Tag Archives: eurovision 2021

Cookie Fonster Revels in Eurovision 2021 (Final): A Native-Language Top Three

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Intro Post

< 2021 Semfinals | 2021 Final | 2022 Semifinals >

Holy shit you guys, I can’t believe 2022 is the next Eurovision year for me to review. That was actually the most recent year of the contest when I became a fan.

Also, a day after finishing the post, I ranked Eurovision 2021!

Introduction

“We’ve got a real range of music tonight. Brilliant staging, great lighting, some wonderful vocalists, and others… well, some as flat as Holland.” My god, I fucking love Graham Norton so much.

The grand final of Eurovision 2021, hosted in Rotterdam, Netherlands, featured the usual 26 competitors vying for the crown—16 veterans and 10 newcomers, meaning that a little over half had competed in 2020.

The contest had a quartet of hosts, each of whom comes from a different background. Chantal Janzen is the usual TV host hired to host Eurovision, which is a smart choice as long as they’re fluent in English and French, which she is.* Jan Smit is another TV host and singer who has co-commentated Eurovision for the Netherlands from 2011 to 2019 and 2022 to 2023. Edsilia Rombley has competed in Eurovision twice: she sang for the Netherlands in 1998 and 2007 and also has experience as a television presenter. And finally, Nikkie de Jager is a beauty YouTuber and makeup artist who had dreamed for many years of hosting Eurovision. She was originally going to be an online host for 2020, but this year she was promoted to an in-person host.

The postcards are probably the part of the contest where the influence of COVID-19 is most notable. They feature the usual tour of different places in the Netherlands (always welcome by me) and don’t feature the contestants in person, but rather feature a digitally generated house with objects relevant to the artist and photos/videos of the singer, then a brief hologram of the artist.

As the title of this post suggests, the top three songs of this year are all not in English. Italy scored their third Eurovision win (first since 1990), France scored second place (their best result since 1991), and Switzerland third (best since 1993)—highest of all the returning artists from 2020. While Italy and France did very well, the rest of the Big Five and host rounded out the bottom four and each scored zero points in the televote. The United Kingdom infamously scored zero points in total, the first time that has ever happened in the jury + televote system.

The flag parade was loads of fun—when was the last time the opening featured the hosts singing? Brings back memories of all the hosts from 1985 to 1987 singing… and not so good memories of the 1991 hosts singing. This might also be the first opening act to feature a fire/desire rhyme. Most contestants didn’t hold a flag of their countries, but Stefania waved quite a big Greek flag. She actually lives in the Netherlands, but clearly she’s proud of her Greek roots, as Greeks abroad tend to be.

I watched the grand final with British commentary, as per usual. I wonder how Graham Norton will react to James Newman getting zero points?

* Chantal can also speak German and does it very well! She sounds near indistinguishable from a native speaker.

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Cookie Fonster Revels in Eurovision 2021 (Semifinals): A Heartwarming Show, but a Heartbreaking Bloodbath

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Intro Post

< 2020 Semifinal 2 | 2021 Semifinals | 2021 Final >

Introduction

Some international annual events had to be canceled for two or three years in a row due to the COVID-19 pandemic, so we’re very fortunate that Eurovision only missed one year and maintained its host city of Rotterdam, Netherlands for 2021. The producers of Eurovision 2021 ensured the contest complied with all COVID-19 regulations, but cleverly disguised the fact that it occurred during a pandemic.

It feels strange to watch clips from the 2020 (actually 2021) Summer Olympics with almost no live audience, so it’s miraculous that the EBU put together a live audience for 2021. They did so by allowing only 3,500 seats in the Rotterdam Ahoy, about a third of the usual amount, and not allowing any standing seats—the space was instead used for a socially distanced green room. The audience members didn’t have to wear masks or sit two meters apart—they only had to test negative for COVID and wear masks when not seated. The audience consisted only of those who had bought tickets for Eurovision 2020, so there were no public ticket sales this year. One change that the pandemic did cause was that backing vocals could now be pre-recorded. It’s a bit of a divisive rule, but as we’ll see in quite a few songs this year, it’ll allow for a new layer of creative freedom.

All countries that would have participated in 2020 returned for 2021, except for Belarus who was banned due to sending a propaganda song, and Armenia who skipped out due to a war with Azerbaijan. Out of these 39 countries, 24 of them internally selected the same artist as 2020, two (Estonia and Lithuania) held a national final where the 2020 contestant won, and 13 selected an entirely new contestant. This means that exactly two-thirds of the entries this year have the same artist as 2020.

The running order for both semifinals looks pretty similar to the 2020 semifinals. The draws of who gets into which semifinal, and who is in which half, were reused from 2020, but the countries were reordered for the sake of the show. This means each semifinal will consist of the same countries as its 2020 counterpart (barring the ones that dropped out), but not always the same singers.

As of this writing, I’ve heard in full almost all Eurovision entries from 1956 to 2024, except for these countries’ entries this year: Albania, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czechia, Estonia, Georgia, North Macedonia, Romania, Slovenia, and Sweden. By the time I finish this post, I will have heard every single song in Eurovision history.

I watched the semifinals with German commentary by an increasingly raspy Peter Urban, who by this point I’ve warmed up to. I find his style of commentary to be deadpan in an endearing old man way. In case you were wondering, I’m back to watching these contests alone. If you’d like to know more about how I find commentary for recent contests, or would like me to send video files I have available, there are multiple ways to contact me listed on my home page. I’m open to helping you out!

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