Intro Post

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In exactly one month, I leave on my first flight for my Eurovision trip. I was already excited for it, but now I’m way more excited because I’ll be meeting a friend there.

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Introduction

For Eurovision 2012, Azerbaijan brought the contest to the easternmost place it’s ever been: its capital city of Baku. The semifinals and final began at the usual 9 PM in Central European Summer Time, which was midnight in Azerbaijan.* One thing I’ve learned about Azerbaijan is that the country is obsessed with showing off its sports arenas. Baku frequently hosts Formula One races and football/soccer championships, and they even bidded to host the 2016 and 2020 Summer Olympics. Knowing this, it’s no surprise Azerbaijan wanted to win Eurovision so badly—it was a perfect opportunity for the country to show itself off.

Although Baku had several arenas available to host the contest, Azerbaijan chose to build a new one for Eurovision called the Baku Crystal Hall. This came with controversy because local authorities demolished homes and evicted citizens to make way for the arena. While Azerbaijan used Eurovision to show itself off, some fans, TV hosts, and even contestants used it to draw attention to the country’s human rights controversies, particularly involving LGBT citizens and Armenians. On the flip side, Iran directly to the south condemned Azerbaijan for hosting an LGBT-related event, which Iran considered “anti-Islamic behavior”.

The EBU had hoped this contest could provide a glimmer of peace between Azerbaijan and Armenia, but it unfortunately didn’t work out. Azerbaijan temporarily lifted their ban on Armenian citizens for this contest and Armenia originally was going to participate, but they withdrew on March 7 (the contest was from May 22 to 26). Poland also withdrew due to financial troubles, whereas Montenegro returned after last participating in 2009, making for a total of 42 participants.

After Eurovision 2010 and 2011 opened up voting right when the songs began, this contest reverted to the usual 15-minute voting time window, although the 2010-11 system will return with some extra liberties for the rest of the world in Eurovision 2024. I watched both semifinals with German commentary.

* Azerbaijan is three hours east of Central European Time. They used daylight saving time from 1997 to 2016, so after that the contest started in Azerbaijan at 11 PM.

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Montenegro: Euro Neuro

Artist: Rambo Amadeus

Language: Broken English, plus a few phrases in broken German and presumably not broken Serbo-Croatian

Key: A minor (verses), D minor (chorus)

We have now arrived at this fucking song, right at the beginning of Eurovision 2012. It was one of the earliest Eurovision songs I heard because as with “Dancing Lasha Tumbai” and “Run Away”, it appeared on the Eurovision introduction document I mentioned when reviewing 2007. The song has lived rent-free in my head ever since. I wonder if this song coming first was part of why the EBU did away with randomized order the next year. It’s more likely that it’s because I’ve heard the 2012 final gets off to a slow start, but a shameless joke entry coming first must have dented the show’s viewing figures. Iceland and Greece (the next two) would’ve been much more appealing openers.

Eurovision 2012 was the second last year where all six former Yugoslav countries in the EBU participated. All of them sang in their national languages except for Montenegro who went for something avant-garde. RTCG internally selected Rambo Amadeus because he’s popular and respected throughout former Yugoslavia, and presumably they let him write whatever kind of song he wanted for Eurovision. The end result is the weirdest song in Eurovision history. As far as I’m aware, this is the only English-language song Rambo Amadeus has ever made; almost all his music in in Serbo-Croatian. This consists of broken English lyrics spoken over weird synthesizer noises, filled with bizarre rhymes like “snobbism” and “bicyclism” and references to the European debt crisis. Rambo Amadeus once said that everyone understands this song except for the English.

Whenever I read someone’s Eurovision reviews, it always seems like a roll of the dice whether they’ll like a joke entry or not. Some of you will hate me for this, but I think this song is absolutely fucking hilarious. Maybe it’s my stupid sense of humor, but I love over-the-top incorrect English. I love the insane amount of rhymes squeezed into this song: first a bunch that end in -etic, -eptic, or -ectic, then -atic, then -ution, then -ism, then -ition, and finally -ool. And -ance in the chorus, can’t forget.

Beneath all the nonsense, there is some actual meaning in the lyrics. In the -ution section, Rambo Amadeus protests against the way bigger countries in Europe treat smaller ones like Montenegro: they’re constantly asked to drop what they’re doing and give up a bunch of money, whether it’s funding climate change research or participating in a song contest. In the -ition section, Rambo admits he has no intention of scoring well in the contest and merely wants to show off his Balkan sense of humor. And that, he very much did. At the end he opens his pockets to reveal they’re empty, perhaps to show why Montenegro has been absent from Eurovision.

The intro and verses mostly consist of weird random notes (that Rambo sings along to with great precision, especially in the intro), but the chorus shows us he’s a pretty decent composer. The funky bassline and especially the Balkan string riffs are really good musically. It sort of reminds me of “Sto posto te ljubam”, another infamously bad song that has some nice Balkan instrumentation if you look deeper. To this day, it’s the most iconic Montenegrin entry by far. The only other one I might consider iconic is the end of the Željko ballad pentalogy in 2015.

(Oh my fucking god, I just discovered a video of Euro Neuro performed as an aria. You guys have to watch it.)

Latvia: Beautiful Song

Artist: Anmary (Linda Amantova)

Language: English

Key: G♯ minor

I swear I remember reading that Montenegro scored second last in this semifinal, but in fact they scored fourth last. This is one of three songs that scored fewer points than “Euro Neuro” and I can see why: it’s absolutely hideous and doesn’t have joke entry appeal. I hate everything about this song. I hate the super-standard chord progressions, I hate the singer’s voice cracks, I hate that everyone on stage looks like random college students, I hate that the lyrics are so inane, and the first verse about Johnny Logan winning Eurovision is just tacky. This just screams “designed specifically for Eurovision”, in a bad way. A song can seem designed for Eurovision in a good way (e.g. “The Code” and “We Will Rave” from 2024), but this song just talks down to the audience. It comes off like the songwriters think that Eurovision fans want to hear a song about a beautiful song playing on the radio.

Speaking of which, the chorus passage “beautiful song is on the radio” causes confusion for me, as a native English speaker. I think they meant “a beautiful song is on the radio”, but to me “beautiful song is on the radio” means “a song called ‘Beautiful Song’ is on the radio”. So it comes off to me like they’re singing specifically about how great this song is. Maybe the songwriters were going for a double meaning and didn’t know how English articles (a, an, the) work?

Switzerland: Unbreakable

Artist: Sinplus (Ivan and Gabriel Broggini)

Language: English

Key: D major

So far, this has been yet another year of agreeable non-qualifiers. This is an alright radio-sounding rock song with a few nice ideas and a distinctive voice, but it really just goes in one ear and out the other. Plus, the lyrics are inane and repetitive.

Belgium: Would You?

Artist: Iris (Laura van den Bruel)

Language: English

Key: E major

Wikipedia is lying to me. This sappy power ballad did not score fewer points than “Euro Neuro”. There is no way that can possibly be true. I’m glad that for once neither the juries nor televoters rewarded a ballad, but while this isn’t something I want to keep, it isn’t too bad by ballad standards. It gets off to a slow start, but once the song builds up it gets pleasant enough despite the sleepy singer.

Actually, looking at a table of results it sort of makes sense this scored less than Montenegro. Belgium got scattered points from six countries, while Montenegro got twelve from Albania and eight from San Marino.

Finland: När jag blundar

Artist: Pernilla Karlsson

Language: Swedish

Key: B minor

Now we’ve reached the only ever Swedish-language Eurovision entry since the language rule was abolished in 1998. To Swedish Eurovision fans who want their language back in Eurovision: I feel you so hard, I want it back too. But I’m not Swedish, so I won’t write a huge rant about language drought like I did for “Frauen regier’n die Welt”.

This isn’t the first time Finland sent a Eurovision song in Swedish—you might remember “Fri?” from 1990. That song was really just a Swedish version of a song originally in English, whereas this is authentic Finland Swedish representation. It’s sung in Swedish not out of necessity, but out of artistic expression. It’s a sweet reflective waltz sung by a young Finland Swedish singer whose career never took off, composed and written by her brother who plays a cello on stage, and written as a love letter to their mother. The choice of language makes it clear this is a personal song to them.

I’ve already heard this song before, but after watching so many contests without the Swedish language, and getting slightly better at recognizing Swedish words… this really tugs at my heartstrings now. I still can’t understand spoken Swedish (or other Scandinavian languages), but sometimes I get lucky and hear a few recognizable words in a row, which happens in the chorus of this song.

Aside from the lyrics, just hearing the Swedish language sung with so much soul makes me nostalgic. Her voice beams with tender appreciation, not aggressive shoutiness like so many slow songs. I can tell she’s singing a different kind of Swedish from all those Swedish entries: she pronounces the notorious sj-sound as a simple “sh” (as spelled in English), the tj-sound as an English “ch”, and her u’s are further back than in Sweden where they sound almost like German ü. Those little details make this song extra special, as someone who likes picking up on pronunciation details.

Unfortunately, this song didn’t appeal widely enough to reach the final: it scored 12th place in the jury, televote, and overall. But it has a fan following and shows up surprisingly often in personal winner compilations.

Israel: Time

Artist: Izabo

Language: English and Hebrew

Key: B major

Sometimes at Eurovision, I’m smacked in the face with a song I have no idea what to say about. It’s some kind of undeveloped amateurish attempt at a rock tune, more of a first draft than an actual song. This feels like a 2008 entry in a bad way, both musically and visually. Let’s leave it at that.

San Marino: The Social Network Song

Artist: Valentina Monetta. You’ll love her eventually, as all fans do.

Language: English

Key: G♯ minor

The full title of this song is “The Social Network Song (Oh Oh – Uh – Oh Oh)”, or as the TV captions list it, “The Social Network Song oh oh uh oh oh”. It was originally going to be called “Facebook Uh, Oh, Oh (A Satirical Song)”, but the title and lyrics had to be modified. The studio version includes the English phrase “I like” and the Italian phrase “mi piaci”, but they weren’t included on stage.

Welcome aboard to Ralph Siegel’s 20th Eurovision entry! As Peter Urban said, the guy just never wants to let go. I’m not quite sure how he managed to compose five entries for San Marino, but I can take a guess. Maybe Germany decided they were sick of Ralph Siegel composing so many of their entries, so they turned down the songs Siegel kept submitting. On the other hand, San Marino was probably dry on composers willing to write Eurovision entries for them, so they happily hired Ralph Siegel. Out of his five San Marino entries, four of them were sung by the microstate’s very own Valentina Monetta. Over the years she participated in Eurovision, she gradually became a Eurovision icon. Fans even like to joke that if San Marino ever wins Eurovision, they’ll host the contest in Valentina’s backyard.

Some people might think this is one of the most painfully stupid joke entries in the world, but I disagree. It’s a perfectly fine silly lighthearted song with some nice funky chords that doesn’t take itself too seriously. It captures the exciting computery feeling of at the time still relatively new social media websites in 2012. That said, it’s not memorable or exciting enough that I want to come back to it. I had already heard this song a year or so ago and felt no intention to revisit it. Will Valentina’s next entries be a different story? We’ll just have to find out.

Austria: Woki mit deim Popo

Artist: Trackshittaz

Language: Bavarian German (Mühlviertlerisch dialect)

Key: D minor

We’ve now reached the last of four Austrian entries sung in a regional German dialect, and the last Eurovision entry sung in any variety of German. I miss the German language in Eurovision so fucking much.

What I do not miss, however, is when the contest assaulted my ears this often. This wouldn’t be so bad if the vocalists didn’t have the most annoying rapping style, or if they had a few sections with singing. And if the lyrics were maybe less inane than “shake your butt in the club”. I’m also annoyed the song ends abruptly, which I suppose is my latest pet peeve. If you know me, you’ll know I have tons of pet peeves.

Semifinal 1 thoughts:

I don’t like the hosts this year and the postcards are just tourism ads, but I’ll get back to these topics in the final. Just know that awkward, stilted hosts can weigh down a year for me. Ah well, next year we’ll have Petra! One thing Azerbaijan did right when hosting this year is the first interval act. It’s a showcase of ethnic dancing full of percussion and bagpipes which kept me engaged all the way through. I burst out laughing when the cameras showed Jedward (yes, they’re back this year) dancing along to the music. Not that I can blame them! Let’s hope the next two Azerbaijani interval acts live up to this. Also, the Big Five and host previews last year were way too short, so I’m glad they were longer this time. The new change for 2024, where the Big Five and host perform in the semifinals but can’t be voted for, was long overdue.

Out of the non-qualifiers, Finland deserved to qualify but the others were rightful, obvious, or both. I’m not as pissed about Finland not qualifying as I was when reviewing 2010, but I’m sad they didn’t make it through. The reason I’m less upset is because Finland this year had an air of “viewers might not think it’s exciting enough”, whereas in 2010 there was zero excuse for them not to qualify. Most of the qualifier reveals I didn’t care much about, but Russia made me smile and Ireland (the last one) made me sad and happy at the same time. I’m happy for Jedward, even though their song isn’t as good as “Lipstick”, but I’m sad Finland wasn’t the last one.

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Netherlands: You and Me

Artist: Joan Franka

Language: English

Key: F♯ major

Musically this is a sweet little guitar tune, but it’s really only known for the controversy where Joan Franka’s managers forced her to wear a Native American headdress that has absolutely nothing to do with the song. A year ago, I remember reading an article about how terribly Joan’s managers treated her in the contest, and it sadly shows in her performance. She sounds like she wants to get this over with and go back home.

Let’s just say, I’m glad we now live in a time where the Netherlands is sending the Eurovisioniest Eurovision delight in the history of Eurovision. I fucking love “Europapa” so much and I hope it wins 2024.

Belarus: We Are the Heroes

Artist: Litesound

Language: English

Key: B minor

God dammit, everything this year sounds so 2012. This is just mediocre early 2010’s boyband music that goes in one ear and out the other, then one of the amazing songs we’ll hear in 2024 sneaks back into my ears. Maybe the month leading up to Eurovision isn’t the best time to review these contests because I’m so hyped about the songs this year, but I’m pushing through anyway. In every blog post series I ever do, there are always going to be some less than fun stretches. Apparently this has a Belarusian version released in 2020 but I don’t care enough to listen to it. Maybe if I reread this post, I’ll be reminded that version exists and give it a listen.

Portugal: Vida minha

Artist: Filipa Sousa

Language: Portuguese, which is a delightful language so I’m glad we still hear it annually

Key: B♭ minor, E♭ minor, E minor

I would like to give a huge, heartfelt muito obrigado to Portugal for sending something actually worth listening to! I can’t explain how unreal it feels to hear 2012 pop song this, 2012 pop song that, and then be smacked in the face with this gorgeous song. In that moment, I felt a burst of clarity and remembered why I started this blog post series: not to complain about endless dancey drivel, but to gush over the hidden gems throughout the contest’s history.

You can always rely on Portugal to buck the trend of bland pop music in English. This is a full-out ethno-ballad from Portugal, in a similar spirit to their 2008 entry. It’s got some lovely guitars and accordions and flowing Portuguese-sounding melodies. I used to think Balkan ballads were the only good type of ballads, but now I know Portuguese ballads kick ass too. Both types of ballads have a slow, free-flowing style of singing, which gives credence to the common observation that Portuguese sounds like a Slavic language.

How the living fuck did Portugal not qualify this year? More than that, how the fuck was this below both the jury and televote’s top ten? I kind of get the juries, they always did Portugal, Finland, and formerly Turkey dirty. But there has to have been more televoters who have actually good taste. Maybe all the ethno-ballad lovers just flocked to Serbia instead? I’m just as pissed that this didn’t qualify as I am that Finland didn’t qualify in 2010. But my frustration is dampened by the absolute delight of hearing a song that’s worth listening to.

I can never stay mad at anything Portugal does in Eurovision. Any country that stays so stubbornly true to itself deserves my respect. I might get mad when the UK or Germany sends bland drivel, or shocked when Turkey or Ukraine sends something boring, but when Portugal sends a dull entry I forgive them because they’ve had to deal with so many unfair results. And 2012 brings a new addition to the pile.

Bulgaria: Love Unlimited

Artist: Sofi Marinova

Language: Bulgarian, plus phrases in, *deep breath*… Turkish, Greek, Spanish, Serbo-Croatian, French, Romani, Italian, Azerbaijani, Arabic, French again, and at the end English.

Key: B minor

And now we’re back to 2012 synthy dancey songs. I loved those kinds of songs as a teenager, but I must have overdosed on them because now they really grate. This one in particular has an annoying ultra-fast swing rhythm which is never something I like. When a swing rhythm is this fast, it defeats the purpose of a song being in swing because you can’t bop your head to the swung notes. This feels like she’s singing improvised over an unfinished demo song that has no progression or buildup. And the lyrics are just “love transcends all boundaries” plus “I love you” in too many languages in the chorus.

I don’t hate this song, but it’s just too overwhelming for me. I’m glad Portugal lifted my spirits because otherwise I’d be losing my mind right now. It turns out that electronic dance soup is just as annoying as ballad soup and Eurodance soup. I can love a good EDM entry, but this year has too many of them back to back. It’s like a party where almost everyone brought a cake, instead of a different type of food. Cake is nice and all (a bit overrated honestly), but eventually you’ll get sick of all these pastries.

Obligatory mention that this is the first Eurovision song to feature the Azerbaijani language. We’ll hear a tiny amount of the language again in 2021, then Azerbaijan’s 2024 entry will finally give us a proper introduction to their language. Next year, Germany and Sweden should get their heads out of their asses and embrace this trend.

Slovenia: Verjamem

Artist: Eva Boto, who is just over three years older than me

Language: Slovenian

Key: F minor, G minor, arguably C minor, F minor, and F♯ minor

I expected Slovenia to send yet another aggressive shouty dance song, so this Balkan ballad surprised me! The title means “I believe” and the lyrics are about the singer’s desperate hope that her lover will reconcile with her, typical Balkan ballad lyrics. It’s not quite the greatest Balkan ballad I’ve ever heard, but I’m so fed up with this EDM soup that I welcome this one with open arms. I will give Slovenia, um… (looks up on Wiktionary)… a hvala lepa for giving me a breather from all this dance pop. This entry has two familiar names as composers: Vladimir Graić who composed Molitva, and Hari Varešanović (the lead singer of Hari Mata Hari from 2006).

The key changes give me the impression this song was started by one composer, then he said “fuck this, I don’t know how to finish it” and handed his project file to the other composer. Midway through the first verse, the key modulates up a whole step to G minor, which is an unusual but intriguing place to have a key change. Then depending on how you interpret it, either the key changes to C minor and then F minor, or the song gradually transitions back to F minor. Then near the end, the key changes up a half step in a way extremely reminiscent of “Molitva” (though both of its key changes were up a whole step). I think the first few key changes and the last key change were done by different people.

I had to relisten while analyzing the keys of this song, and on a second listen I decided I quite like this song. I’m not sure I want to come back to it, but I respect Slovenia for this pleasant surprise, and for sending native-language songs so often. I’ll even forgive Eva for breathing into the microphone at the start.

Wait, this song scored second last in the semifinal, below some of the other shit I had to sit through? Why do Eurovision results keep on not making sense? It scored lower than Portugal in both the jury and televote, therefore below the top ten in both. I agree it’s not quite as good as Portugal, but it’s one of the bright spots in this semifinal.

Croatia: Nebo

Artist: Nina Badrić

Language: Serbo-Croatian (Croatian)

Key: G minor, A minor

This starts as a sadgirl guitar song, then becomes something of a Balkan ballad, then at the key change it turns into a Balkan rock ballad. It’s a decent effort from Croatia, but it sounds like it can’t decide what genre it wants to be and it doesn’t wow me as much as other Balkan ballads. Still, I’d rather listen to this than most of those cheesy dance songs. I get the feeling Loreen’s victory will cause even more countries to send dance songs next year.

Georgia: I’m a Joker

Artist: Anri Jokhadze

Language: English and, for the first time, Georgian

Key: A♭ major. This song may constantly change styles, but not its key.

The intro of this song is in Georgian, the rest is in English. We’ll hear the enigmatic Georgian language in two more Eurovision entries: both of them are sung in Georgian, but the titles are in English. I’ve never heard either of them, so we’ll see how good they are. I just realized that all three Caucasus countries first introduced their national languages through a song dominantly in English: Armenia in 2007, Georgia in 2012, and Azerbaijan in 2024. It’s like these countries were testing the waters before showing their languages in full.

Peter Urban described this as a musical-style song that changes genres way too often, and he’s pretty much right. I’d normally like that Georgia is sending something different, but this is too unfocused for me. It’s like ten songs squeezed into one—why couldn’t this song pick one good style and stick to it? I’d go with either the ethnic dance or the disco.

Slovakia: Don’t Close Your Eyes

Artist: Max Jason Mai (Miroslav Šmajda)

Language: English

Key: C♯ minor

Aw, poor Slovakia came dead last place with their final ever entry. Not last place with the juries or televote, but last overall. Their last entry isn’t four-chord pop drivel like last time, but a hard rock song that’s not bad at all. Hard rock entries aren’t normally my thing, but the elaborate drum rhythms really elevate this one and make it quite fun to listen to. I guess the juries and televoters both preferred dance pop this year. I’d say this is the second best Slovak entry behind “Horehronie”.

Given their poor results throughout Eurovision history, I can’t blame Slovakia for never becoming interested in Eurovision. The Czech Republic has seen some good results in the past decade, so maybe that could encourage the Slovaks to give Eurovision another shot.

Semifinal 2 thoughts:

You know when you rewatch a work of media you loved when you were a kid, and it doesn’t hold up at all? That’s how I feel about Eurovision 2012. I don’t mean the contest itself, but the overall genres of songs. I loved this type of pumpy early 2010’s dance music as a teenager, but now it just seems tacky and shouty and repetitive. Maybe that’s how people my parents’ age feel about 1980’s pop. This is also how I feel about most of the YouTube content I watched as a teenager, particularly Minecraft channels. But some media I loved as a kid still holds up today. No matter how old I get, SpongeBob SquarePants always makes me laugh. Basically what I’m saying is, Eurovision 2009 is like SpongeBob and Eurovision 2012 is like (insert Minecraft YouTuber here). Maybe the final will have filtered out most of the bad stuff, but I won’t get to hear the breath of fresh air from Portugal. After a particularly dire dance song, I can relisten to “Vida minha” and pretend it got a spot in the grand final.

The second semifinal has a “hey, remember all those songs that won a few years ago? here they are again!” interval act, exactly the type that annoys me. The winners of 2007 to 2010 sing each of their winning songs accompanied with Azerbaijani traditional instruments, which isn’t a bad concept but they stayed WAY too faithful to the original songs, so it just felt like a cheap rehash. Then all the winners of 2007 to 2011 sing “Waterloo” together, as though we haven’t heard that song enough times already. If you really have to remix previous Eurovision winners, then you should reimagine the entire song like Stefan Raab’s brilliant cover of “Satellite”.

I spaced out through most of the qualifier reveals, but Serbia and Sweden woke me up. Serbia sent the king of Balkan ballads and everyone can agree Sweden’s dance song stood the test of time. I’m not surprised that Peter Urban didn’t expect North Macedonia to qualify. “Das finde ich eine echte Überraschung, muss ich sagen”, as he would always say in his deadpan tone. When you watch the same commentator enough times, you start getting a feel for their tastes.

Random fact: In the first semifinal, the hosts forgot to list Spain among the Big Five. In the second semifinal, they forgot to list France instead. As you can tell, I’m not a big fan of the 2012 hosts. I miss Haddy, Nadia, and Erik from 2010, their hosting (and Germany winning) made it a delightful year.

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See you next time as Loreen wins Eurovision for the first time. I can never stay mad at her, she seems like such a sweet person.

>> 2012 (Final): A Curious Amount of Native Language Jury Bait