I have to admit that one of the coolest things for me was that Renars Kaupers was one of the presenters. Okay, being a Eurovision presenter is not necessarily a good thing. You don't tend to come off that well. The script is always cringeworthy. But I like Renars because... he's the lead singer of the Latvian band BrainStorm.
You may remember BrainStorm from the 2000 Eurovision contest. Their entry was called "My Star", and it was oddly catchy. Plus, Renars has this really peculiar leg-wiggling way of dancing. It's reminiscent of Beck. Anyway, he's cool.
After last year's contest I found an MP3 of "My Star", and also one of their song "Maybe". This led to me buying two of their albums. Yes, I have two albums by a Latvian group. How many people can say that? Probably some people in Latvia, but hey. They're highly entertaining. And in the interval, there was a clip from a BrainStorm song that I'd never heard! Fantastic. Apparently they have a new album out. Woo-hoo!
But I doubt you want to hear me ramble about BrainStorm. I doubt you want to hear my opinions about the contest, either, but I'm going to tell you anyway. :p
My shortlist was as follows:
- Belgium (a made up language and a catchy tune!)
- Estonia (a proper indie song, cool)
- Turkey (eventual winners, the song with the veils)
Visit the Eurovision website to hear all of these songs, and more!
I really wanted Belgium to win, but they were pipped at the post by Turkey. Boo! Boo! Although at least TATU didn't win. How I laughed when the audience booed them. Honestly, it's one thing to be scary Russian lesbians taking over the pop world, but I don't think they can sing live. And they're not really silly enough to be in Eurovision. They're kind of scary. Unless it's just me who finds them scary. :)
Belgium's song was... a chillout kind of song. Really nicely done. And it was an interesting idea, to make up a language instead of singing one of their native languages or English. I'd never heard of Urban Trad, but I wouldn't mind hearing more of them. It really is a very good song.
Estonia's entry was by far the coolest, in a trendy indie sort of way. It was, in many ways, too much of a proper song to do well in Eurovision. The band is Ruffus, the song is "80's coming back". And it was strangely appropriate, considering that the last entry in the contest was very eighties. Slovenia's entry had synthesizers, a singer who looked kind of like Toyah Wilcox... it was so 80's.
Listening to that song again, it was a good song. It deserved to do a lot better than it did. Although let's face it, few countries seem to vote purely on musical prowess. Sometimes I think I'd doing the wrong thing by choosing the people whose music I like the most. ;)
Turkey's song was catchy, and it's always good when countries do something that's vaguely to do with their ethnic roots. In their case, belly dancing. Heh... Still, it was catchy. And a lack of clothes never guarantees that you'll do well. So it was their music that helped them win.
Maybe you're wondering where all the daft entries were. Well, look no further than... Austria. It always seems to be a country around there (okay, Germany sticks in my mind) that enters the daftest song. Maybe they think it's serious. I hope not..!
Obviously you're not going to get the full experience unless you saw this performed, but to give you an idea of how great it was, here are the lyrics...
I like most animals on this earth
But I really prefer little rabbits and bears
Soon all birds and beetles will die
But Adam's in bed with Eve busy reproducing
Rabbits live in the woods
Cats in the meadows
And cockroaches
Live under tiles
Little rabbits have short noses
And kittens soft paws
And Mother Holle likes her wool
From the african dromedary
The difference between animals such as apes and primates
Is no bigger than between noodles and pasta
But whoever wants to know more about animals should study Biology or inform himself on my homepage
Some animals have wings
And others have fins
Some live outdoors
And others in cans
Small rabbits…..
Apparently this is a song, "about animals living in the filth created by man". So there you go.
There were other bizarre things, too. For instance, although the German entry was in English, it wasn't English that made a lot of sense. I'm left wondering how you can be both 'cool and stressed' at the same time. Not only that, but to hear a modern song telling everyone to be gay... maybe TATU should have sung that song, instead of the weirdness that they ended up with.
Yeah, TATU. Their song didn't make any sense either. But at least they had the excuse that it could have been poorly translated from Russian to English. I couldn't really work out what it was about. Maybe it had some sort of deep meaning, but there was a line that read, "someone will untie the wire from the cleat", which yes, it kind of makes sense, but... huh?
Every year I wish people would sing in their own language. If your song's not going to make sense in English, then why sing it in English? Does it really matter if a few more people understand it? Surely subtitles are fairly widespread now? And does it matter anyway? Belgium's song didn't have words that anyone could understand, and it was great!
Maybe all songs should be sung in Esperanto. ;)
TATU were not Eurovision material. They ponced on stage with their hand-holding and "we're famous pop stars" thing and... it wasn't just me who didn't like them. The audience were cheering when they scored low in the voting, and booing when they scored the high points. There's just something about Eurovision that makes you think big stars shouldn't be allowed. It's kind of cheating. At least they didn't sound that great. There were some much better singers in the competition.
Sadly, the UK entry did not feature those better singers. To be fair, by the end of the song they were sounding pretty good. But the girl started off in the wrong key. When the bloke had to come in he didn't get the right key either. Eventually they worked it out, but it was too late. It wasn't a great song to start with, and... good effort, but no banana.
And so, the UK scored nil points. Terry Wogan reckoned that this was entirely due to a post-war backlash, but we didn't deserve to do well. We deserved to scoop one or two points, sure, but we didn't deserve to come anywhere near the top. Unless we enter a good song into the contest, the likes of (dare I say it), Katrina and the Waves, Sonia or even Gina G, we're not going to get near the top of the score board.
Or we shouldn't, anyway.
But let's face it, anything can happen...
Hee, the Ukraine's entry was called, "Hasta La Vista"...
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