all the flashy effects, weird staging props, and janky English singing. Nice violin riffs though.

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Who’s my favorite?

To make up for the obviousness of my winner this year (which is Ukraine, Dancing Lasha Tumbai), I’ll tell you what my second favorite is. Initially I was expecting Germany to be my second favorite, but then I decided I like the winner from Serbia the second most. Maybe once this blog post series is done, I could make rankings of each year’s songs, but I don’t know yet where or under what format I would publish them. I probably won’t rewrite this blog post series all over again.

• Belgium, 2 (1976, 2003)
• Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1 (2006)
• Denmark, 3 (1963, 2000, 2001)
• Finland, 3 (1968, 1983, 1989)
• France, 3 (1977, 1990, 1991)
• Germany, 4 (1956, 1979, 1982, 1999)
• Hungary, 1 (2005)
• Iceland, 1 (1992)
• Ireland, 4 (1970, 1980, 1993, 1994)
• Israel, 1 (1987)
• Italy, 1 (1958)
• Latvia, 1 (2002)
• Luxembourg, 4 (1961, 1965, 1972, 1988)
• Netherlands, 7 (1957, 1959, 1964, 1967, 1969, 1975, 1998)
• Norway, 5 (1960, 1966, 1973, 1985, 1995)
• Portugal, 2 (1971, 1984)
• Serbia and Montenegro, 1 (2004)
• Sweden, 2 (1974, 1996)
• Switzerland, 1 (1986)
• Turkey, 2 (1978, 1997)
• Ukraine, 1 (2007)
• United Kingdom, 2 (1962, 1981)
• (20 winners)

I’ve chosen four new countries as my winner in a row now, from 2004 to 2007! We’ll see whether 2008 continues this streak. It has another Željko ballad from Serbia and those are extreme Cookiefonster bait.

General thoughts:

For the first time, the voting recap featured both snippets of the songs and footage of the contestants in the green room, some of whom gave messages to the audience. A nice touch, I’d say! The recent contests have fillers and pleasantries taking up tons of time, but SVT is aiming to trim the fat in 2024.

One advantage of Eurovision taking up multiple nights is that a country can organize multiple interval acts, which means they can show off more sides their music. The semifinal act focused on Finnish folk music, whereas the final went for something more modern: Finnish symphonic metal with acrobats. I liked the semifinal act more, but both are good showcases of Finland. That trapeze performer has nerves of steel!

As I said in my semifinal post, the visual design this year is lovely and timeless. The postcards were loads of fun too—they all told little stories about Finnish life and had a good sense of humor. The hosts were charming and competent, but the green room girl in pink was totally obnoxious and Terry Wogan was right to clown on her. I’m surprised he didn’t call her an eejit. According to Wikipedia she purposely adopts a self-absorbed persona on TV, so maybe she’s like Silvia Night in that her humor is only well-received by her local audience.

Much like 2006, this year is so packed with iconic entries that I have trouble summing up my overall opinion. To me, this is one of the Eurovision years, one of those that defines people’s perception of the contest to the present day. Serbia and Ukraine’s top two are both renowned icons, but others such as Hungary, Greece, and even the non-qualifying Norway are beloved to this day. And of course it has a handful of joke entries, but they weren’t as intrusive as I was led to believe. Besides, one of the joke entries was Dancing Lasha Tumbai.

The voting sequence went much like last year: tons of hilariously predictable bloc voting, but also proof that Serbia and Ukraine appealed to the entire continent. Even funnier than the bloc voting was all the “thank you for the wonderful show tonight” and the annual long-ass speech in French from France. I love how excited the audience got whenever the spokespersons spoke Finnish; even “hyvää iltaa” was enough to make them cheer. I’m baffled the Netherlands chose Paul de Leeuw as their spokesperson after what happened last year—maybe he begged for a second chance and promised not to be as annoying this time? I still think he’s an annoying manchild, but he wasn’t so bad this year.

The only remaining question is: why did western Europe flop so badly? I don’t think it’s just because of bloc voting: most western European countries that reached the final didn’t have very competitive entries. The UK and France sent joke entries, Ireland had a painful vocal performance, Spain and Sweden weren’t that memorable, and Germany was probably too niche to score well. The only one that I would’ve expected to do well was Finland, whose rock song was quite good. Maybe voters wanted a different genre to win this year.

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See you next time for the first ever three-night Eurovision year.

>> 2008 (Semifinals): The Year of Rainbow Barf Staging