Tag Archives: johnny logan

Cookie Fonster’s Eurovision 1992 Commentary: Anglophone Bias to the Extreme

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Intro Post

< 1991 Review | 1992 Review | 1993 Review >

Introduction

Eurovision 1992 completed the trio of major cities in Sweden by taking place in Malmö, the same city that hosted in 2013 and will host in 2024. It had more participating countries than ever before, at a whopping 23. This included every country that had ever participated, except for Monaco and Morocco… though Yugoslavia wasn’t quite the same country as last year. Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and (North) Macedonia had all seceded, and the next year, what remained of Yugoslavia was banned from the competition until 2004.

This contest is best known for Johnny Logan’s third victory for Ireland, but this time only as a composer. Just like 1984, Linda Martin sang a composition of Johnny Logan’s, but this time, she won with a power ballad called “Why Me?” Power ballads are going to score highly throughout the 1990’s, so be warned. As the post’s title suggests, this is the first contest where the top three songs were all in English, and that sets another recurring theme of 90’s Eurovision. As more new countries poured into the contest, the juries became more and more biased towards English until the language rule was abolished.

YES, they brought back the orchestral arrangements of last year’s winners at the start! I missed that so much!!! The opening orchestral music transitioned into a jazzy arrangement of “Fångad av en stormvind”, which made me smile. I was expecting the contest to be presented dominantly in English with a bit of French, so I was surprised the hosts spoke this much Swedish. Though if I didn’t know better, I might have mistaken it for Danish because of those guttural R’s.

I wanted a break from Terry Wogan, so I watched the contest with Austrian commentary this time. Ernst Grissemann is by far my favorite of the German-speaking commentators I have heard.

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Cookie Fonster’s Journey into Eurovision 1987: An 80’s Fever Dream

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Intro Post

< 1986 Review | 1987 Review | 1988 Review >

Introduction

Hosted in Belgium for the first and only time, Eurovision 1987 had quite a lot of drama behind its production. Two broadcasters had agreed to organize Eurovision together in the event Belgium won: the Dutch-speaking BRT (now called VRT), and the French-speaking RTBF. However, when the time came for them to team up, they were as good at cooperation as a nerd and a jock assigned to do a high school chemistry project. When the French-speaking broadcaster chose Brussels as the host city, the Dutch-speaking broadcaster threw their hands up and left RTBF to organize it alone, while BRT chose the Belgian entry. If you want to see two broadcasters successfully collaborating, you’d have to wait until 2023.

This contest had the largest lineup of countries so far: Greece and Italy returned after skipping last year, making for 22 countries total. All countries that had ever participated in Eurovision were present this year, except Monaco, Malta, and Morocco. This is an intimidatingly long contest, almost as big as a Eurovision final in the current era. The winner was the first person to win Eurovision twice: Johnny Logan, representing Ireland. The postcards are themed upon what comes to most people’s minds when they think of Belgium: Belgian comic strips.

Annoyingly, this is another year where due to one particular song (glares intensively at Spain), you can’t find many commentary uploads on YouTube, and most of them are of terrible quality. So, um, I guess I’m watching it with Swedish commentary this time. The video description contains a link to the full unabridged Swedish commentary in good quality, so I’ll use that. I won’t be able to understand the commentary, but I’ve at least picked up on a few words from Scandinavian languages by reading translations of their Eurovision entries.

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Cookie Fonster Peeks at Eurovision 1984: The Era of Crazy Presenters

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Intro Post

< 1983 Review | 1984 Review | 1985 Review >

Two days ago, Belgium was the first country to confirm their representative for Eurovision 2024: a singer from Brussels named Mustii. Going by his discography, he’ll probably send a song in English. I’m looking forward to what he’s got in store!

Introduction

Hosted in Luxembourg for the most recent time, Eurovision 1984 had 19 countries participate. Ireland returned after skipping last year, whereas Israel and Greece skipped, due to a national holiday and the broadcaster’s lack of interest respectively. Sweden narrowly won with the first of two Eurovision songs in Swedish. Ireland got second place with a song composed by a prior winner and sung by a future winner.

This contest had the youngest presenter in Eurovision history, at only 19 years old. The presenter’s style is just, oh my god. You have to see it to believe it. She switches back and forth between English, French, German, and Luxembourgish and makes tons of irreverent side remarks, exactly like you’d expect a 19-year-old on TV to do. For people who can only speak one of those languages, this must be like hearing someone from the Philippines alternate between English and Tagalog. I don’t know why this analogy came to mind, but it did. Considering the language mishaps of the last presenter, as well as the next presenter’s famous underwear incident, it’s safe to say we’re in the era of crazy presenters.

The contest begins with a montage of Luxembourg set to an orchestral medley of all five of their winners, plus “L’amour est bleu”, proof that Luxembourg was a Eurovision powerhouse. Oh, how I missed these medleys. As with last time, I watched the contest with British commentary.

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Cookie Fonster’s Thoughts on Eurovision 1980: Oddball Year, Normalball Winner

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Intro Post

< 1979 Review | 1980 Review | 1981 Review >

Introduction

Before I begin, I’m obligated to say that “normalball” is totally a real word. If you think it isn’t, there’s probably something wrong with you.

In many ways, Eurovision 1980 was the opposite of a normalball. First off, it’s the only contest since 1958 hosted neither in the previous winner nor the United Kingdom. Israel wasn’t willing to host after winning, and neither was Spain (the runner-up) nor the UK (the usual fallback). So instead, the Netherlands stepped in and hosted a low-budget show in The Hague, in the same building as 1976. This was the last time until 2023 that the previous winner didn’t host the contest, and the last contest hosted in the Netherlands until 2021. Unlike the last two years, this contest had only one presenter, and she almost entirely spoke Dutch.

Another oddity that this was the only Eurovision with an Arab country participating, and the only one with an African country. The country is Morocco, which participated for the first and only time due to Israel’s absence, which was itself due to Israel’s Remembrance Day. Turkey returned after skipping last year, and Monaco withdrew, only to return in 2004 to 2006.

In terms of the winner, this contest was the opposite of the opposite of a normalball, or more concisely, a normalball. Johnny Logan won for Ireland with “What’s Another Year”, the first of many Irish ballads to win in the 80’s and 90’s. It was the second of Ireland’s seven victories, and first of Johnny Logan’s two victories—three, if you count the song he composed in 1992.

This contest didn’t have proper postcards, but in their place is something I found super cool. Before each song, a presenter went on stage to introduce it in its country’s native language, accompanied by a slideshow of photos in the corner. Now I wish Eurovision did that every year. I watched the contest with German commentary.

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