1988

An interesting year: many of the songs that make my top 10 based solely on the studio versions fall down live, while many that make my top 10 based on the live performances don’t really cut it as songs in their own right. Mind you, the pickings are pretty slim.

01 Iceland
B: This is awful for its ‘list song’ qualities.
A: This is awful for the way it builds up to the chorus like it really believes it has something to say, too. I can’t believe it was entered or written in the 1980s, especially this close to the 1990s.
V: It’s fitting that this song should be the first to play against the backdrop of the Hooked On Classics set Irish TV put together for the occasion. Pity the neon trimmings couldn’t infuse it with any energy.

02 Sweden
B: It clearly wants to be poetic, and may well be in Swedish. But what’s he on about?
A: Unremittingly boring. Not even the strings save it for me, sacrosanct as they normally are. The ending does an alright impression of ‘stirring’.
V: As a performance this is better than Iceland before we’ve even reached the 30-second mark. If Tommy was struck down with streptococcus (or whatever the excuse was), I can only imagine how good he must have been at full throttle. The song still goes nowhere.

03 Finland
B: They’d clearly been on a daytrip to Tallinn before writing the first verse (“Ihmistenkuoria, tyhjiä... / Outoja ilmeitä, kylmiä katseita / Muutamat ilmeettä aivan”)!
A: Unashamedly synthesised. Hooray! You could say that about the ’80s generally I guess. Brave but rather odd move to pitch the chorus down; presumably it was to save their voices. You don’t hear it much in pop.
V: An unattractive prospect, in a very late ’80s kind of way, but vocally not bad. The chorus, sadly, is the weak link, and (since?) the sound mix isn’t great.

04 United Kingdom
B: There’s nothing particularly suggestive about the lines “One day you were in love with me / Then the next… he came along”, but the lack of any gender identification whatsoever elsewhere in the text leaves it open to interpretation.
A: Right at the start, this sounds like something you might still find in a Balkan final. By the end, it sounds like a Michael Bolton song without the Billboard polish. It’s not bad, but the chorus isn’t particularly strong, and the ending’s terrible.
V: When I first saw a picture of Scott Fitzgerald and then heard his voice, nothing matched with how I imagined it should be. Loose-fitting grey suits with enormous shoulder pads were one of the worst crimes of the 1980s in men’s fashion, so it goes without saying that they mar this performance. Which is in fact rather ragged.

05 Turkey
B: These lyrics are oddly euphemistic: “İnsan insanı sevmez mi Sufi?” Yeah, Sufi, there are gays in Turkey, too!
A: Sounds fab – synthesised and Turkish and with a tune to it. It’s like the music of my formative years given a Euro-makeover. It could almost be SAW trying something really far out (for them). It’s over and done with by 1.45, it seems, but then they go off on a tangent and I’m drawn in even more. Unfortunately awful ending again, although I choose to overlook it in a year where I’m more than likely to favour trash as treasure.
V: The orchestra sounds great, but I really don’t want to hear them quite that prominently. Fantastic harmonies, and if the vocals were slightly higher up in the mix this would be just about perfect.

06 Spain
B: Love the way it comes out as “made in e-Spain” but that they still come up with lines like “¿Qué tendrá, que lleva de cabeza al que la ve? / Cambiándole con su filosofía”.
A: Now this must have been produced by Spain’s version of Stock, Aitken and Waterman! So cheap. So fabulous. Drags a bit, though.
V: This is very of its time, musically and visually, right down to the bow-legged choreography. How the guy in the pea-green trousers managed not to sing like a eunuch is anyone’s guess.

07 The Netherlands
B: Is this set in some former Dutch colony in the Far East, with all the talk of rice paper and bizarre rhyming couplets like “Langs ieder flatgebouw / Zie ik een bamboetouw”? ‘Shangri-La’ hails from that part of the world, IIRC.
A: Decent enough – bar the ending, which I hate – but what’s the point if all it does is leave you wondering what to say about it?
V: This looks a bit half-arsed, like they changed their minds at the last minute and decided they couldn’t just stand there and sing the song. Gerard more or less does though, and pretty well. Pity he chickened out of the falsetto ending.

08 Israel
B: I love the resigned wisdom of “Ki adam hu adam hu adam”!
A: Didn’t they realise they’d score highly from France without having to go to all this trouble? At least it makes it stand out musically, I suppose, in which sense it’s quite competent, if rather derivative. [Shortly] Oh, hang on, is it French or Greek? Hoist with my own petard. I’m a bit over it by the end, which is too manic by half.
V: That said, it takes far too long to reach it live.

09 Switzerland
B: I quite like the lyrics here, even if nothing in particular stands out and almost half the lines begin in exactly the same way. I like to play with them to produce: “Vous qui volez vers l’an deux mille / ...vous allez peut-être / Trouver de nouvelles musiques”.
A: I quite like the song as a whole, in fact, without anything standing up and saying “this is why”: it just works (and has a good ending for a change). Not very exciting though.
V: The sound mix on the night was always going to favour a soloist who could project over the orchestra, so it’s no surprise Céline shines. Her theatrical delivery is a bit irritating.

10 Ireland
B: The only way I derive any titillation from this is to ignore half the lyrics and imagine the rest as a series of pick-up instructions. With the band’s name as euphemism.
A: Ireland proving they’ve been stupefying and nauseating audiences for a lot longer than people choose to recall. Jump The Gun seem to be going for an almost Queen sound on parts of this, musically and vocally.
V: I can see why this should have been an attractive proposition at the time, but it’s not now. The beginning sounds very odd, and the structure’s strange as well. However much I try, I just can’t get into it. And why should I need to try at all?

11 Germany
B: Songs with titles like this sound so much more cloying in German.
A: Someone’s been listening to their pre-sir Elton John records, but whether the song is indeed “Ehrlich und gradheraus, zärtlich und klug” I wouldn’t like to speculate. It sounds quite nice, and the sentiment is humble enough for me not to hate it entirely.
V: The penultimate line of the chorus is bugging me: it leads into... what? What is it? Damn. It’s in there, somewhere, he said, tapping his head. (See also: Norway.) Awful vocals. Why can’t we hear the mother? Then again, do we want to?

12 Austria
B: Mention of a ‘Glitzerstadt’ holds a camp promise you know they’re not going to deliver on.
A: Part of the reason for this scoring a big fat zero is surely because Wilfried sounds like a prat. By rights, this should only be about 1/20th as awful as Iceland, but it’s clearly a rival. “Irgendwo bin ich froh.” Next.
V: The little intros by the hosts are hilarious, but they don’t do Wilfried any favours by pointing out he’s basically everything but a singer. (Not that it would’ve taken much pointing out.) This must qualify as one of the worst songs and performances in the history of the contest.

13 Denmark
B: You’ve got to love a song title with six words, none of them longer than three letters, and four punctuation marks. There’s some dark lyrical content here in lines like “Og som godt ka’ li’ at trampe på dig / Når du ligger ned”.
A: It’s surprising how often Denmark came up with the goods when Sweden didn’t and still never got anywhere for their efforts. This is predictable to the last (and very much like La det swinge, yet again) and incredibly cheery for a song with lyrics like that. Works for me though, however wilfully non-contemporary.
V: I wouldn’t have been that woman in the tutu kicking her legs about for any money with that comedy yellow guitar pointing all over the place. Fun performance, in a crap kind of way. And what was Kirsten Siggaard thinking?!

14 Greece
B: “M’ oti kano yelun” – I’m not surprised.
A: Virtually everything I said about Iceland also applies to this song. I would just point out, however, that this is a hundred times worse: I challenge anyone to find a redeeming feature. Greece at Eurovision is sometimes very wrong.
V: Well, the vocals are OK. Apart than that, I hold this song and performance in total disdain.

15 Norway
B: What on (our) Earth does “Hennes skrik er uten hud” mean?
A: I’m sorry, but I just can’t abide songs with environmental messages, however neatly arranged they may be. There’s a hint of greater things around the two-minute mark, but it never manages anything much.
V: And what does this sound like? There, as it comes down to the end of the chorus... It’s in exactly the same key as Germany and everything. Bah. (See also: Yugoslavia.) The intro and outro are lovely.

16 Belgium
B: There haven’t been many lines like “tous ces mioches qu’on mutile” in Eurovision, have there? Bit of a running theme between this and Norway, it appears. Are all French-speaking Belgians this introspective?
A: There’s something oddly entrancing about the composition here – touches of PSB, with a pinch of Chris de Burgh.
V: Yep, it’s the late ’80s. This was never going to do very well: it just sounds too empty. But I applaud them for trying.

17 Luxembourg
B: And on a lighter note, after the ostracised environmentalists and menially repressed masses from Norway and Belgium…
A: Listen to that voice! Lara Fabian is so good. With a slightly less dull number to perform I’m sure she’d have gone all the way. Given the era, I’m surprised there haven’t been more songs along these lines. Ironically ahead of its time, perhaps.
V: Why this didn’t pose a greater threat to Switzerland I don’t know.

18 Italy
B: Far and away the best lyrics of any song this year – “Sarà per... / paura di sentire / Troppo chiaramente / Quello che ci fa soffrire” and “Per non correre il pericolo / Di sorprenderci feriti” – but then that can often be said of the Italian entry.
A: Musically this is unusually uninventive for the Italians, and that is undoubtedly its undoing. It’s very easy to listen to, as it captures some tender truths very lightly, but is a bit hollow-sounding in places (perhaps appropriately).
V: There’s nothing wrong with this – apart from the ending – but it just sort of happens, then stops. On the plus side, Luca's attractions are manifest.

Addendum: The lovely Michelle’s not going to be getting a job in Italian TV any time soon with an accent like that.

19 France
B: Brave of him to put the words ‘tender’ and ‘schoolboy’ in the opening line of the song.
A: This sounds very not-French to me, mainly because of its synthesised everywhereness, which here seems misplaced for some reason. Perhaps because it’s not as blitheringly pointless as the others.
V: Gérard doesn’t put a foot wrong, but there must have been a big French delegation in for the audience to get as excited about this as they do.

20 Portugal
B: Intriguing lyrics. I’m sure many people would recognise themselves in lines like “Mas fiquei sem ti por te amar assim”.
A: Yet another quality entry from Portugal, which sounds huge, although in the verses it’s as if she’s about to go off into “I love you (I love you) / I do” and give us a rendition of Save Your Kisses for Me.
V: This doesn’t sound huge, it sounds massive. The backing vocals are a little hard to take in places, particularly at the start, but there’s still lots to like.

21 Yugoslavia
B: I kept thinking the line in the chorus meant “unlike me, you don’t want to have a baby” until I read the Croatian. See what Eurovision language skills can do for you!
A: Very little here that can’t be programmed into a keyboard. In studio it doesn’t really hook you, so they must have done something right live.
V: Did Yugoslavia have some agreement around this time that they’d always go last? A tad shouty and tuneless, this. There’s a bit in the verses that’s mightily reminiscent of something. I Wanna Dance with Somebody?


And so to the points...

1 point goes to France

2 points go to Germany

3 points go to Sweden

4 points go to Denmark

5 points go to Italy

6 points go to Luxembourg

7 points go to Finland

8 points go to Portugal

10 points go to Switzerland

and finally...

12 points go to...


Turkey!!!


The wooden spoon goes to Austria, although Greece deserves one, too. And Iceland. In fact, bugger it: they can all have one!

1987

Probably my least favourite year to date. My winner and runner-up stand out a mile, leaving me with 20 other songs I’m either ambivalent about or actively dislike. But at least that makes the race for the wooden spoon more exciting.

01 Norway
B: I see Mr Loveland the composer is back, with a set of lyrics by Hanne Krogh*. I love the sound and rhythm of ‘en stemme hvisker spent’, and the fact that it looks like it should have nothing to do with ‘a voice whispers anxiously’.
A: No surprise after Belgium’s win that the first entry is someone doing their best to sound like Sandra Kim, however misplaced the attempt. *Together you’d think they’d be able to come up with something that demonstrated more – or in fact any – potential. Instead we just get a plodding ’80s production.
V: And I thought 1986 was bad for big hair and shoulder pads! Neon blue wasn’t the best choice for her blouse given the prevailing colour scheme on stage. Big fat meh of a song. Next.

02 Israel
B: Great lyrics.
A: The music pretty much fits them, but seems a little hyperactive in places for something purportedly so laid back. I’d normally criticise the synthesisers, but here they fit perfectly. It’s like an act for a children’s party, and shares about the same degree of intellect musically.
V: This is the kind of thing that’s only ever really going to make sense in the context of a national final. Their ties look like two strips off a cat o’ nine tails.

03 Austria
B: Helpfully, this namechecks the following song (‘langsam und still’).
A: There are some decent things happening here in the vocal arrangement which give the whole thing a bit of a lift, but the saxophone middle-eight is its death knell, spelling the end of its usefulness.
V: Props for owning the receding hairline, Gary. He gives a generally reliable performance of a thoroughly unexciting song, although he looks like he’s about to dissect something, or someone. Where’s LaGaylia Frazier when you need her to sing Dr Frankenstein?

04 Iceland
B: Or as I prefer to call it: Slowly & Quietly (in Case the Children Hear). I like the line “Eftir standa... / ...sögð og ósögð orð”. The Icelandic itself looks barbed.
A: This pootles along in the manner its title suggests and almost feels out of date even by 1987 standards. Ms Margret sounds like she’s doing exercises to overcome a speech impediment and not making much headway.
V: The fact that the pianist has a textbook jawline and that the backing vocals are almost operatic are the most interesting things about this performance, which is lovely but unengaging.

05 Belgium
B: Was this set against the backdrop of some conflict? Or was it just a general appeal? Either way the title makes it sound like cheap porn. “We voelen ons schuldig / Maar drinken een slokje wijn” is a keen observation.
A: The chorus here comes perilously close to The Final Countdown. The song as a whole isn’t bad. Not great, but not bad.
V: It seems unfair that after delivering the country its only victory, Wallonia had to defer to Flanders to provide them with their defence of the title. (Maybe Liliane dropping Keuninckx as a surname in favour of Saint-Pierre was by way of tipping the hat to them?) I would have preferred to see them win with this rather than J’aime la vie, if I’m honest, but there was never any likelihood of that happening.

06 Sweden
B: Walkmans, Coke... it’s so late ’80s.
A: I suppose once the Coca-Cola references were removed this made more sense in a European/Jamaican crossover kind of way, although it must still have sounded like an ad for Coke anyway. As with most things Swedish, it’s well produced: nothing is there for no reason.
V: In an effort to continue the commercial references, Lotta appears to have strung the contents of a bag of peanut M&Ms around her neck. The energy that goes into sustaining this performance is inverse to the success it meets with.

07 Italy
B: “A noi che siamo gente di pianura / ... / Il mare ci fa sempre un po’ paura / Per quell’idea di troppa libertà” – terrific lyrics as ever from the Italians. I love “Inchiodati dalla realtà”, too.
A: This is about nine-and-a-half tenths of the way to being a great anthem, but there’s just something missing in the composition. They get very close in the chorus, but there’s still something... I’m not sure what. It’s very good though, despite the occasional Phil Collins moment.
V: Am I just not remembering the studio version having that odd timing, or is it the arrangement here that’s putting me off? Still head and shoulders above everything else so far.

08 Portugal
B: What are the odds of having People of the Sea followed by This Sailing Boat? Something tells me the whole boat/river/ocean thing might be a metaphor. The lines “No meu país a beleza invento-a na minha mão” and “O meu país é um sol de raiva e alecrim” are great.
A: It’s strange to find myself listening to something Portuguese and thinking Sweden in terms of the composition and arrangement, which is quite catchy. Mr Nevada doesn’t have quite the right voice for the song – it should have been a woman – but still.
V: I know the outfits are designed to underscore the theme, but they just make them look like the crew of a pleasure craft who have taken to entertaining their passengers with a few self-penned ditties along the way.

09 Spain
B: “Los amigos, ¿para qué están?” Fashion advice. They clearly didn’t give you any.
A: I thought we were heading for Chariots of Fire territory there for a moment. It’s odd how the second verse sounds like the chorus is still rambling on. [Shortly] Oh, that’s the second verse. So that was all the chorus then? This seems awfully overblown, and oddly out of place, when a box of chocolates would do just as well.
V: Rouge! Hideous.

10 Turkey
B: We need a huge gay club anthem called Söyle sevgi üstüne in Eurovision.
A: Spain segues seamlessly into Turkey. This is a bit Cyprus ’86 in some ways. They’re not reinventing the wheel, but at least they’re giving us an ’80s sound and making it vaguely palatable.
V: White’s not really their colour, is it.

11 Greece
B: LOL at the way “Kikloforas stis disco, ke milas yia cinema” is described as “Mia zoi me risko”!
A: A million songs start exactly the same way as this. It’s trying to be all sorts of things: Norway ’85, Sweden ’86 and a bit Wake Me Up Before You Go Go. You soon grow bored of it. The vocal arrangement in the chorus is all wrong and very off-putting.
V: Thanos sounds like Cliff Richard and looks a bit androgynous. His backing singers’ style certainly is not Garbo. Quite a good performance all told, by the evening’s standards.

12 The Netherlands
B: I like the idea that “de waarde van gelukkig zijn werd bijgesteld”.
A: Thank god for the almost-catchy chorus. There’s not a single bar in the entire song that’s inspired.
V: Krystle Carrington sings for the Netherlands! Does two songs constitute a run of consistency? White’s not really anyone’s colour in 1987.

13 Luxembourg
B: Hard to believe that one of the composers behind this also gave us Belgium ’05. (Not Monsieur Bertrand, obviously.)
A: Someone’s been listening to their early Pet Shop Boys LPs. I can see why this wouldn’t have gone down well with the juries, but it presses a fair few of my buttons. Quelle délivrance! And just as I was about to say “it really ought to fade out now”, that’s exactly what it did. Avoue c’est louche!
V: If nothing else, our Plastic shows an affinity for the stage that few of his peers have tonight. The song itself falls flat on its arse and goes nowhere.

14 United Kingdom
B: It’s only the light. I think.
A: So much of 1980s music sounded exactly the same, and not in a good way. That could explain why we can have studio versions of every song from 1959 but every other one here is a bad quality live version: perhaps they were considered so mediocre that no one bothered to record them. Was Rikki Peebles ever heard of again after ESC? I suspect not.
V: At least he’s fairly easy on the eye. And to be fair, this works a lot better than it has any right to.

15 France
B: I still think Magique musique du cœur pour le bonheur would have made a better title.
A: I suppose I shouldn’t complain that this has nothing to do with the ’80s given that it comes straight after the UK’s appalling effort, but the strings, the piano... it’s so ’70s, in a very much behind-the-times sort of way. It does have an easily accessible melody, of sorts.
V: Ms Minier looks pink and saucy, and the orchestra has a reason to exist, so I guess it’s not a total waste.

16 Germany
B: In other words: Don’t Worry, Be Happy. I love the fact that a Siegel song contains a line translatable as “Thousands of little reasons are making you dumb”!
A: Tragically, they win you over through sheer persistence. And half a dozen key changes.
V: Their yellow & white is even worse than everyone else’s white, but their vocals are just about better than everyone else’s combined so far.

17 Cyprus
B: “To prosopo su vlepo ston kathrefti / Kathos tis niktas en’ asteri pefti” forms a great couplet.
A: This is annoyingly familiar, but I can’t put my finger on what it resembles/plagiarises. I think there are two sources in any case. It’s nicely put together, and makes a good song for a wider audience [than Greece].
V: It’s like a who’s-who of Cyprus at Eurovision. Pity Alexia’s on lead vocals.

18 Finland
B: Thumbs up (for two quite different reasons) for the lines “Pelätään pelkomme pois” and the translation of “Kun rakkaus kiinni painautuu” as “When love sticks tightly to you”.
A: This chorus is a bit chirpy for a song that sets out to have a bit of an edge to it. Again though, I shouldn’t complain about approachable tunes amongst this lot. The arrangement seems absolutely Finnish for some reason, like an ’80s Pump Pump.
V: Vicky looks like she’s wearing a uniform from Star Trek: The Next Generation. For some reason I remembered this as doing pretty well by Finnish standards. (I suppose 15th was.) It deserved better in a field this weak, even though – yet again – the language sounds off-putting.

19 Denmark
B: Ligegyldigt must be worth a good triple-word score in Danish Scrabble. As for the rest, take your “Syng en sang om en bedre jord / Det hjælper mere, end du tror...” and fuck the fuck off.
A: There’s nothing original about this whatsoever. I would say “at least it’s melodious”, but the vocals, guitars and key changes all feel like they’re stolen from Ein bißchen Frieden.
V: So hollow, like they’re singing inside a plastic drum. Next.

20 Ireland
B: These lyrics have to be up there amongst the most honest and heartrending the contest has ever produced. The story they tell is intensely personal and yet they speak to everyone.
A: What do you say when words are not enough? This stands out so strikingly from everything else that it might as well be from another planet.
V: The slight injection of tempo here adds a sense of urgency to what the song’s saying, but I’m not sure it does it a lot of favours musically when the orchestra really don’t get to grips with it the way they should. Still, as winners go it’s as deserved as it is obvious.

21 Yugoslavia
B: The way the English is interwoven here is quite clever. It’s a surprise countries didn’t try and get away with more of it along the same lines, really.
A: I’ve little to say about this, coming straight after Ireland: they’re in completely different leagues. The scary thing is that Yugoslavia actually won with something this derivative two years later. I mean, it would be nice to think the Balkans were ahead of their time (and the West) in terms of the late ’80s/early ’90s 1950s rock’n’roll revival, but with them it was more a case of still being stuck there.
V: It feels like you’re trapped in some Welsh holiday camp in 1955, so they must be doing something right.

22 Switzerland
B: The metaphors here are neatly rendered, so it’s a pity it veers between anthem and straightforward ballad with such abandon before trowelling on the karma.
A: I don’t think I’ve ever heard a song that is so relentless and so economical at the same time: there must be a total of about eight different musical lines here, repeated over and over and over again. The upshot of this is that it’s over with before you know it.
V: What a bunch of dorks! It’s like the cast of a painfully unfunny American high-school sitcom have been rehearsing in their basement and the wise-cracking lead character’s mum is hogging the mike.


Voici les risultats...

1 point pour la Grèce

2 points pour le Portugal

3 points pour Chypre

4 points pour la Belgique

5 points pour le Luxembourg

6 points pour les Pays Bas

7 points pour la Finlande

8 points pour l’Allemagne

10 points pour l’Italie

et finalmente...

Les 12 points sont attribués à...


l’Irlande!


La Cuillère de Bois de 1987 – c’est médaillée à l’Espagne! Felicitations!

1986

Hair, hair everywhere! Sherisse Laurence, Doris Dragović, three-quarters of Cocktail Chic, the Vlasblom sisters, Daniela Simons, Sarai Tzuriel, the lady Luv Bugs, the Maessens, Ingrid Peters, Elpida, Lise Haavik and Dora... Not to mention the men! (And the shoulder pads.) A great deal of the music is atrocious, but in the end there was a fierce battle for my 12 points anyway.

01 Luxembourg
B: I like the idea of someone telling you “...sans raison / Des choses qu’on ne dit pas sans raison”.
A: I can’t believe this is from the same composer and lyricist as Parlez-vouz français! Listen to that echoey ’80s production, like it was recorded in a stadium. It’s one of those typical power ballads of the era that sounds like it’s deliberately reining itself in for emotional effect. ABBA would be proud of the first couple of lines of that chorus though; either that or take them to court for barely disguised plagiarism. The male backing vocals sound very lazy.
V: She might be Canadian, but she’s no Celine Dion. Her French accent is awful. I’m very appreciative of the live arrangement giving the song a bit more atmosphere than the wispiness of the studio version.

02 Yugoslavia
B: “Sve me boli od tebe” – I know how that feels, love.
A: They’re all for backing vocals with no concept of subtlety, aren’t they? Nice guitar break adding to an otherwise fairly spartan composition. I can’t think of anything else to say about it other than that the whole point of this song seems so Balkan for some reason.
V: Fantastic guitar break underscoring the otherwise very spartan composition. Doris looks like she’s about ten foot tall.

03 France
B: I adore the claim “C’est l’amour français, un peu libéré”!
A: Composers Georges and Michel Costa may have been involved in some big-hitting numbers elsewhere, including three winners, but this was never going to add anything to their trophy cabinet. It’s the kind of thing that feels like it should be anathema to France. The chorus isn’t bad, but it’s that thing again of wishing they’d just get on with it and stop faffing about: it all feels so laboured. (At least there’s a key change to pep things up.) But everything already sounds the same and we’re only three songs in. I hope they sounded completely different live.
V: [Checks] Yes: worse. The combined vocals of the four of them amount to less than what one decent singer and a handful of better backing vocalists could have provided. The orchestra does what it can to lift the song, but there’s not much to work with.

04 Norway
B: I love these lyrics, and the lines “Men da æ ønske ‘velkommen ombord’ / Fikk æ høre et par velvalgte ord” in particular. I’m a sucker for knowing self-deprecation.
A: Now this is much more accessible, and actually sounds like it’s playing at the right speed. I’m inclined to sing along, so it must be doing something right.
V: I’d already seen snippets of this performance so I knew how daft it looks these days, but it’s not nearly as OTT as it could be. Great vocals, and this is the first piece of music to actually sound like it has a purpose in life.

05 United Kingdom
B: “Go back in time till I get to when / I took your heart like a runner in the night” is the only pair of lines that exhibits any of the flow that a song with a title like that should. The rest are all very disconnected.
A: Was this a chart hit or just three minutes of Eurovision? It seems kind of familiar, even though it’s only the second time I’ve listened to it in this context. Maybe it just has a recognisable sound. Well, they all do, but you know what I mean. Here the brassy bits are very SAW Bananarama even if, sadly, the rest of the song isn’t. It’s OK, if repetitive.
V: Competent enough, but it still sounds like it was written in someone’s granny flat.

06 Iceland
B: ‘Never deposit and only withdraw’ indeed.
A: The strings add a touch of class to this, which is synthesisers ahoy. Rather melodramatic opening: they clearly wanted to make an immediate impression. The chorus almost seems like an afterthought, sounding more like a verse. Oh, hang on... that was a verse. Awful “time’s up” ending.
V: There’s honestly not a whole lot to like about this: it’s as though Iceland’s taken all of its inspiration for its debut from the worst excesses of the contest. The song certainly doesn’t contribute anything to it. Our Eiríkur always puts me in mind of that kid in Mask.

07 The Netherlands
B: I find the line “Neem de tijd voor alle dingen” absurdly amusing.
A: I get it that it’s meant to be about the rhythm, but the chorus here could do with some work. It’s not exactly abounding with either frizzle or sizzle. I like the vocal arrangement though, even if it is happily married to the music, which is itself deceptively layered and suits the song well. Deciding to crank it up a notch for the last 10 seconds is neat, but is also like closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. Or in this case after it’s just stood there doing nothing for two and a half minutes.
V: At least their outfits are more palatable than the ones they were sporting in the postcard. Good vocals, and effective (if unimaginative) choreography, but neither go very far in disguising the song’s weak points.

08 Turkey
B: Top marks for everything about the line “Peri kızı gel... değdir değneğini”. Halley’s comet seems now like such an obvious choice for 1986 that it’s a surprise only Turkey made something of it. Do you think there’ll be a Klips Ve Onlar: The Next Generation trying to better this at ESC 2062?
A: Surely the least Turkish-sounding Turkish entry ever. Which is presumably why it did so well, comparatively. You wouldn’t think it came from the same composer as Sev. I suppose it’s quite good. I’m having trouble telling them apart, to be honest.
V: They look like a bunch of office workers with pop-star aspirations they know they’ll never fulfil but who’ll give it their all in a we-wrote-this-in-our-garage kind of way.

09 Spain
B: ‘Champaña y seducción’ sounds just right in Spanish.
A: If nothing else, we can’t complain these songs weren’t a product of their time or failed to reflect contemporary trends in music. This one doesn’t do a lot that’s different, but the way it’s spliced together works very well. It’s only the second song so far that makes me think: yes, I can see why that won its national final.
V: I wouldn’t go so far as to say I like this, but it stands out a mile from virtually everything else so far.

10 Switzerland
B: I don’t know why, but I particularly like the line “Je suis méfiante de ceux qui ont des expériences”.
A: God, it’s almost a relief to hear Switzerland doing something that sounds more old-fashioned and with some proper orchestration (the latter in particular). I love the flutey bits in the bridge. This is pretty strong actually, and composer Atilla Şereftuğ must have been inspired by its success to return a couple of years later with the eventual winner. The piano is very Richard Clayderman.
V: Très together, and ironically more straightforward than most of the other entries so far. I’m glad of the pink trim on Daniela’s blouse: the rest of the stage seems to have had the colour blanched out of it.

11 Israel
B: The lazy repetition of these lyrics is mind-numbing, even if they do mention “ha’ahava she’ein la shem”!
A: Talk about outdated: there are ’80s elements, but the core of this needs carbon-dating.
V: How I wish this was as vocally appalling as the rest of it is.

12 Ireland
B: Horrendous lyrics.
A: There are a lot of hints at the beginning that this should turn into something decent. Instead it unfolds as a blatant copy of whatever that song is I can’t think of, rendering the fact that it’s quite catchy pretty much void. And Ms Luv Bug doesn’t sound like she could be counted on further than the walk from the recording booth to the control panel of the Calrec Soundfield Microphone.
V: There’s no let-up this year, is there? At least it sounds better than I thought it would.

13 Belgium
B: I love the fact that a word like ‘poussière’ is still so beautiful in French.
A: The Maessens are back! And joy, frankly: I know Sandra says “Ne m’en veuillez pas / Je suis née comme ça”, but she has such a shrill voice. That said, I get the appeal of the song. The verses are flat, but soon pick up with the bridge, and the chorus is catchy. However, it all stops being interesting and refreshing after a couple of minutes.
V: Well, it makes perfect pop sense on a night like this.

14 Germany
B: Not entirely blatant political message draped in romance here. I quite like the lines “Wir sind zu Gast nur für einige Zeit / Auf diesem Stern voll Licht und Dunkelheit”.
A: [Rolls his eyes.] I know it’s not Germany’s fault – well, actually, I suppose it is – but it’s just so... German. Good vocals in the chorus, which really lift an otherwise predictable arrangement. It gets better with the key change, and while it mightn’t have the Swedish touches to the composition, it’s better than Luxembourg. Marks a somewhat belated return to the contest for composer Hans Blum (last seen three times in the 1960s).
V: German challenges Finnish for the title of least attractive sounding language at times, but the music and vocals work well together. Nicely controlled performance which isn’t at all boring.

15 Cyprus
B: I like the drunken holiday romance feel to this.
A: This is the one that was once voted worst ever entry, right? Not that I’ll let that sway me. [30 seconds later] Doesn’t sound any worse than most of them. In fact it’s easily the most upbeat thing on offer, and that will almost always score points with me. Puts me in mind of the theme tunes to shows like Moonlighting. I really like Elpida’s voice; it sounds like she could smoke sausages just be sighing at them. [Almost up to 3 minutes] OK, I ask you: how is that the worst song in the history of the Eurovision Song Contest? It’s better than the winner if you ask me. 
V: Still can’t see (or hear) what’s so wrong with it. It’s no masterpiece of music or performance, but it’s still better than a whole lot of stuff so far. And you’ve always got to love a bit of audience participation!

Addendum: This was composed by the same guy as Why Angels Cry??!

16 Austria
B: I wonder whether “Die Zeit ist einsam und sie ist müde / Sie ist müde, dich zu suchen, und bleibt steh’n” refers to a halfway decent Austrian entry?
A: I knew I was going to hate this within about 10 seconds of it starting. Well, ‘hate’ is a bit strong I suppose, and the piano-led bits make a nice change from almost everything else. But it’s just generally so irritating. I feel like I want to slap Timna Brauer with her lame-sounding German lyrics and ineffectual arrangement.
V: You’ve got to wonder what the song that came last in the national final was like sometimes, don’t you.

17 Sweden
B: I’m not normally into songs where much of the chorus is the backing vocalists repeating what the lead singers have just said, but it works really well here. It would work well as audience involvement, too, if any of them spoke Swedish. The last line – “E’ de’ det här du vill?” – sounds like it’s directed at them.
A: I love the way the bassline sounds at times like it’s doing its own thing. Predictable but nevertheless wonderful ending. Never change, Sweden!
V: What the hell were those outfits on the backing vocalists about?! The leotard on the little guy is far from the only thing about this performance that leaves nothing to the imagination. It gets on my nerves after a while, but I can see why it managed a top 5 finish.

18 Denmark
B: When you read all of these lyrics they’re actually very self-aware and playful.
A: Thank god for ’80s Denmark, too! This seems ridiculously upbeat for a song with a title like that – and with a chorus presaged by the question “for ved du hva’ du er?” you know it’s gonna hurt – but it suits it rather well. All the ingredients are there as far as I’m concerned. Well, I’d prefer the key changes to have been effected a little better, but still.
V: No surprise there was only a point between this and Sweden: you’d be forgiven for confusing them. Does what it says on the tin just as convincingly.

19 Finland
B: Finnish reads and sounds at times like a language someone’s made up to sound as unpleasant as possible.
A: I can’t believe that’s the first saxophone of the year. Were they more of a late ’80s thing? They must have thought they were on to something with this. It’s put together as a ballad should be and is quite strong, after all. Just sounds a bit awful, unfortunately.
V: Were they any good live? They had a very experienced team of backing vocalists. [Investigates] Well, yes, great vocals all round. But the song and delivery strive for a sympathy they’re never going to get.

20 Portugal
B: There’s been so much sensuality and raw emotion in Portuguese entries over the years. I love the idea that “O lado bom de passar contigo” is “As crises curtas”.
A: Just as I knew I wasn’t going to have a lot of time for Austria, I knew pretty much straight away I’d have plenty for this. The bass is doing its own thing again while the rest of the composition skips along, but it underpins it all perfectly. We have much to be grateful for that arguably the most overlooked of countries in the contest never got petulant about its lack of success and gave the contest the finger it so often deserved.
V: This is fun in a way that makes you realise that even if most of the others that should have been had tried to be, they still wouldn’t have. Been. Great end to a rather trying contest.


And so to the points…

1 point goes to Finland

2 points go to Belgium

3 points go to Spain

4 points go to Sweden

5 points go to Germany

6 points go to Denmark

7 points go to Cyprus

8 points go to Switzerland

10 points go to Norway

and finally…

12 points go to…


Portugal!


The wooden spoon is awarded, with relish, to Israel.

1985

There aren’t any truly great songs among this bunch, are there?

01 Ireland
B: I’m always drawn to lyrics about insecurity. I particularly like the line “Sunshine looks so good on you”. (Not that it has anything to do with insecurity).
A: Pedigree behind the scenes, which is fairly obvious from a solid if uneventful production I suspect will sound better live than it does in studio. It’s entirely ’80s without being all that off-putting.
V: Something of the Bonnie Langfords about this performance. Maria’s microphone looks even more bling than Charlotte’s was in 2008, without any adornments.

02 Finland
B: The way this morphs from an environmental statement to a ballad to a save-the-children anthem is nifty in a naff kind of way. Again they insist on stuffing the hook with Äs and Ys and Ös, like they’re sucking on something unpleasant and vocalising at the same time.
A: Not hard to tell this is from the same composer as Sata salamaa. It has a bassline in the verses that sounds like it should have been sampled for a chart-topping dance number in around 2003. There’s something about the way it’s put together that screams the early part of the decade to me. Surprisingly melodic.
V: Three minutes that encapsulate just how wrong hair, make-up and fashion were in the 1980s: I really wish she would “hide [her] furry head under a good friend’s arm”. The long shots in particular reveal how static this performance is, when it should be anything but. Lame clapping.

03 Cyprus
B: Nice lyrics. Can’t think of much more to say about them other than that the second verse seems to be an exercise in using as many words which are close to their English equivalents as possible.
A: Plods along pleasantly enough. The elder Ms Vissi’s vocals are less than convincing.
V: Is she nailed to the floor as well? Perhaps the director told them all to hit their mark and hold it.

04 Denmark
B: What makes the innocence of this appealing is the fact that it’s offset by lines like “Hvis bar’ du vil, så ta’r vi til mit hem’lige sted” – delivered, I hope, with brow firmly arched.
A: Essentially the same thing they gave us last year (or next year or whenever), only cheesier still. It doesn’t even come close to grabbing me until the final key change.
V: God, the direction is so boring! The least successful of Hot Eyes’ three entries, but surprisingly not because of the outfits, which would get even worse. Perhaps it was the inclusion of the small child.

05 Spain
B: “¿Para qué echar más leña arder / Si el fuego se ha apagado ya?” is very poetic as put-downs go. Paloma San Basilio is a lovely name for a glamorous lady, but a stage name surely?
A: This has a sense of upper-class emotional restraint about it which appeals to me for some reason. It comes from the same composer as Eres tú, and you can hear it occasionally. Lovely ending, which will presumably be cut live.
V: Fab Dynasty-style overacting, too! Is it just me or is her dress rather... revealing?

06 France
B: “Mélodie, mélodrame, sourire et puis larmes” sounds like a paean to Eurovision rather than the ladies.
A: I hope the orchestra makes something out of this, because no one else is. It throws melodrama in your face a few times to make up for the lack of incident elsewhere, but remains uninvolving.
V: Best eyebrow action all night, and good vocals, but the song’s so boring.

07 Turkey
B: MFÖ impress me with the realism of their lyrics: being so wrapped up in new love that you forget everyone else, before reaching that point where you want to tell them all about it.
A: They were always going to win me over with something this upbeat. It’s about a hundred times more interesting than all of France within the first two bars. Not particularly challenging perhaps, but that still doesn’t explain why it and its like always did so badly when presented by Turkey.
V: That opening is such a breath of fresh air. And they’ve got a clap machine!

08 Belgium
B: The look on Linda’s face in that screengrab on Diggiloo says it all. That’s one shitty relationship she’s trying to extract herself from.
A: Is Ms Lepomme not a native speaker of Dutch, or is there just a slight difference in the way Flemish sounds? That’s the only aspect of the song I can find something to say about.
V: I see they couldn’t be arsed importing their own conductor. She seems to be quite in the moment, which is more than I am.

09 Portugal
B: I like the use of “Lá fora a chuva cai” here as a metaphor. Another set of lyrics which I admire for the fact that they’re saying: yes, I realise this is what I’m like, and no, I’m not going to change for you.
A: Yay, it’s from the same composer as Bem bom! That bodes well. [Listens] Or not. Three minutes of pretty much nothing.
V: Still three minutes of nothing, but with a spangly dress.

10 Germany
B: Ticks all the anthem boxes, so I can see in theory why it did so well. Incidentally, I wonder why the Wind line-up was different every time they appeared at Eurovision. Why did they ditch lead singer Rainer Höglmeier? Perhaps this will be revealed when I listen to the song.
A: Isn’t that a woman singing? Can’t be Rainer, surely. Some of the touches to the composition and the way the vocals are delivered (whoever they’re delivered by) make me think the singers are taking the song way more seriously than they should be.
V: Shudder, sports coats with cinched-up sleeves. Oh, it is Rainer! Odd choice of vocals in that case, and it pretty much answers the question I posed. Hardly anyone seems to be trying very hard to this point.

11 Israel
B: Whadda ya know, it’s an anthem.
A: Eurovision’s an incestuous world in Israel, isn’t it, when you look at the people behind it. Here we get Kobi Oshrat and Hamutal Ben Zeev teaming up, and I assume it’ll be more of a Ze rak sport than an Amen or Hallelujah, despite the lyrics. [Investigates] Always a safe bet, with a title like that. More of a hangover from the last days of disco than something truly ’80s, but without the glitz or ostentation of either.
V: Finally a bit of energy! This has to be one of the campest routines Eurovision has ever seen. You can see why they thought they were in with a realistic chance, and the audience laps it up. Mr Cohen hasn’t changed much in seven years, apart from his legs, which appear to have withered to twig-like proportions. Great ending, but as is so often the case with Israeli entries, it is let down by its backing vocalists.

12 Italy
B: This did quite well for itself in the wider world, didn’t it? At least I’m familiar with it to the point of remembering how the chorus goes without, I think, having listened to or heard it any time recently. That it mentions the ‘fata morgana’ though is indicative of a set of lyrics which only appear to have something to say.
A: This, on the other hand (compared to Israel), has every fibre of its being rooted in the ’80s. And again, to my surprise, I find myself rather attracted to it regardless. The arrangement works well, and there’s definite quality on offer.
V: Full marks for consistency, coming 7th twice. The outfits are appalling. Ms Power is clearly the weak link, given she’s never allowed to open her mouth without all of the backing vocalists doing so at the same time.

13 Norway
B: The chorus might as well be in English.
A: Another example of what is presumably the Norwegian version of schlager: an obsession with the sounds of decades-old rock’n’roll. At least they’re cobbled together in an appealing way, although not so that you’d hear it and immediately think 'winner'. Then again, it’s all about context, and in this year’s contest it stands out. Great harmonies.
V: Talent night at the holiday camp makes it easy to forget that Elisabeth Andreassen is actually a brilliant singer, having made four appearances at Eurovision and finishing in the top 10 every time.

14 United Kingdom
B: “Is the ice worth breaking / ... / Where angels fear to tread?” Terrible.
A: Why am I not amazed we’ve never heard of Ms Watson again. As with many UK entries from this era, potentially decent songs are wasted on no-list singers. The chorus is one of the strongest of any this year, but Vikki’s vocals make me not want to listen.
V: Fair dos, they’re more palatable live. Are they sure the hole in the ozone layer wasn’t exclusively the result of all the hair spray used in the 1980s?

15 Switzerland
B: I love the turnaround from one song to the next between the UK’s entry and this. Is it just me or does “ich fühl’ mich ausgesprochen wohl mit dir” really not sound like it should mean “I feel extremely good with you”?
A: Bleurgh. Next.
V: A much stronger performance vocally than I expected, accounting for the decentish result they achieved. Still, that’s not saying much in one of the least inspiring contests ever.

16 Sweden
B: I like “Visst fanns det andra i mitt liv / Men mer än tidsfördriv, det kunde ingen ge mig”.
A: Lost for something to say about this, too.
V: Just by the way Kikki Danielsson’s posed in that screengrab on Diggiloo you know this is going to be a showcase of meticulous Swedish camerawork. (Yes, I typed that before I realised that there were only three cameras.) One of the most relaxed – and therefore best – performances of the night.

17 Austria
B: Very whatever anthem, this. Calling it Blumen im Asphalt would have at least made it mehr interesting.
A: Thumbs up for the vocal arrangement in [what I presume to be] the chorus. Gary Lux’s voice actually suits the song really well.
V: The question you always have to ask about Austria: what are the backing vocalists wearing?

18 Luxembourg
B: As if Austria wasn’t bad enough, we’re then confronted with Luxembourg. It’s patently untrue that “Tous les enfants sont formidables” and “merveilleux”. The lyrics alone make me want to kill myself.
A: I was going to say this must be Ralph Siegel’s nadir, but realised the competition for the title is too strong to be so strident.
V: Margo, Olivier, Diane, Ireen, Malcolm and Chris can take themselves, their beloved singing children and their precious path of life and fuck off.

19 Greece
B: The translation of the lyrics seems a bit dodgy, but I particularly like the lines “Tha me pikrenis, ki isos kapou se malono / Tha mas enonoun omos panda i stigmes / Aftes pou kanoun pio anthropino to pono”.
A: This wins the award for most solemn production of the evening.
V: Funny how someone in three quarters of a tuxedo can look so scruffy. Great vocals.


And so to the points...

1 point goes to Greece

2 points go to Sweden

3 points go to Ireland

4 points go to Finland

5 points go to Austria

6 points go to the United Kingdom

7 points go to Italy

8 points go to Norway

10 points go to Turkey

and finally...

12 points go to...


Spain!


Six wooden spoons are awarded to Luxembourg.

1984

One of the best orchestrated contests ever.

01 Sweden
B: I love the rhyme and rhythm of “Att när jag vaknade vakna’ jag med glädje”.
A: While you might chuckle at and tend to agree with Terry Wogan’s views on this song’s lyrics, there’s no denying how catchy it is. There are some nifty touches to the music as well that keep it interesting in the verses when it threatens to plod.
V: Who wore golden boots, like, ever? Mormons perhaps. This sounds great, vocally and musically. The three lads, and in particular Per, sound very not-Swedish. (I doubt it was only their accents that were corrupted by their time in the US of A.) I love the way the camera never manages to catch a moment of their choreography, almost as though they felt it would give them an unfair advantage. And perhaps they were right.

02 Luxembourg
B: French sounds so fake and empty in songs like this, even given potentially philosophical lines like “On a le mer, mais pas la plage”.
A: Is this a sped-up seven-inch or was Sophie about 10 years old? There are shades of early ’80s ABBAesque disco in the opening bars, but the production sounds much too cheap overall to be reminiscent of anything greater. The chorus isn’t bad, having said that.
V: The way Sophie places all her weight on her right hip makes her left trouser leg look about 10 cm shorter. This excites me more than her performance does, which is very Coco Dance. They’d just about get away with her not being able to sing to save her life if there was anything knowing about it.

03 France
B: Luxembourg and France form the first of two back-to-back couples this year with similar themes.
A: This is nice enough, if a little bland. The second verse drags after the first chorus, and the title line sounds strangely clumsy set to music. I like the overall sentiment behind it though.
V: Fabulous vocals from Ms Thoumazeau, and the orchestra works wonders with the arrangement.

04 Spain
B: As with many good pop songs, there’s a distinct sadness at the heart of this: the titular lady is clearly pathetic, but there’s sympathy for her, too.
A: Oooh, now this is very ABBA-does-Spanish, albeit, again, without quite scaling the same heights. Worthy attempt though.
V: I’m amazed at how seamlessly this comes across, in terms of sounding exactly like the studio version whichever way you look at it. Or indeed listen to it. Amaya looks like she’s stepped straight off the set of some early ’80s American sitcom, playing a hard-working mother of at least several spunky children and the devoted wife of someone like Alan Thicke.

05 Norway
B: Duff anthem, but the line “Ingen forstar, alle vet, ingen ser” is good.
A: I’m struggling for points of reference as usual, but it’s ABBA yet again, predominantly in the verses; the chorus is spectacularly naff. The song as a whole makes you recall that it was only in the ’90s that Eurovision failed to reflect what contemporary music sounded like.
V: Bananarama touches to the styling and choreography, if not to the song itself. This is a bit sparse when it’s just the two girls carrying it, but the backing vocalists save them in the chorus. The whole thing sounds a lot better than I thought it would, but does go on.

06 United Kingdom
B: The line “You gave me sugar lovin’ and it stuck like glue” receives a dashed underline and double exclamation marks for reasons that do not need any spelling out.
A: As a retro number alone I think this is pretty solid. Not too exciting, but very well produced.
V: Britain hadn’t been a fashion superpower since the Swinging Sixties, but come on, how low could Belle & the Devotions go? Especially since their song is such a throwback to the era. It’s not exactly white soul, but I’m impressed. I’m glad the two pretend vocalists finally got to turn around and face the front.

07 Cyprus
B: “Mu dhiohnis to himona ke ti monaksia” is a lovely sentiment.
A: Well, this goes nowhere (especially without Greece to give it 12 points). Such ‘sweet purpose’ to so little effect.
V: I’m sure Paul Darrow would approve of the hairstyle and outfit Andy Paul is sporting. Coming after a fairly strong run of entries this sounds like it’s not really trying, and the backing vocalists are largely ineffectual in all but the bridge.

08 Belgium
B: As you might expect from French, there are some great – if somewhat bewildering – lines in this, including “Sois poete sans bourreaux”.
A: You’ve got to wonder what made them think this had a chance of winning. It does have some lovely strings, which to this point have been notable for their absence, but still.
V: I thought they’d forgotten to turn the lights on there for a second. Despite what I said above, this is another one of those songs you can tell almost instantly will have at least a sizeable number of points thrown at it. There’s something almost Israeli about the performance, without it being at all cheesy.

09 Ireland
B: This was composed by Johnny Logan?! I can see him penning the lyrics: I love the line “Fly to me on the wings of all you meant to me”.
A: The music sounds like the theme tune to a kids’ game show for much of it. Yet again there’s the sense that everyone’s trying to do ABBA, but here it doesn’t hang together all that well. I would have expected (and probably preferred) this to be a straightforward ballad.
V: Nice touch to colour-coordinate with the Luxembourg flag, although hair that shade ought to have been a crime against humanity. This is very demanding vocally, and Ms Martin pulls it off with aplomb.

10 Denmark
B: “Det store sus… / Der pluds’lig dukker ud af det blå / Det’ lige det, jeg går og venter på” – aren’t we all, honey!
A: This is next year’s winner, isn’t it? Hot Eyes ought to have sued. Given how relatively strong the chorus is, it’s odd that they linger on the verses as long as they do. The almost-reggae bridge I could do without. And what was with all the echo in the ’80s?
V: This is fine vocally, but as a performance it comes across as a bit scatterbrained and shambling. The grand piano seems to be there just to give Søren Bundgaard something to do.

11 The Netherlands
B: It might have said a lot that amongst these lyrics I failed to find a single line that impressed me for its originality or insight...
A: ...but in the context of the music and Maribelle’s delivery, it just works. The arrangement is exquisite. I love the French horn or whatever it is that comes in at about the halfway mark. It mightn’t have anything new to say, but it’s all in the way it says it.
V: This performance isn’t pitched perfectly – Maribelle looks a bit daft, and despite being camera-savvy doesn’t really connect – but vocally it’s a triumph, and the arrangement is brilliant, with little nuances emerging here and there that you wouldn’t expect to pick up on in a live version, like the harp. And it’s still just lovely.

12 Yugoslavia
B: I love it when lyrics throw up lines that sound as right as “Šaptala si moje ime”.
A: Synthesisers in a Balkan entry? Yay! Sadly, Vlado sounds like he’s undergone a Doctor Who-style cybernetic upgrade and ruins it for me. But if I ignore him and concentrate on Izolda’s lovely vocals, they are the icing on a more than palatable – if fairly plain – cake.
V: Vlado seems entirely indifferent to the rather obvious overtures of the glamorous Izolda. This sounds a million times better than I thought it would, too: the orchestra this year must be one of the most consistent (not to say best) in the contest’s history.

13 Austria
B: I like the lines “Rette sich wer kann, ich muss einfach raus / Ich fang’ von vorne an, ich halt’ das nicht mehr aus” and the proffered translation: “Devil take the hindmost”!
A: I like the general idea here as well, but on the whole it makes too little of itself to be truly enjoyable. It’s as though the music is left to its own devices once the vocals are brought in, with no attempt to make any distinction between verses and chorus.
V: The mistake that is Anita’s frock is symbolic of this entry as a whole. I was starting to wonder whether anyone would give Sophie Carle a run for her money.

14 Germany
B: Second pairing, as per Luxembourg/France. This is quite a good borderline ballad/anthem for women (and certain other subsets of the audience). “Noch sind in meiner Seele Splitter” is a great line.
A: This doesn’t really have enough oomph for immediate impact, but I like it, as I tend to with German entries that don’t do as well as they perhaps deserve to.
V: I’m glad they changed the background colour for this, otherwise it would have been a beige overload. The chorus here makes the something out of the song (and thus performance) that the rest of it flatly refuses to. Mary’s blank expression as she waits for the orchestra to finish says it all.

15 Turkey
B: “Bir başkayız aşka gelince / Coşkuluyuz sel gibi” – sounds good to me!
A: So much the outsiders in every sense, Turkey here couldn’t sound more alien if they tried. Which is a good thing, naturally: alien, not just weird. Parts of it are a bit ponderous, but then something comes along in the arrangement that makes me smile. The instrumental bridge completely changes the pace and is a real winner.
V: A bit of colour at last! I was wondering whether we’d be allowed any. As soon as BYÖOYS open their mouths, this sounds like it’s from a different planet; the arrangement and performance are from another decade. That said, it’s one of the best-sounding disco numbers a Eurovision orchestra has ever given us.

16 Finland
B: The idea that “Maailman kuvaa muutenkin voi laajentaa” is bizarre, but so right.
A: One of the few instances of Finland doing truly exuberant in Eurovision, and it works. The piano bits are perfect, and the chorus is actually catchy and as near to sing-along-able as Finnish ever comes. It almost makes me like the mouth organ.
V: Love it. The whole point of this song is that it’s meant to be like this, so I’m glad it is. Mind you, the only place you’re likely to find the guy in the yellow polo shirt and sparkly leatheresque trousers hanging around at the train station is at the public conveniences.

17 Switzerland
B: Like, duh, sunshine’s yellow! Lump this one in with France and Norway for crossover themes.
A: I can’t think of anything about this that I actually like.
V: How torpid this comes across after the Finnish entry. Next.

18 Italy
B: Can you think of a reason why either Alice or Battiato would have any recollection of the dingy depths of a salt mine?
A: While not the all-conquering number some Italian entries have proven to be, there’s a lot I like about this. Italy was never that different to Turkey in doing its own thing, when you think about it; they just managed to make it more accessible.
V: Battiato has an intensity about him that makes me suspect he’s a serial killer. Alice appears to be wearing her stockings on her arms. Between them they put in a professional but not particularly memorable performance in which, however good they are, they’re eclipsed by both the backing vocalists and the orchestra.

19 Portugal
B: The lyrics here are, at times, perplexing for their beauty (“As vezes sou o tempo... / ...em que ninguem quer accreditar”).
A: Poor Portugal – they serve up fado, they serve up poetry, and still they get nowhere. The arrangement here is very simple but oh so effective.
V: Utterly engrossing.


And so to the points...

1 point goes to Italy

2 points go to Denmark

3 points go to Ireland

4 points go to the United Kingdom

5 points go to France

6 points go to Spain

7 points go to Sweden

8 points go to Portugal

10 points go to the Netherlands

and finally...

12 points go to...


Finland!


The wooden spoon goes to Austria.

1983

At first I thought this was going to be a fairly average year, but I found myself trying to stuff a baker’s dozen into my top 10 and struggling on the rankings once I’d finally decided which songs to include. In the end, the winner picked itself. Surprising amount of quality all told, and nothing without a redeeming feature of some sort. The three languages and pregnant pauses are a bit much though.

01 France
B: The more I look at these lyrics, the more I’m sensing all sorts of metaphors.
A: I like the way this develops from straight ballad to soundtrack music. The structure is a bit off-putting at times though, and there’s a sense that it’s taking itself altogether too seriously. Fits together neatly enough, having said that.
V: Guy Bonnet looks like he’s just had something unexpected inserted in his person at times. Perhaps that’s where the lines “...aime à genoux / ...même si tu dois souffrir” come from. Nice vision mixing from the team at ARD. The big ending sounds a bit out of place.

02 Norway
B: “Så enkel og så fin.” I’ll be the judge of that.
A: The introduction does nothing to endear this song to me. In fact it irritates the crap out of me. But more than that: it almost seems out of place, despite the point of the whole song, because what follows is musically otherwise quite decent for Eurovision. And yet it’s so tired – it’s Jahn Teigen again, with a song written by him and Anita Skorgan again, from the same lyricist as their 1982 entry, and it really has no ambition whatsoever. Still, it’s nice to see that the ending is as bad as the start. At least they were consistent.
V: I remember my mum wearing outfits scarily similar to those sported by the backing vocalists, whose contribution here is more welcome than Mr Teigen’s. The orchestra does a good job of the music.

03 United Kingdom
B: These lyrics read like they were penned by a non-native speaker, which makes me wonder whether any of the fabulously named writing team of Roker, Pulsford and Wigger were foreigners. Is the title a threat or a promise?
A: As usual for the UK, this is very much a product of its time. You can see why it didn’t do that well, but it’s not bad. In fact the chorus is rather good: textbook stuff in more ways than one. There’s no need for a key change though.
V: And I thought the Norwegian outfits were bad! I’m gobsmacked at how good this sounds, which I suspect has something to do with the invisible backing singers.

04 Sweden
B: As clichés go, “Stjärnor jag ser dom, vill gärna ta ner nån till dig” is rather pretty.
A: At last I can refer to ABBA for good reason. The chorus is surprisingly underwhelming until it all gets turned up a notch at two minutes, but the production is very solid (as it should be coming from the prolific Lasse Holm). Is it an indictment against Sweden that this song could have come from Melodifestivalen 25 years later, only programmed?
V: Carola sounds her age, in a good way. If only there was as much power in her three-quarter pants and tank top as there is in her voice! I suppose I have to resign myself to the fashions. Another stellar turn from the backing vocals and orchestra here – you’d think you were listening to the studio version at times.

05 Italy
B: Now this is a set of lyrics. (Can you imagine anyone in the Balkans ever contemplating wasting this many words on one song? Of course in not doing so they’re denying themselves, and us, the poetry that so many Italian entries represent.) I love the lines “...quando spegnerai / Indosserai le stelle e... / Avrai ... / un silenzio quando vuoi parlare”.
A: The song’s secondary to the story it’s telling and simply carries it along rather than flowing in its own right. Which is not to say that it’s not good – it just doesn’t grab me, feven with those lyrics. More guns here, too, after France; was there some war going on around Christmas/New Year 1982-83? The Falklands was earlier than that, no?
V: If I was the drummer having to follow that plodding timing I’d be covering my ears with those giant headphones, too. Lovely performance by one and all, yet again, but there’s just not enough to the music to hold your interest. Riccardo’s little “I did it!” bit at the end is endearing, if somewhat self-deceptive.

06 Turkey
B: What a mystifying choice of ode for the Eurovision stage. And it’s a list song to boot.
A: Just doesn’t work.
V: Çetin Alp has a good voice, but he looks like he’s stepped out of a[n admittedly dapper] production of Dracula. The schadenfreude when novelty entries fall flat on their arse is *chef's kiss*.

07 Spain
B: Bonkers. “Las trenzas de tu madre… / Que dime quién se las peina… / Voy a pedirle que me trence, anda y sí” shows that the best hairdressers have always been gay.
A: I can understand why the juries were a bit reluctant to throw points Spain’s way. What I prefer to call Who Floats My Boat? probably has great artistic and musical value, but it isn’t ideally suited to a contest like Eurovision.
V: This is hard to take your eyes off, for many, many reasons. Ironically, or perhaps understandably, Ms Amaya looks pained. It’s odd how enthusiastic the audience is for it when the people giving out the points weren’t: you have to wonder how it would have fared if there’d been anything resembling a televote at the time.

08 Switzerland
B: “Così non mi va... / Si fa per amore oppure no” – give it a chance, love, or your husband will be out in search of a rent boy! For some reason Swiss Italian never comes across as entirely authentic to me; maybe the Swiss operating in about five languages simultaneously explains it. The lyricist of this is the same one behind Switzerland ’81, ’86 and ’88, and it shows, whatever the language.
A: Back to more traditional Eurovision territory then with the Swiss entry – surprise! – but I actually quite like it. The chorus is nothing like what I expected it to be, which is nice.
V: There’s a real hair war going on here between Mariella and her band. She looks and sounds like she’s singing her own song at the beginning, completely ignorant of what’s going on around her. The performance, like the song, is competent but wholly unexciting.

09 Finland
B: I like the line “Huominen on kaiku eilisen”.
A: So easy to pinpoint as Nordic. It’s amazingly melodramatic, considering how accurate and ordinary a picture the lyrics paint. It has to be one of the least Finnish-sounding Finnish entries from back in the day. Good it is, too. (Coincidence?!)
V: Great direction again, and the sound certainly matches the visuals in quality. I assume it was always the Finnish itself that turned the juries off the country’s entries, since here, as so often, it sounds awful. But top marks for the performance.

10 Greece
B: The romance in these six lines of lyrics is rather sinister in a Fatal Attraction kind of way.
A: The contrast between Finland and this works in both their favour. The music is just lovely, and the arrangement is grea– oh. It turns into a show number two-thirds of the way through. Why couldn’t it content itself with being a gentle ballad?
V: They thought it was worth having a guy on stage just to play the triangle? I love this up to the two-minute mark, but can’t abide it after that. The nasty saxophone sums it up.

11 The Netherlands
B: Flash forward 20 years and “Hoe het daar is en wat doe je dan zo aldaar” could be a line out of Wadde hadde dudde da.
A: I was prepared to hate this, but it’s too well-produced. Yes, it’s twee and annoying, but unlike much that is twee and annoying, it still works. I’d rather it not have been done by the Dutch, but what can you do. At least the production is pretty much guaranteed to be good that way (and the arrangement here is terrific, with touches of Xanadu). But would you ever guess that it was composed by the same person as De troubadour and De eerste keer?
V: What on earth is Bernadette wearing, a garland of daffodils? She might have the range, but she hasn’t got the depth to her vocals to outshine the orchestra, let alone the backing vocalists, so she gets a bit lost in this.

12 Yugoslavia
B: Neat play on words in “I nju mi je odnio dan / Ostalo samo je sjećanje na jedan juli”.
A: For a long time, Bosnia was just as bad as Sweden for still producing the same music they’d been making for the previous 30 years. Is this Bosnian? [Checks.] Oh. Oh well, you get the idea. I don’t like it much at all, but I won’t necessarily mark it down because of it. Funny how this and Rock Me were their big success stories.
V: The slight injection of tempo here makes this come across a bit odd to my ears, and it’s the first time tonight that the music has sounded empty and far away. Danijel’s vocals are spot on.

13 Cyprus
B: Last year’s winner repackaged.
A: Pretty obvious attempt at Ein bißchen frieden in terms of composition, too (in the bits between verses and choruses). Still, it’s very solid, and the arrangement is both rich and imaginative in parts. Singer Dina went on to compose Mana mou, so of course I love her.
V: You could strip this of the language, the look, just about everything basically and the vocal technique alone would be enough to pinpoint it geographically. I wonder whether the beefed-up arrangement was a reaction to it all sounding a bit too much like E.B.F. I’m not sure I like it as much, but it’s still well done. Elena Patroklou resembles a brunette Bette Midler.

14 Germany
B: Good lyrics, with none of the superficiality that many German entries are tarnished by. I love the lines “Fehlte uns die Kraft, uns zu vertrauen? / War es Angst vor ehrlichem Gefühl?”
A: Great chorus. Very solid overall, and a great entry on home soil.
V: Were they the Hoffmanns’ best matching blue and pea-green outfits, do you think? I love the fact that they just stand there and deliver this. I would have been as chuffed as this audience clearly are to have something of this quality representing me at home.

15 Denmark
B: Kloden drejer looks so un-Danish to me for some reason.
A: Nothing much to the music or lyrics here, but Denmark did this kind of thing very well back in the day. Strange how it morphed into guitars and mid-tempo.
V: Love the minimalist, bassy feel to the chorus, but Gry’s vocals are very exposed. Yes, let’s leave it at that.

16 Israel
B: Given that these lyrics combine the themes of songs, praying, the nation of Israel and friends from across the seas, they’re more quattro formaggi than anything you’d find on an Italian restaurant menu.
A: Completely Israeli, as you might expect it to be when composed by Avi Toledano and written by Ehud Manor, but good enough to overcome it, too. The arrangement is impressive, if a little busy at times, which nevertheless fits in with the lyrics. Ofra Haza has a lovely voice. Perfect stuff for Eurovision really. Takes ages to get to the first chorus, but soon makes up for it.
V: The political significance of this song being performed by Jews in Germany is as impossible to ignore as the audience’s enthusiasm for it. But then, on a purely Eurovision level it works a treat: its allure is undeniable.

17 Portugal
B: I wonder, with lines like “Mas não há nenhum mal em ser assim”, whether the ‘she’ of the opening line is his psychiatrist?
A: Everything about this is romantic, from the flow of the words and the way Armando delivers them to his oh-so-right voice and the orchestration of it all... bar the electric guitar, for which it automatically loses points. Otherwise lovely.
V: Mr Gama looks like the love child of Yoko Ono and Professor Snape. He sings beautifully, and there’s nothing wrong with any of it. But in the context of some of the other songs and performances, it’s just a bit too unremarkable for its own good.

18 Austria
B: Lyrics like “Ich leb’ in meinen Phantasien” and “Ganz allein mit meinem Kummer” would set off all sorts of alarms if this were the German entry, but you know Austria’s never going to be quite that interesting.
A: What a triumph for synthesisers everywhere this is, especially when paired with those strings. I bet it sounded nothing like this live.* It would be easy to dismiss it as yet another lame Austrian entry, but it’s not bad really.
V: Oh my god – those outfits! Gary Lux looks like Kenny Everett. *Actually it sounds exactly the same. I’m impressed. The routine makes perfect sense, and the vocals only get better as they go along.

19 Belgium
B: It took two people to write those lyrics?
A: Sounds like Bananarama. Never a hope in hell of impressing the juries, but it’s a little masterpiece. It’s like modern art, only you get it. I think.
V: Utterly, fabulously amazing. Pretty much everything has sounded good tonight, but nothing has sounded this good.

20 Luxembourg
B: Wonderful, terribly sad lyrics: “Mais le temps a tous les droits / Et l’enfant qui n’est pas là / C’est aujourd’hui mon seul bonheur imaginaire”.
A: The big French number none of the other French-speaking countries could manage in 1983. Is that (and the fact that it comes straight after the rather more off-beat Belgium) the reason the juries voted for it? It’s competent, certainly, but doesn’t strike me as being overwhelmingly good. Just good. The ending’s rubbish, after all.
V: Every time I see Corinne Hermes she looks like she’s just had a fan-forced convection oven opened in her face while baking in her dressing gown. She certainly overeggs the pudding here. I both can and can’t understand why this won, which is a bit of a shame really.


And so to the points…

1 point goes to Cyprus

2 points go to the Netherlands

3 points go to Denmark

4 points go to the United Kingdom

5 points go to Portugal

6 points go to Israel

7 points go to Finland

8 points go to Sweden

10 points go to Germany

and finally…

12 points go to...


Belgium!


The wooden spoon goes to Switzerland.

1982

Odd to have a year without big guns Italy and France; even Greece’s absence is felt, despite Cyprus showing up, and if not exactly missed. Maybe they stayed away because of the strange way the contest unfolds: in studio there’s lots of fun to be had, but on stage, however hard a lot of them try, they just can’t convince me the contest is an enjoyable experience.

01 Portugal
B: Hey!
A: Surely a contender for Portugal’s most brainlessly upbeat entry (and successfully so)?
V: I first came across this and a host of other Portuguese entries quite by accident one day when I found my way to the TVP site and discovered it had clips of every Portuguese entry from 1964 to the present. I was drawn to this of course by their outrageous – but somehow still rather glamorous and culturally appropriate – costumes. I fell in love with it immediately. Live it sounds very empty compared to the bass-driven studio version, despite the very obvious percussion. And the vocals are a bit rough in the verses. But what can you do. It’s still fab.

02 Luxembourg
B: “Il faut être fou / Pour vivre à genoux” – not sure everyone would agree with you there, dear! This is quite interesting when you consider just how materialistic the ’80s would prove to be. It’s the first example of a not-France French song from this year that looks like it was put together by a sixth-form student armed with a rhyming dictionary.
A: Svetlana’s delivery is right for the song but borderline irritating-as-fuck.
V: What I thought would be the weakest link here based on the studio version ­– Svetlana herself – turns out to be perfectly alright. At first I thought the fact that there were 500% more backing vocalists was designed to mask her shortcomings, but not so. That said, the song and performance are still pretty uninvolving.

03 Norway
B: “De vil aldri dø” indeed: you couldn’t weld the lid shut on the Eurovision coffin of these two underachievers, could you?
A: At least they kept them short. This is a decent enough attempt at a touching piano-led ballad, but it struggles to even locate the heartstrings, let alone tug at them.
V: Has Jahn Teigen just stopped in on his way to the pub? This sounds lovely, but then it has the kind of arrangement that was always going to benefit most from the set-up. The bits where Anita stops playing mid-way through the chorus look weird.

04 United Kingdom
B: I like how realistic “But I forgot all the things that I planned to say / I don’t know if I tried to” is, and I initially put lots of exclamation marks beside the lines “You could have turned around / And hit me and I wouldn’t have cared” because I assumed it would be a woman singing them. Dodgy either way, of course.
A: Again the UK pushes the envelope and tries to force something contemporary on doggedly intractable Eurovision. This stands the test of time remarkably well if you ask me. Pity they didn’t make more of the short-lived early fusion of synths and acoustics.
V: Stephen Fischer and Sally Ann Triplett are decent singers, but this fails to come together however much they throw at it. It doesn’t help that the entire chorus sounds like it was written for tambourine, the way the sound emerges from the orchestra.

05 Turkey
B: Such a fascinating language: even Finnish would be hard-pressed to sum up the ideas contained in lines like “Konuşulmuyor hiçkimseyle” so economically, and yet Turkish looks and sounds to me at times surprisingly similar to another Finno-Ugric language, Hungarian (“Kullanmazsan birkaç tatlı sözcük”, for example).
A: They like their extended introductions, don’t they? This sounds quite good; a bit repetitive, but this is offset by the variety of the arrangement, which features some great strings and never for a minute lets your attention slip. I’m glad to see it had at least one set of decent points thrown its way.
V: The first 20 or so Turkish national finals must have been sad and strange affairs. “Who shall we send to be unjustly ignored this time?” Mind you, they look like the cast of a cult sci-fi series, and the backing vocalists have no concept of the term ‘subtlety’. It all comes together quite well – if rather brassily – towards the end.

06 Finland
B: The first Eurovision entry to contain the word ‘poo’? You’ve got to praise this for having such a serious message at its heart. Needless to say the play on words in the title is fantastic, and I love virtually everything about the line “Jos et sä herää tällä erää, niin et herää ollenkaan”.
A: Musically it’s a bit of a disaster, despite the orchestral arrangement, because it seems so meandering and disjointed. But maybe that’s the whole point. Incidentally, when you go back and compare them, this and Hani? have uncannily similar beginnings.
V: Within seconds it’s obvious no one’s going to vote for this, but in its way it’s a work of genius by the Eurovision standards of the day. For much of it Kojo sounds like he’s left his vocal cords in Helsinki.

07 Switzerland
B: I identify with the lines “On peut quitter sa patrie... / Il nous faut l’amour d’abord / ...quand bien même tu nous enchaînes”.
A: However, this is another case of Switzerland going for the lowest common denominator. The composition sits together very comfortably, but therein lies the problem: the chorus in particular is predictable to the last. A safe but entirely unrewarding two-and-a-half minutes, with a naff title to boot.
V: Best orchestral arrangement so far, and it comes across all the more convincingly for following Finland. Still unexciting though. No wonder it came third.

08 Cyprus
B: ‘Only love’, Anna – we get it already.
A: The bridge is the musical highpoint of this song, promising to turn it into something completely different; the rest, I’m afraid, fails to win me over. And why am I not surprised by the instrument of choice?
V: It’s The Curious Case of Anna Vissi, in that she almost looks older here than she did in Athens. I blame the perm. (I inevitably do. Even the guy on backing vocals has one!) Rather like the Swiss entry, this is cleverly arranged to make the most of the orchestra, but it fails to do anything for me whatsoever.

09 Sweden
B: You look at some of the lyrics here (“Men nu var det nåt som sa mig”, “Sen den dag jag såg dig här...” et al.) and think: do they have some rule that word length must not exceed the number of fingers on one hand on which you can count their letters?
A: You can sing along to this even if you’ve never heard it before and still hit most of the right notes, but there’s something about Swedish schlager that makes that a good thing where in the case of Switzerland it just doesn’t. Perhaps because it doesn’t seem so contrived, although it clearly is. Double standards perhaps to reward it for doing what you expect of it, but that’s my prerogative.
V: Schlager this simplistic should at least be fun, and yet this must qualify as one of the most listless and perfunctory Swedish performances the contest has seen. I didn’t expect that from this pair at all.

10 Austria
B: Never have six less true words been spoken (or sung) than “Hat so etwas Schönes an sich”.
A: They chose to call themselves ‘Mess’? Why not call yourself ‘Our Song Is Shit’?
V: Kudos to them: they do a good job of filling up the stage when there’s only two of them, and of making it all seem like something verging on fun. Vocally they manage much the same feat. But there’s no disguising how empty the music sounds for a lot of the song, and the emphasis on the strings in the opening bars doesn’t work.

11 Belgium
B: “N’est-elle pas magnifique? / … / Fais qu’elle fasse vibrer!”
A: Fab early ’80s disco, but it’s saddled with a chorus from a much more irritating and run-of-the-mill song, and those incessant drums (snare?) really annoy me.
V: Of course the trump card was in getting a proper diva to do this: it’s the kind of thing that would be wrong in the hands of anyone else. (That said, she seems to have recycled her curtains, and delegated backing vocals to her secretary.) Needless to say this is as fabulous in closing as the pink music box is in opening it.

12 Spain
B: I love the line “Él es igual que un perro fiel”, and the lyrics generally. It all makes me think of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for some reason. Veruca Salt?
A: This sort of sits you up and slaps you around the face, doesn’t it? Just in time for the orgasmic sighing. And key change. It’s more or less run its course before two minutes are up and after that very literally fades away to nothing, but it’s impressive while it lasts.
V: Wonderfully airheaded and full of character. I too would be prancing around on tiptoe most of the time if I had trousers as tight as Lucia’s mascara-clad male dancer.

13 Denmark
B: You’re really reminded of the era you’re stranded in when you’re given references to colour TV like it’s something magical. Some things never go out of fashion though: “...når jeg ska’ slappe af / Bar’ et tryk på knappen...” indeed; only the technology changes! I can see why such an obsession would have led to accusations along the lines of “Hun si’r jeg ikke er helt normal”.
A: This must have been very much of its time. They should have realised it would get them nowhere. Flawed, and slightly cringeworthy when you look back on it now (can you imagine an entry in the mid-’00s called iPod, iPod or something?), but get past that and you can see its worthy qualities. Such as they are.
V: Pretty much everything I said about Nuku pommiin also applies to this, apart from the bit about it possibly being a work of genius. Very early ’80s in a way that didn’t serve it terribly well then and still doesn’t now.

14 Yugoslavia
B: They’re leaving themselves open with admissions like “Priče sve, čudno je”.
A: I can appreciate why they might have thought they were onto a winner with this very ABBA-sounding number. Pity it’s already at least five years behind the times. I’m seeing Pac-Man, for some reason.
V: Until the key change, when they start sounding somewhat less like drag queens, this sounds unremittingly awful.

15 Israel
B: Love the imagery of “Ve’od nisa ha’arafel ba’emek / Bein hazricha vehatal”.
A: I like the instrument at the beginning. Is it a fiddle? This follows a well-worked formula, so I’m not surprised to see that it very nearly delivered them their third victory in only five years. The way it builds is very effective.
V: The staging and choreography are pretty standard in approach, too, but they work like a charm in a line-up which seems to have been deliberately designed to sap the fun out of everything. To this point it’s head and shoulders above everything else.

16 The Netherlands
B: The vowel-o-rama of “Daar waar de perenboom staat” is positively Estonian.
A: Ooh, what does this sound like? Morning Train springs to mind, but I’m not sure it’s that. Something famous and chart-topping from the period though. Good vocal arrangement: nothing overwhelming, but with some nice touches that unexpectedly lift it.
V: Bill van Dijk sounds like the most cliched Dutch name you could think of. Full marks for looking and sounding like something very much of its time.

17 Ireland
B: Terrible lyrics.
A: In the verses this sounds very early (and indeed some much later!) Bananarama, while at the same time showing all the signs of being complete early ’80s disco, no holds barred. The chorus is far too lacklustre for this kind of song, although I quite like the mechanical nature of it, which feels right. In fact by the end of it I’m quite disposed towards it.
V: The orchestra sheds most of the disco trappings here, but the Duskeys do their best to retain them in their awful outfits and choreography. Sounds alright though.

18 Germany
B: “Dass ich die Hoffnung nie mehr verlier!” Well, one win from 50+ attempts clearly sustained them until Lena came along.
A: I suppose Bernd & Ralph had to get it right at some point: this has WINNER stamped all over it in huge splotches of red ink. Touches of Elton John piano in evidence once again.
V: Very simple and effective; blue vein cheesy, but Nicole’s sincere and charming enough to pull it off. Plus it sounds like nothing else before it.


And so to the points…

1 point goes to the United Kingdom

2 points go to Sweden

3 points go to Norway

4 points go to Turkey

5 points go to Belgium

6 points go to the Netherlands

7 points go to Spain

8 points go to Portugal

10 points go to Israel

and finally...

12 points go to...


Germany!


The wooden spoon is awarded to Yugoslavia.