2012

Azerbaijan – land of plastic hosts and uninspired production values. Not a very exciting year musically either, with some disparity between the better entries and performances, but a few songs should stand the test of time.

01 Montenegro

B: This splits me right down the middle: I have a sneaking admiration for what it’s saying, and how it’s saying it – the whole “different mission, different school” thing, and the fact it’s the most overtly political entry this year – but my overall reaction to it is never anything more than ...nah.
A: You’d never guess this came from the same stable as Samo ljubezen. It’s the mark of a good composer, I guess – or a versatile one, at any rate. There’s a lot going on in this which you don’t necessarily get on one listen, and right enough too: that’s the song in microcosm. The chorus is not only its most readily identifiable ethnic element but also its best bit.
V: Inserting the “I got no ambition for high position in competition” disclaimer was erecting the wall and putting the writing on it, but again, I quite like the fact that they – Montenegro and Mr Amadeus – are doing their own thing here and bugger the outcome. Continuing the fine tradition begun by Kamil Mikulčik in 2009, he looks like he’s just getting in from a particularly heavy night on the tiles at some Podgorica wedding.

02 Iceland
B: I wonder whether “I still believe that you’ll remember me” was the mantra they intoned as the votes failed to roll in during the final and they languished at the bottom of the scoreboard.
A: There’s something self-important about this composition. I don’t know what it is, but it rankles. I almost feel obliged to be impressed by it, which of course means I’m not.
V: It’s like someone’s decided to turn a Halldor Laxness novel into a musical and we’re being treated to a three-minute preview. Greta’s bouncy violin antics are a little disconcerting, as are the half-baked backing vocals, but Jónsi looks sexy in a skeletal kind of way and provides some great harmonies.

03 Greece
B: Of course, we all know what she’s really referring to when she says she can’t get enough of his ‘aphrodisiac’.
A: Eurovision by numbers from the Greeks: it does what it’s required to, but nothing more. It’s certainly the most derivative and least interesting of their recent entries. You can almost see the composer’s one-fingered thumbing of the keys as he turned out the chorus.
V: The one thing that this routine is lacking, given the lyrics, is any evidence of Ms Eleftheriou dancing like a maniac. Fantastic lighting and backdrop though – the first to really show off the stage. I hope they paid the backing vocalist as much as (if not more than) our spunky lead, since she carries the whole thing. Yet again I’m befuddled by the Greek inability to pronounce /æ/: you’d swear the song was called Ufrodisiuc.

04 Latvia
B: I hope Rolans Ūdris feels even a tenth as embarrassed about these lyrics as I do on his behalf.
A: Not even Malta has sunk this low. OK, as a piece of music it stands up alright, without being in any way remarkable, but even the potentially interesting bits – like the hint of Benny-and-Bjorn guitar – sound like they’re slaves to the Eurovision groove the song is stuck in. And either way you’re stuck with those fucking awful lyrics.
V: There’s so much slap on Anmary that she looks like she’s trying to cover up the fact she was born in distant 1960, not the year that Irish Johnny Logan won. That, however, is the least of their problems with this performance, which couldn’t be more cringeworthy if it tried. (Visually at least; the vocals are alright.)

05 Albania
B: “Më ler ni të qaj... / Se ktë gjë më së miri di ta bëj tani” pretty much says it all about these lyrics. Harrowing in a way we haven’t seen* since Poland stopped being any good.
A: *Or heard. The music alone tells a story: glorious string arrangement, haunting piano. I’ve always held that the percussion is a bit too miitary tattoo for its own good, but there’s no denying the strength of the composition as a whole. And sometimes, just sometimes, squealing like a stuck pig can be beautiful.
V: Entrancing even, and that’s despite it (and Rona) being so challenging. It doesn’t matter a jot that she fumbles the whole note-perfect thing. The melodramatic denouement is an unnecessary coda to the tangible drama of the preceding two-and-three-quarter minutes.

06 Romania
B: Breezy lyrics that capture the feel of the piece perfectly. I do like “Tú, déjate amarte”.
A: The tattoo continues, just not as regimented. The bridge is my favourite bit here, in a composition that’s workmanlike but not unworthy. And again, it feels just right.
V: Helena shows great professionalism in the face of audio adversity in the semi, which makes her flawless (if slightly out-of-time) vocals all the more impressive. The cute routine suits the song down to the ground.

07 Switzerland
B: “It doesn’t matter how hard it is.” I beg to differ.
A: This has such potential until it reaches the chorus, after which it plateaus and remains as flat as a tack. The middle eight captures something of the nascent excitement of the opening bars, but by that point it’s far too late. Added to all this, the lead singer’s got an irritating voice.
V: He’s got big starey eyes that make him look like he’s on day release, too. Regardless, this performance is about as engaging as it was ever likely to be. It also gives us our first sighting of this year’s abundant crop of overacting bit-players mugging at the cameras.

08 Belgium
B: If debutante Iris had penned these lyrics herself I’d be more inclined to forgive their shoddiness, but you’d expect more from a bunch of Belgians. Still, some of the observations are spot-on (“It’s a two-way street, and I know that”). Just not necessarily from the point of view of a 16-year-old.
A: I said from the word go that this was too pedestrian to stand out from the more polished and more interesting ballads on offer, and I was proven right. It’s clearly aiming for a guileless Tom Dice appeal, and isn’t actually all that shabby, especially once it comes into its own in the last minute or so. It’s just not very exciting, and the young lady helming it was never going to turn that deficit around.
V: Iris – more naïve than dulcet and every bit the awkward little girl – is completely overexposed here. She’s not bad, but nothing shines through like lack of experience. She definitely hasn’t mastered the ability to look like she’s enjoying herself on stage.

09 Finland
B: Lovely sketch, this. I understand it’s of her mother, but it could be about any intimate relationship with lines like “Nå’n som fattar vad man säger fast man talar utan ord”.
A: How much more I find myself appreciating this when it’s stripped of its vocals. It’s wonderfully arranged, with each strand doing its own thing and yet complementing the others perfectly. Pernilla’s vocals... Well, they’re coming from the right place, I suppose, but I really can’t take to them.
V: Sweet, but the momentary delay there at the beginning is indicative of a song that’s going nowhere. The tomato, basil and mozzarella colour scheme doesn’t do it any favours.

10 Israel
B: I do like these lyrics, since they work on two levels: you can interpret them literally, but also read them as representing something or someone much more specific – like Time, who sounds like a kiddy-fiddler when labelled the “man in my playground”.
A: I liked this when I first heard it and still like it now. There’s something laid back, almost lazy, about the way it all hangs together that couldn’t be more attuned to what the song’s saying. And it’s retro, but in a timeless way, which feels right too. The music and vocals are happily married, which is an added bonus. Thumbs up.
V: Another fab backdrop; pity we see so little of it. The camerawork is a bit hit and miss here, particularly where it counts most, and this doesn’t help in a performance where everyone looks (and at times sounds) like a caricature. The whole thing comes across as odd rather than enjoyably quirky. The frump on the keyboard looks totally bemused at even being there.

11 San Marino
B: I quite like the fact this tells a story.
A: Albeit one that gets completely lost. Plus there’s no discernible chorus. Given it’s from the House of Siegel, it could (and probably should) be a lot worse than it actually is, but it hangs together despite itself. There are even occasional flashes of inspiration.
V: You’d swear the dorky guy in the pilot’s outfit was the same one who implored everyone to “dance!” in Wir geben ’ne Party. Valentina’s vocals are impressive from the off, although there’s a sense that if she looks at the camera for more than a split second she’ll forget her lines.

12 Cyprus
B: “Love the way you fill me up with life” is as single an entendre as you’ll get among this year’s lot.
A: I love the guitar strumming away beneath the verses. There’s something instantly uplifting about this that’s always drawn me to it, whilst recognising that it’s every bit as this-button-then-that-button as stablemate This Is Our Night. I like it about a gazillion times more though.
V: Liv Tyler sings for Cyprus! The full weird-arse sound of her voice is disguised in the studio version but out there for all to hear live, and it truly is something to behold (and boggle at). The slickness, confidence and imagination of the routine knock Greece’s into a cocked hat for once. Great backing vocals from composer Björn Djupström – which is what they are for the first time, after singing every word with Sarbel and Arash in 2007 and 2009.

13 Denmark
B: This is a painfully accurate portrait of a failed relationship. I love the play on words of ‘home/homeless’, the suitcase imagery and everything encapsulated in the line “You’re so here, you’re so there, you’re not really anywhere”.
A: This just works for me as a piece of music: in and of itself, given how effortlessly it blends its elements; and when paired with its vocals, and its lyrics. It really speaks to me. I love how contrary those little ding-dong things there at the start are, and indeed throughout.
V: What a cosmopolitan bunch! Very welfare society. It suits the feel of the song, right down to the ASBO cellist. The vocals are uniformly good, both times.

14 Russia
B: Let’s face it: we’re not listening to this song for its lyrics. That said, lines like “Кочыше но шумпотэ но, пуные но шумпотэ / Мылы-кыды капчия но, шумпотонэн пачылме” reflect how cute and cheery the whole thing is.
A: We’re not listening to it for the music either, which is pure Saturday-night light-entertainment cheese. Flick through every Russian channel and you’ll find this kind of thing allegedly diverting the masses. (Mind you, that opening – shorn of the gummy vocals – could almost pass for something Enya might once have thought twice about.) But to give Party for Everybody its dues, it does have a clear Verka Serduchka appeal. The fact it was written by the same guy as Nobody Hurt No One blows my mind.
V: The opening is a bit painful, but you forgive them anything the moment you set eyes on them. Anyone who expected this not to come second was being wilfully blind.

15 Hungary
B: Fairly decent stab at an anthem.
A: What impressed me about this the first time I heard it was how neatly Compact Disco had interwoven the orchestral accompaniment into the beeps and blips of the synthesisers propping the whole thing up. It sounds really big in places, which is very much in line with its anthemic pretensions, and builds to a surprisingly satisfying crescendo.
V: I’ll have the lead singer and the tall guy on bass wrapped to go, please. Mr Walkó is clearly confident enough in his sexuality to sport silver lamé. And indeed to display his wanking technique on the microphone so brazenly.

16 Austria
B: “Dei Popo wü Begegnung, geht scho gib erm wos a braucht!” Can’t argue with that.
A: This did nothing for me when I first heard it, but it’s one of a few songs this year that have really grown on me. I don’t know why, since I’m clearly not its target audience, but there you go. And both because and in spite of this, I can’t think of anything else to say about it.
V: The backdrop really adds depth to the visuals here, as does the camerawork, which is unusually good in places. I’m not taken with the colour scheme, or the strip-club chauvinism at the heart of the performance, but I liked it enough to think it would qualify. There’s definitely something crowd-pleasing about it, but perhaps you had to be there; it didn’t translate into votes, after all. I love it when whatshisname’s cap gets knocked off by one of the dancers and he catches and sticks it back on so deftly.

17 Moldova
B: The line “On a plane which belongs to your daddy” is surprisingly effective as lyrical shorthand in a set of lyrics which are otherwise fairly (if inoffensively) simplistic.
A: Moldova-lite, but with enough cheeky charm to get away with it. It’s not nearly as mechanical as Aphrodisiac, either, although in Eurovision terms they’re both following the path of least resistance. That said, the vocals here are actually pretty demanding.
V: I’m sure there are a few people who’ve never seen Pasha Parfeny’s trumpet who’d be more than happy to give it a brass rubbing. Fab costumes and choreography, which are both a bit nuts. Great backing vocalists, too.

18 Ireland
B: Designed to make pre-pubescent girls everywhere think that Jedward, like, totally love them? Some of the imagery, while inevitable, is cleverly used.
A: Trawling through this looking for something to criticise is like a musical pop smear, and yet it comes up clear. I’m not a fan of it by any means, but I’m forced to concede its neat touches and to admire how solidly it’s constructed. Thematically, the lyrics and music are, ahem, watertight.
V: Gimmicks aplenty, not least of which being Jedward themselves. Not that they bring anything new to the table, bar the water feature. There’s no disguising the fact that this is a stage with six backing vocalists on it – as they’re running round the fountain towards the end of the song you can hear only too clearly (ironically) how low the Brothers Grimes are in the mix. Nevertheless/therefore, it all sounds pretty good in the final.

19 Serbia
B: The opening lines set the tone for this – another battered and bruised account of a relationship coming to an end – in a way that almost makes you recoil at how much pain so few and such simple words can contain. But then the whole thing’s like that: poetry set to music. I love the rhythm in the bridge before the final chorus.
A: Prior to which (the bridge, I mean) this could just about come from anywhere. The music is cunningly contrived to sound a little bit Nordic, a little bit Irish, a little bit anywhere and everywhere, and it’s only really when the ethnic tags are attached that it betrays its roots. And what a wonderful betrayal it is! I wasn’t sure I’d love this as much as Lane moje when I first heard it. I am now.
V: Željko’s vocals are like velvet. The staging is only a very slightly stripped-back version of what he gave us in 2004, but it works. And as it does in studio, the last bit of the song sounds amazing – real hair on the back of your neck stuff.

20 FYR Macedonia
B: Kinda hopeless, this, in the most literal sense, and yet in a wonderful way. There’s a lot of honesty in imploring your other half to “Отвори душа признај ми / Што сме сега јас и ти”.
A: Macedonia just can’t be doing without its electric guitar, can it. Still, it fits the feel of the piece and forms a nice counterpoint to the stabbing strings and the undercurrent of piano. And it certainly matches Kaliopi’s vocals for raw power.
V: They’re all very black and blue, these Balkan outings (Црнo и синo, anybody?). This comes across far better live than it does in studio, thanks largely to Kaliopi herself.

21 The Netherlands
B: The cat chasing its tail in the chorus here feels so right for what the song is saying – and we haven’t had a lyric as recursive as “It’s you and me and everybody out there / And I can see that everybody knows / About you and me” since Leha’amin’s “To have a dream that maybe one day / We can find the way / To have a dream” in 2004.
A: You’d never take me for a fan of this kind of thing, but I absolutely adore it. It’s just such a complete package, with music, lyrics and vocals coexisting in perfect, nostalgic harmony.
V: Well hello Mr Banjo Player! He was always going to steal my attention away from Joan, Village People headdress or no. Sweet performance, if a little sharp and shifty-eyed in places.

22 Malta
B: The first line provides quite a good hook into the rest of the song, I suppose.
A: Given the depths of naffness the Maltese usually plumb, this isn’t bad at all. The first time I heard it I thought to myself: I ought to be liking this a lot less than I am. I guess that goes a long way to explaining why it made it out of its semi. That and greasy palms.
V: The performance helps, up to a point. Neither it nor the song take off the way they should – the remix makes it sound a tad murky – and it goes a bit pear-shaped towards the end, but the little dance is nifty, and I love Kurt’s ad-libs (especially the Crystal Hall one in the final).

23 Belarus
B: This is a pretty impressive set of lyrics by Belarusian standards. Nothing that makes you go “ooh!”, but decent enough.
A: Which is more or less what can be said of the song itself. I’ve never heard the original so can’t say how much of a Eurovision compromise it turned out to be, but I can’t imagine it was amazingly more powerful in its original form. It’s an OK piece of music, in much the same way as This Is the Night. Damning with faint praise though that may be.
V: It’s not nearly as personable, however, which is its undoing. Who knew Alex Panayi was on backing here! The Mad Max mike stands are interesting, but everyone’s hair is terrible, and a sideways shuffle never constitutes choreography.

24 Portugal
B: Everything’s here for the full faux-fado, from Saudade and the City to the quintessential floral references. Sweet enough, in its way, and I do like the lines “Mas entre tudo que possas ser na vida / Só quero, meu amor, sejas vida minha”.
A: Far too much echo. The song was only ever going to win people over for what it was rather than reverberating its way into their hearts. The artlessness of Filipa’s vocals successfully masks the more disingenuous aspects of the composition and sells the song for me. Well, almost: I flirt with buying it, but in the end decline politely and move on to where they’re selling the real thing.
V: While it’s satisfying to see the two biggest eurowhores in the competition – Siegel and Babić – falling at the first hurdle, I feel a bit sorry for Filipa here, who puts in an impassioned and vocally very impressive performance. The backing vocalists look like the cast of some South American soap opera.

25 Ukraine
B: Punning titles are always good. Is she really chanting “La la la la la la la la la love” though? I assumed she was just making noise.
A: When you listen to this without Gaitana’s vocals, it’s a bit bereft. She’s a powerhouse and no mistake, and that’s clearly what won the juries over, if not the televoters. The song itself is typical Ukrainian bombast. I admire the economy of penning a song for one competition and then entering it in another.
V: Interesting performance: you can see (or rather hear) exactly why the juries went for it and also precisely why the televoters didn’t. The synthetic brass they laid over the top for the live version still irritates me.

26 Bulgaria
B: It’s brave to pepper an entry like this with lyrics that admit it has no colour and that pain knows no borders.
A: If the universe were defined as the lower reaches of an infinite number of Eastern European semi-final scoreboards from about 2002 onwards, you might reasonably claim that this had a universal sound. And as if that wasn’t enough, we then have to contend with a positively Israeli multitude of “I love yous”. Ugh.
V: Yowzer! We haven’t had an opening salvo go that wide of the mark since Germany in 2005. She can’t keep time either, and looks like your typical 40-something quasi-ho wife of a corrupt nouveau-riche husband from behind the Iron Curtain. So I’m still surprised by how (relatively) well this did for itself, given the kind of song it is.

27 Slovenia
B: This could very well be glorious for all I know, but the only thing I think when I look at these lyrics is how unattractive they make Slovene seem.
A: Given the track record of the composers, this is unexpectedly meh. It takes forever to get to the point, too, repeating itself before it does. The last minute or so makes an attempt at ‘rousing’, but by that point there’s no one left listening.
V: All very heartfelt, I’m sure, but they’re a lot more convinced of its gravity than anyone else is. “Čutim da grem do dna” indeed. Backing vocalist Sandra Feketija puts in a very humdrum aah-aah-aah turn here. There’s far more potential in Ms Boto, who belies her tender age with a strong performance.

28 Croatia
B: I didn’t realise there was such bitterness at the heart of this. Fab!
A: I could slide up and down that guitar all day. This has acoustics, it has strings, it has build and it has the wonderfully smoky voice of Ms Badrić – so why don’t I like it more?
V: Back to black (and blue). I’m not sure “Poslušaj me kad ti kažem sve sam probala” is a fair reflection on the performance that follows here: on the one hand, it has some very effective choreography; on the other, it has some ineffectual fabric being flapped about in the background and a trio of possibly the most oddly attired backing vocalists ever. And it’s all just a bit too dark for its own good.

29 Sweden
B: Very ‘club anthem’ set of lyrics, this. The ‘u-u-u-u-u-up’ bit is a brilliant hook.
A: This is a song that definitely needs its vocals, unless you’re in a leotard. It’s an undeniably modern production of something that nevertheless sounds about 20 years old.
V: Has a Swedish entry ever displayed this level of artistry? If I’d known this was what it was like beforehand, I would have understood why everyone was sure it would win. You really can’t take your eyes off it. Outstanding use of light and shade.

30 Georgia
B: “მოლოდინი დასრულდება” – and so it comes to pass...
A: ...the moment the sweeping intro is superseded by the lameness that is the other two-point-five minutes of the song. It shares this structure with Party for Everybody, incidentally, but is more successful at integrating its ethnic elements into the song proper (inasmuch as the Russians don’t even bother after the first 30 seconds). But calling it a “song proper” is being far too kind to what is, at best, a series of disconnected interludes randomly strung together.
V: I’m sorry, Anri, but no one’s going to believe you’re a womanizer after a performance like that. The tone is all over the place, not helped by the remix ramping up the disco.

31 Turkey
B: This outdoes even the great Enid Blyton for the surfeit of overt entendres.
A: Regardless of the instrumentation, this is up there vying for the title of least Turkish Turkish entry ever. Which is to say it still sounds very Turkish, but it’s just so... different.
V: And as departures go I heartily applaud it: it’s brimming with character, and Mr Bonomo has just the right kind of “who, me?” quality to win you over instantly. He also looks like he’s having a bloody good time!

32 Estonia
B: This is arguably the most Estonian set of lyrics the country’s ever delivered at Eurovision. As I said at the time of Eesti Laul, both it and fellow superfinalist Mina jään speak directly to Estonian sensibilities – and the idea that ‘vaikusel on võim heliseda’ sums up the way the locals think in four simple words. As an anthem it may resound broadly, but its aim is very specific. In that sense, it could well be the most representative song in this year’s contest.
A: I know this is the epitome of Eurovision schmaltz for a lot of people, but it presses all sorts of buttons for me, each and every one of them right. The way it builds, quietly gathering power, is in complete accord with what the lyrics are saying.
V: Marvi Vallaste provides faultless backing vocals here. Ott overeggs it in the semi but tones it down just enough in the final to strike the right balance.

33 Slovakia
B: Hmmm, I wonder if the “God save me” bit is ironic. Christian mettle? Boom tish. Not that I had any idea that’s what he was saying there at the beginning, or indeed that he was saying anything, as opposed to just screaming.
A: This is the third entry in a row penned and performed by the same lad. This one’s all about comfort zones, oddly enough, and sticking to them. There’s not a lot else you can say about it, since it’s very much the kind of thing you either take or leave.
V: And I think I’ll leave it. It’s tuneless enough to begin with without being that out of tune on top of it.

34 Norway
B: Work it, move your body, baby! You better WORK! You better WORK! Still the best bit of the song.
A: This is just as effectively crafted as Popular was last year, I think. Of course, it has little tinkly nods to Tooji’s ethnic origins, making me like it more, and some farty synths I quite like for a change.
V: Hmmm. Let’s just say I’m glad he’s got his looks to rely on. The bridge has zero oomph.

35 Bosnia and Herzegovina
B: We always knew the Balkans were home to some tortured souls at Eurovision, but there’s an unprecedented amount of it this year. Not that I’m complaining when it produces lyrics like “K’o da kradem te od svih samo za sebe / … / I opet sve to prezirem dok se pred tobom branim”.
A: Such a lush, intricate, multi-layered arrangement. Easily one of my favourites of the year. You know you’re onto a winner when the music tells as much of a story as the lyrics do, and with this one all the emotion is in there. Just gorgeous, and so beautifully complimented by Maja’s vocals, which are fragile and yet unequivocal at the same time.
V: But it’s a disappointment live, if I’m honest. The simple blue backdrop is stunning, but I have no idea what she’s come dressed as, or why she gives up all pretence of playing the piano halfway through. Her voice doesn’t have the brittle strength that it has in studio either, and while she’s by no means bad, she doesn’t quite have the presence to make the song carry – not in the way it needs and deserves to, at any rate.

36 Lithuania
B: That screengrab on Diggiloo makes it look like Lithuania’s produced a hybrid John Barrowman clone to sing for them. Which makes “I’m on my knees for you” about right.
A: Every time I listen to this I long for it to explode into something far more discotastic than it ever becomes, and yet I find myself quite liking it all the same. At least it never pretends to be something it’s not, and the boy’s certainly got a voice on him.
V: Swarovski crystals! I knew something had been missing from Eurovision for the last few years. For a dinky wee thing, Mr Montell does a good job of filling the stage. Strong performance, too, vocally, but it’s a little uninvolving on the whole.

37 United Kingdom
B: There’s a lovely, sad, selfless story playing itself out here, heart very much on sleeve. Racked with pain, but full of hope. Melikey.
A: Yet another delightfully expressive piece of music, particularly in isolation. Not that Engelbert’s vocals detract from it; I just prefer it as an instrumental.
V: Sadly, watching this, or more precisely listening to it, I still prefer it that way.

38 France
B: These lyrics tend to run in circles, which is fitting, but they ought to get to the point a lot sooner than they do.
A: None of this really does what I expect it to, even now as I listen to it for the umpteenth time. There are aspects I’d happily extrude – the synthesised whistling, for one – but overall I find myself more impressed by it than I assume I’m going to be. I do like Anggun’s voice.
V: There’s a concept here, but I’m not sure what it is. (None of the televoters did either, obviously.) Anggun looks stunning, and the way the backing makes her vocals sound double-tracked in places is clever. Strange three minutes though.

39 Italy
B: There’s something nonchalantly slinky about this that makes the interweaving of the languages work for me. It’s almost like the English bits are what she’s saying while the Italian bits are what she’s thinking.
A: This is one of only a handful of songs this year that sounds like it existed before and would continue to exist beyond the Eurovision bubble. I love it: smart, sassy and with some really clever touches to the composition.
V: In hindsight, the [brilliant] line “You’re great, but not impressive” sums up this performance. It is great – I love the backing vocals and Nina’s attitude – but for some reason it just never achieves its full potential. Heigh ho.

40 Azerbaijan
B: There’s not a lot to these lyrics, but they say what they have to.
A: The composers have certainly got a good thing going with the Azeris, or vice versa I suppose – presumably on the principle that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And it certainly ain’t broke when it continues to deliver to this level. Running Scared, in all its MOR glory, may have won the whole shebang for them, but this is streaks ahead, and even better than Drip Drop. It bears all the hallmarks of its Swedish origins, despite the ethnic touches, but could just as easily come out of the British scene. In that sense, no happier a marriage will you find in this year’s contest.
V: Is it actually the dress itself that’s changing colour? It’s not very clear. Otherwise the performance (and camerawork) is kept surprisingly simple. The cross-legged man hovering in mid-air is far too distracting with his ethnic wailing when the song sells itself well enough with him turned right down in the mix, but I guess they felt they needed to up the local content for the home crowd.

41 Spain
B: This is all very ouch. Pathetic, in the best sense of the word. It feels quite real, too: the realisation of what you’re throwing away in “Y ahora que te veo marchar / Sé que no te voy a olvidar”.
A: This is a step up from pretty much everything everyone involved has given us at Eurovision. Of course, how much you agree with that statement depends on how willing you are to embrace the melodrama of a ballad as big as this, and I’ll be the first to admit that I was initially very reticent. My main misgiving was how calculating it seemed; and it probably is. But it’s certainly won me over since then. I guess, in the end, I’m just a sucker for someone prostrating themselves.
V: The vocal performance of the contest. Brilliant backing vocals, too. But boy does she look severe.

42 Germany
B: What a contrast back to back with Spain! And yet equally recognisable: they might almost be two takes on the same situation. There could be an awfully hard edge to something like “this ain’t giving up, it’s knowing where to stop”, but it simply rings true.
A: Germany and Azerbaijan have adopted much the same model in their approach to Eurovision in recent years, outsourcing their entries, so it’s no surprise to see them both winning and maintaining an envious string of results. Standing Still is the third very strong entry in a row from the Germans, and easily one of the most radio-friendly of this contest. The vocals work really well with the music – which, oddly enough, is very reminiscent of Running Scared.
V: Roman might be relieved the relationship’s over, but you wouldn’t expect him to be smiling quite that much. This is a neat, contained performance that lets the song speak for itself.

And so to the points...

1 point goes to Italy

2 points go to Moldova

3 points go to the Netherlands

4 points go to Spain

5 points go to Bosnia and Herzegovina

6 points go to Azerbaijan

7 points go to Sweden

8 points go to Germany

10 points go to Denmark

and finally...

12 points go to...


Serbia!


In this Olympic year, a full set of gold-, silver- and bronze-plated wooden spoons are awarded on the losers’ podium of shame to Georgia, Bulgaria and Slovakia, respectively.

2011

In which the impact of the transition from weeknight to weekend was never more obvious and the juries by and large forgot what their remit was. But which nevertheless produced one of the strongest finals in years.

01 Poland
B: A bit limp, these lyrics, even if the Polish makes it look as though you’ve fallen headfirst into a nest of brambles.
A: There are lots of neat things happening in the production here, which I maintain was the first this year to show any sign of having a purpose in life. The vocals seem entrenched in a narrow range of notes at times, but the arrangement is actually quite complex, with some interesting harmonies.
V: Which is all well and good if you can get your levels right on the night. As the first performance in Düsseldorf, it’s uncanny at times how much this looks like it’s being beamed in direct from the Oslo stage. Messy and overly busy, and the camerawork doesn’t help.

02 Norway
B: Haba haba hujaza kibaba! Or not, in this case. Still, I like the message.
A: I also like the minimalism, with musical layers being added in a circumspect kind of way that adds to the whole rather than detracting from any of the other parts. Which is not to say there’s a whole lot to it, but who says there has to be. As a piece of upbeat exhortation with no pretensions beyond putting everyone in a good mood, it’s really effective.
V: Stella could hardly be called a vocal powerhouse. Still, no one expected her to be, and it still sounds good live. There’s no need for the matching outfits when everything else about the performance is so simple and straightforward.

03 Albania
B: “I dab my lips with your morning dew” is representative of the knack the Albanians have for knocking out a generally decent set of English lyrics to match or better their originals. “Nuk ka ngjyrë e nuk ka fjalë” is perhaps being a little self-deprecating, but then it’s hidden away with the bit that reveals it’s a Praise Jeebuz! song, so it’s all good.
A: This isn’t as far removed from the original as a lot of people perhaps hoped it would be, and yet it’s streaks ahead in terms of how effective it is when you strip it of the vocals and see what’s underneath. The only problem is that however atmospheric it may be, the arrangement comes across at times as almost threatening.
V: The performance is certainly in-your-face enough to scare off a significant proportion of the voting audience: powerful doesn’t even begin to cover it. It looks (and sounds) amazing.

04 Armenia
B: You can come up with all the explanations under the sun, honey: you’ll never add depth to anything this shallow. I wonder if they were saying “Let’s try to hold our spirits high” after failing to qualify.
A: The first example of several this year of otherwise surefire qualifiers settling on complacent as an approach and being punished for it. That said, I have more time for it knowing that it didn’t qualify. There are odd flashes that make you think it could (and should) have been a whole lot better – primarily if they’d given it to a more competent performer than Emmy. And spent more than 10 minutes on the lyrics.

V: On this evidence, two years in a row without Armenia in the final could well be a good thing. Emmy’s fine until she actually has to do something other than park her fanny on the oversized fist, and for a moment there at the beginning it all looks like some bizarre Dancing Santa routine. On the plus side, the animated backdrop works a treat.

05 Turkey
B: “Here’s your favourite song on the radio”, in hindsight, probably wasn’t the best line to open this song with, given how much of a pastiche it is. “Driving on with no map to lead me on” lends itself nicely to the performance, too. But as I said with Norway, I appreciate the message at the heart of the thing.
A: Cobbled together though this is from the best bits of a dozen other songs, you’ve got to give them credit for the neatness of touch with which they did it: the production values are exemplary, and the Turkish elements are woven through it in a way that’s both very subtle and highly effective.
V: It starts well enough, but then the lads decide they have to ‘perform’ and it all falls apart. Vocally it’s fine, but they should have realised that’s all they needed to rely on. They should also have realised that Manga came second last year despite the silly robot woman, not because of her: the contortionist is the problem with this performance in microcosm.

06 Serbia
B: “Naša ljubav je zarazna” – as is this! Lyrics that suit the feel of the song perfectly.
A: This is one of very few songs from this contest that I loved from the off. Its brilliant arrangement is as authentic as they come.
V: The rate at which this eats up the lyrics means Nina’s delivery is a bit breathless in places – most of them in the semi – but she looks the part, and is clearly having fun with it, so you tend not to care. And it would be stating the obvious to say the stage looks fabulous.

07 Russia
B: Oh – I thought the second line of the chorus was “I’m running, I’m gunning for you”. I’d have liked it more if it was. One less reason to be impressed.

A: This being Russia, I imagine they tacked on the faux-ethno intro just to get the thing up to 3 minutes. It makes for an atmospheric beginning before the pop banality that ensues. You can certainly see RedOne’s fingerprints all over it, but equally, you can see why it ended up at Eurovision: it’s sub-sub-sub the stuff the likes of Lady Gaga have made a squillion out of. Add to this the fact that Mr Vorobyov and/or his producers believe he has more natural talent than he actually does and voila, you’re left with one pretty unconvincing entry.
V: And then it’s all he can do not to drop the microphone from his quivering hand. The James Dean look is well suited to his artificially inflated ego. Each and every one of his ‘ad libs’ is terrible, twice. The faceless backdrop is inspired.

08 Switzerland
B: Sunny, strum-along-a-sing-song. Thumbs up.
A: Utterly delightful. You can hear every string being plucked, every key being struck. It’s like being wrapped up in a musical bubble you never want to emerge from. Anna’s vocals match it perfectly.
V: Her diction’s a bit odd in places though; she sounds like she’s in need of a speech therapist. And she appears to be wearing her mum’s dress from 1985. But these are mere quibbles: it’s the very definition of charming. The camerawork during the na-na-na bit is great: a kind of slow-mo take on Siren.

09 Georgia
B: Far from the most competent set of lyrics the Georgians have given us, but you get the point. I admire them for daring to include the line “I am lame”.
A: There’s a nice underground feel to the whole thing. The arrangement and vocals seem to be holding themselves back during the verses, waiting to explode into the chorus. Ditching the original singer was the best move they made.

V: Turkey is knocked into a cocked hat before this has even notched up a minute of screen time. It might as well be in Georgian though, for all you can understand the English. Sopho (are they all called that?) has great hair. It’s almost as impressive as her voice, which can’t possibly come out of a frame that petite.

10 Finland
B: “Peter is young, he tries to talk, but no one listens to him.” Perhaps they would if he got off his schoolboy soapbox. [Adopts Catherine Tate Show sketch character voice] I’d give him a backhander. Just one swift backhander, right across his soppy, puppy-eyed, save-the-planet face. And then shove a dictionary in it and tell him to look up ‘twee’.
A: Piano, guitar and strings. What more can a boy ask for? One of the least assuming and most successful compositions of the year.
V: Such boyish charm has our Axel! I admire his principles, but the recycled shirt still looks naff. Which stands in stark contrast to the backdrop – one of the simplest and most effective of the contest. It makes for a rousing opener to the final, and it’s lovely to hear the crowd da-da-dumming along with him for all they’re worth.

11 Malta
B: You don’t even know me, you say that I’m not livin’ right... The Maltese delegation should get “No lesson learned” printed up for themselves on T-shirts: they’d get good use out of them.
A: Glen’s voice and the very mid-’90s theme and production (particularly in the bridge) make this sound like it’s trying to be one of those anonymous club tracks that would have been remixed by Brothers in Rhythm and actually made to sound good. Fab backing vocals.
V: Hair, make-up and wardrobe disaster across the board, plus the choreography’s awful, and it’s all far too dark. But apart from that it’s alright.

12 San Marino
B: I wouldn’t say no to “something so beautiful but hard at the same time” if anyone’s offering. I quite like these lyrics. “Tonight, can we pretend there’s no more time” makes a good hook (or the nearest equivalent to one that this song has) going into the chorus.
A: For some reason I’d been expecting big things of San Marino this year, but when this materialised it patently wasn’t it. Which doesn’t mean it’s not accomplished, or that I dislike it. There’s something slinky and sultry about it, and about Senit, that presses all the right buttons with me.
V: But as Eurovision entries go it’s also completely underwhelming. It doesn’t help that it feels so disjointed, like none of them have actually ever sung or performed it before, or that Senit’s about *that* far off for the entire three minutes.

13 Croatia
B: “Put your hands up” works well in context, but there’s not a lot that’s worth celebrating here. Break a Leg with dits ‘sack full of hoping’ might have been laughable, but given what we got it almost seems like an improvement. I love the way Diggiloo (at the time of writing) credits the lyrics to ‘N/A’!
A: As with many a casting show, the result is ultimately scuppered by the song the winner’s lumbered with. Which in this case is last-in-its-semi stuff from Dora ca 2003.

V: Jacques Houdek might have saved it from total ignominy. The ginormous Daria does what she can, but the performance is both literally and figuratively about distracting people’s attention from the shortcomings in the song itself. The four backing vocalists look like they won some Singing Secretaries competition, and the magician’s a total creep.

14 Iceland
B: Þórunn Erna Clausen really delivers with these lyrics, straddling the divide between bog-standard ballad and a doffing of the hat to the song’s composer and making it seem both effortless and elegant.
A: I really can’t imagine anyone other than Iceland giving us Dixieland at Eurovision. And I wouldn’t want to, given how brilliantly they pull it off.
V: Lovely. They really capture the intimacy of the preview video despite being in an arena that’s about half the size of their country. I could’ve done with more close-ups of the guy on drums and his amazing chiselled features, but hey. The motif in the background manages to be both thematically and ethnically fitting, with a touch of the Norse about it.

15 Hungary
B: “Mit mondhatnál, mit mondhatnék / Elkoptunk rég, szemeinkből nézd, hova tűnt a fény?” I think it got eaten by the Hungarian lyrics, which here seem to be speaking with their mouth full. Kati prises herself out from under the thumb of her man like the would-be diva she clearly believes herself to be.
A: This is well produced, but as dated as the concept behind it. There’s a sense that it would only have taken some minor tweaking for pretty much every element of the composition to sound contemporary. Still, it works. The last minute of the song is one of the best of any this year. In that sense, it’s very much more than the sum of its parts.
V: The lighting, the camerawork, the terrible outfits, the dancers... You’d swear this was from some late ’80s or early ’90s contest. Some weird mash-up of Lausanne meets Dublin ’94. Ms Wolf is the mould from which the hardest-bitten of all drag queens are cast.

16 Portugal
B: It’s an ode to revolution, but works just as well in the context of not qualifying. Win-win.
A: Minus the marching music, this isn’t a million miles from their 2009 entry, and is equally enchanting. Sans vocals, anyway, whose arrangement does what it says on the tin.
V: It’s not a struggle to enjoy this performance for what it is, but it’s not much of a joy either. I like the subtlety of the backdrop.

17 Lithuania
B: Je dis non.
A: Better than their 2008 dirge, but the almost Armenian-sounding woodwind that pops up a couple of times is basically the only interesting thing about it.
V: So she can sing – big woop! What jury in their right mind charged with the task of finding a song with widespread contemporary appeal would pick this as the winner of the semi-final? Still, it’s big and busty, and she does sign language. Just what the song needs.

18 Azerbaijan
B: The play-on-words in the title here is clever in a way that is never reflected in the lyrics themselves. I love the way the word ‘anyway’ has become a vocal comma a la that other favourite of Scandinavian songwriters in particular, ‘just’.
A: This year’s Drip Drop in more ways than one. There’s a clean edge to this that shouts ‘modern production’. Ell and Nikki’s vocals blend nicely, despite being unevenly matched in how good they are. Not the most exciting winner, on the whole, but not undeserved.
V: Looks stunning.

19 Greece
B: You can see why the Greeks went for this when you actually bother to read it.
A: You either like this or you don’t, I think. The aspect of the composition that captures my attention every time is the shift in timing once we hit the key change. From there on in it spirals beautifully to its conclusion.
V: If you’ll forgive the allusion, it’s like waking up with a boner and doing something about it, this performance. That’s the only way I can think to put it. Sleepy-eyed nine-foot-tall wolverine Loukas really ought to have fewer clothes on.

20 Bosnia and Herzegovina
B: I can’t claim to know what Dino’s banging on about here – it all gets a bit quasi-philosophical for me at times – but I do like the lines “We keep on running from certainty / But don’t know where to run from reality”. And the rhythm.
A: In keeping with the lyrics, this is deceptively simple. And yet the fact that it flows as smoothly as it does, deepening and broadening all the time, only goes to show what a proficient piece of music it is. The layers of the arrangement, including that of the vocals, mean you discover something new pretty much every time you listen to it.
V: Somewhere between Putnici and Pokušaj in terms of wackiness, and blessed with the vocals of both. Sparky enough in its own right that it doesn’t need the fireworks.

21 Austria
B: This spends three minutes teetering on a precipice that’s signposted <---Means well - Overeggs it--->. It doesn’t fall off, though.
A: White gospel anthems aren’t usually my bag, but I have a whole heap of time for this. While it doesn’t do anything you wouldn’t expect it to, what it does do it does with consummate professionalism, and actually manages to be rousing. The vocals, across the board, are excellent, and the last minute of the song is one goosebump moment after another.

V: There are few types of music harder to pull off with only a handful of people on stage than this genre, but Nadine & co. do a fine job of it. She looks a bit like Betty Boo, now I come to think of it.

22 The Netherlands
B: This works better than Austria saying much the same thing, and you’ve got to applaud them for doing a decent job of maintaining the sentiment of the Dutch original. Even if “...there are golden gardens / At the sweet end of your trail” sounds like a very dirty euphemism.
A: Supremely Dutch, in a good way. There’s a lot to like about the composition, but there’s no denying it’s a late bloomer: it takes two minutes to reach a hook (the oh-oh-oh bit), and that, of course, is two minutes too late.
V: We’re back on the Oslo stage here, with not much going on in the background, the lights being too low and blue being the default. The vocals are good without being very appealing, and what with the terrible outfits and the random wandering about, it’s all a bit of a mess. In other words: supremely Dutch, in a bad way.

23 Belgium
B: The Belgians are clearly far less abashed than their neighbours, if their ‘tugging each other into bliss’ is anything to go by.
A: The skill involved in this is admirable, and the vocal arrangement’s fantastic. It all seems very ’50s though.
V: Great value, this: it goes on forever. I’d just give the guy in the red trousers his own song. And then take his red trousers off and stick him in something that makes him look good.

24 Slovakia
B: I wonder if Veronika and Daniela walked through the fire to get to Los Angeles.
A: Surely the most stripped-back entry we’ve ever had, and that’s coming straight after a song with no music at all. It’s a very American production, not dissimilar to Running Scared in its approach, but with even less happening. For all that, however, I rather like it. I normally rail against songs that exist within a range of about four notes and employ even fewer instruments in their composition, but somehow this one feels complete.
V: Honey tones are the colours to go for if you’re your semi’s minimalist US number, it seems. The girls are indescribably gorgeous. Their vocals aren’t quite as together as they themselves are, but I was impressed enough to vote for it on the night, and I can still see why now.
[Addendum: Finally, a wind machine! Or have I just not noticed it before?]

25 Ukraine
B: In spite of having nothing to do with it, given it’s an out-and-out ballad, this comes across as little more than a rehash of their last entry if you pay the amount of attention I’d attribute to the average viewer or listener. I’d love it if the white crystals she’s referring to were crystal meth.

A: Not terribly exciting, but no slouch – which is something I’ve come to expect from the country. There are touches to the chorus that are almost medieval, and the bridge is a little soundscape all of its own. Mika’s vocals have the requisite fragility without sacrificing strength.
V: You’ve got to hand it to the Ukrainians: one way or another they know how to keep you watching, even when there’s plenty worth listening to alone. If Ksenya Simonova isn’t Eurovision’s next Riverdance, something’s gone wrong somewhere. Cute (and more than capable) backing vocalist. The “Oh! whatever’s going on?” moment before the performance in the final adds a thrilling beat of uncertainty to a production that’s otherwise run like clockwork.

26 Moldova
B: “Winner, dusk to dawn sinner / Love traded in for lust, it’s emotions I don’t trust” make a great couple of lines. Nice irony in the title, too.
A: Direct comparisons might be lazy shorthand, but this is no Boonika bate doba. It has plenty of individual character – especially alongside some of the year’s more faceless entries – but is playing with a diminished hand. And it puts all its cards on the table well before it’s reached the halfway mark.
V: These three minutes seem to last at least twice that long, but I’m glad this made the final: it would have been somehow diminished without it, despite its failings. The vibrant backdrop is reminiscent of a Very-era Pet Shop Boys video.

27 Sweden
B: There’s something grittily and unashamedly desperate about these lyrics which not only suits the song (and Sweden’s intent in running with it), but also rings true.
A: Nothing new from the Swedes, or indeed Kempe, who have been giving us these entirely disconnected but expertly welded together bits of schlager for years.
V: Worldwide television phenomena are based almost entirely on this kind of thing, so it’s no surprise it made the podium. It gets the annual Sakis Rouvas award for Best Supporting Vocals.

28 Cyprus
B: I love the cheery religious overtones of “Me stavroses, me matoses ki as pethena ya sena”. Quite a mature set of lyrics, really.
A: With the Greeks and Cypriots being the only ones to corner the ethnic market this year, it was obvious who’d come out on top. This composition is more interesting on the whole, but also diluted – yes, electric guitar, I’m looking at you – and hard to get a hold on. It’s not unpleasant to listen to, though, with nicely (necessarily?) measured vocals.

V: The silk-purse industry is clearly flourishing in Cyprus: this is about as good as it was ever going to get. The backdrop seems to depict a field of tethered, gently swaying condoms.

29 Bulgaria
B: This is similar to Albania, what with its anthemic rock pretensions and ‘lest He smite me’ bridge. At times it sounds like garbled English, which means fun times for all making up the lyrics. I’ve already taken to calling it No You’re Not.
A: Competent but hard to love, in that every time I listen to it I want to like it a lot more than I do. Not that I can pinpoint what it should do differently, if anything, to make itself any more integral.
V: It’s like a Bulgarian lesbian sect whose only point of reference in terms of fashion is Vanilla Ninja. Poly does them proud. In the bridge, one of her backing vocalists doesn’t.

30 FYR Macedonia
B: “Ma ništo ne ja razbiram.” What’s to understand?!
A: In its opening bars, this hints at being the poppiest thing FYRoM’s ever given us, barring XXL, and in its way it’s not far off. It doesn’t really deliver on that promise, however, and as uncomplicated as the fun is that it presents us with, it never lives up to its potential. Vlatko’s scratchy vocals complete the picture whilst being entirely unattractive.
V: I’m surprised how very Macedonian this performance is, while a) looking nothing like one in anything but the costumes on the dancers and b) being extremely camp. The backdrop’s phenomenal, and even Vlatko sounds good.

31 Israel
B: I’m not sure anything will bring Dana redemption after this.
A: The only nice thing I can say about Ding Dong is that there’s the seed of a decent song in there somewhere.

V: As if the original studio version wasn’t devoid enough of reasons to like it, they then go and use this one to wow the massed hordes of Europe. Christ almighty! At least the backing vocals are decent by Israeli standards.

32 Slovenia
B: How very uncompromising and unforgiving of you, Ms Keuc. And quite right, too.
A: This is a real slow burner: it just builds and builds and builds. The way the strings punctuate and characterise the opening verse, before being reintroduced at the close alongside the brass to the same effect, is astounding. No one does bombast quite as fabulously at Eurovision as Slovenia.
V: I’m not sure the cherry blossom backdrop works, or the “I’m not a hooker, I’m an empowered woman who simply chooses to dress like one” outfits, but it doesn’t really matter, since this is all about the vocals. And here I wholly concur with the juries. (How could they get it so wrong in the first semi and so right in the second?) Maja would appear to have attended the Close But No Cigar School of English pronunciation among whose alumni Geir Rønning numbers. I’m tempted to say this is the best entry Slovenia has given us.

33 Romania
B: Come on, everybody! Together we can change the world! Eye roll.
A: The Denmark of the East once again produces perfect midweek fodder, as evidenced by its (and indeed Finland and Iceland’s) nosedive in the final. What sets it apart from its Nordic counterparts, of course, is its production, which is workmanlike at best. It delivers, yes, but never more than it has to.
V: If anything needed changing, it was his outfit. And that awful backdrop. The vocals are as solid as a rock – (insert titillating reference to Mr Bryan’s sexcapades here) – if a little underplayed in the final.

34 Estonia
B: There is something surreal, almost dream-like, about these lyrics, but mostly in combination with the music. Apart from that, I can’t think of anything to say about them.
A: There’s a simple reason this didn’t do as well as either Popular or Lipstick: it’s not as good. It’s not bad, either, but just comes across as more generic (unbelievably, when you hold it up against Sweden). It’s better than most of the stuff from the Sven Lõhmus stable of shameless pop though, and perfectly suited to a vocalist like Getter.

V: Savvy and confident performance from Ms Jaani, making it easier to overlook the fact that she’s not much of a singer. But who cares when she’s having this much fun? Not the audience.

35 Belarus
B: I hope they were forced to write this on pain of death.
A: Why would anyone vote for this? No, but really? And yet nine countries did. All of them from Eastern Europe, who should have even less reason to want to be seen to be legitimising such propaganda. I can only assume they were Russian.
V: Truly awful. She could be singing anything, anything else and it would at least just be another cheap, poorly performed and swiftly forgotten Eurovision number; this way the agitprop is completely undermined, which is exactly what it deserves. The pyros towards the end make it look like it’s self-destructing.

36 Latvia
B: What an odd amalgam these lyrics are. They give us decent lines like “Two worlds collide, honest and true / You’re my lullaby, passion for life, my starlit night”, only to anchor the chorus around clunkers like “Stare me with candy eyes, love me with luscious thighs”. Which in itself is classic stuff, but still.
A: This finds its level and sticks to it, so full marks for persistence, if not imagination. Lead singer Emīls has a surprisingly mature (and surprisingly sexy) voice for someone so young.
V: Well, it’s there. The guy on the guitar looks like a young Elvis Costello.

37 Denmark
B: More ‘you can do it’ than Romania’s ‘we can do it’, which as differences go is pretty subtle, but possibly helps to explain why it did so much better.
A: Of course, that has a lot to do with the packaging. New Tomorrow is the more obvious anthem of the two, and more obviously the one that’s going to translate to a Saturday-night audience. Although more palatable than their last entry, it’s just as derivative, doing little in its composition that catches you unawares. But doing it well.

V: Look and learn, Safura – it is possible to run and sing at the same time!

38 Ireland
B: Lyrics that come ready-made for a crash-and-burn that never eventuates. “Sisters, let me tell you how it works” is only one indication of how queer this is.
A: This is probably the most modern entry the Irish have come up with at Eurovision since joining in 1965. It’s clever in ways that only something aiming at commercial appeal needs to be, with some great hooks, and does a good job of disguising Jedward’s vocal limitations. Having said all that, it left me cold on first listening, which might explain why it didn’t do quite as well as expected.
V: Visually, this is the most expansive and arguably the most impressive performance of the entire contest. Everything comes together for Ireland here in a way that it rarely has before at ESC, even if the vocals are no great shakes.

39 France
B: So which is it: “Cantu per a vittoria” or “mi lamentu”?* I’m glad to see that the pomposity and ultimate futility of the composition are reflected in the lyrics, which are riddled with hopelessness.
A: However genuinely gifted our Amaury may be, this is little more than marching music for the masses, and could be the first single off the back of a Susan Boyle-style Wherever’s Got Talent triumph (or indeed second place). An impeccably orchestrated one, but let’s be honest, there’s only so far that will get you.
V: *And from this performance it’s hard to tell. I’m not sure who’s at fault here, but it all goes a bit tits-up for France, rendering Amaury’s mid-song “look at me, aren’t I special” wander away from the microphone redundant.

40 Italy
B: “Se mi fermo un attimo, io non so più chi sei / ... / But someone hit me and I fell into your heart, my dear” is characteristic of the almost filmic narrative that unfolds here. I love the way the whole thing ends on the repetition of one simple word that says so much.
A: From the interaction of the instruments to the melding of the music and vocals, this is glorious; that goes without saying. But where’s the contemporary appeal?
V: I’m still amazed that Raphael came within a few douzes of victory without connecting with the camera for a single moment: he’s no Michael Bublé. He can sing, of course, and that’s what sells it. The last note is phenomenal.

41 United Kingdom
B: Quite clever, really. The lyrics work on three levels: the relationship gone astray; the boyband reunited for one last shot at glory; and the UK picking itself up and pulling itself together after last year’s disastrous showing.
A: You know, this is a classic example of the inverse ratio between how empty a song can be and how huge it can come across. It’s all synths and percussion, leaving almost all of the colour to be added by the vocals. Blue still sound good though, so that’s alright.
V: Lee – you are the weakest link. Goodbye. The decision to turn the first chorus into an early bridge is odd, four of them is enough without the LEDs and it isn’t as punchy as it needs to be, but it still holds its own, and is without doubt the strongest British entry as an overall package in a very long time.

42 Germany
B: I’m still trying to figure out if this song is about misogynistic violence towards prostitutes. Whatever: it’s a brilliant departure from the Eurovision norm. “Can’t help it if you like it ’cause I won’t be here tomorrow / No one ever told you that you wouldn’t be rejected” is one of my favourite pairs of lines in the history of music.
A: Shifting, seedy, sinister... There are all sorts of undertones to this, far and away the most original and non-conformist of the year’s compositions. It makes no concessions whatsoever.
V: Best home entry since Turkey 2004, and possibly ever. They clearly kept all of the Big 5’s graphics and lighting budget (and imagination) for themselves, and who can blame them. Lena getting her hes and shes mixed up in the lyrics only makes the narrative more intriguing.

43 Spain
B: “Y aunque sé bien que... me caeré / Sé que... he disfrutao de todo lo bailao.” That’s nice for her, isn’t it, as consolation goes.
A: Elements of the composition make this sound like the theme tune to Monarch of the Glen. And that’s all I have to say about it.
V: The backdrop gives this a cheap cruise-liner feel which is both utterly shit and utterly spot-on. Vocally surprisingly solid (given the thing’s still being helmed by tousled temptress Lucía) but visually lame, the performance harks back to the cheesy choreography of the Operación Triunfo days. But let’s face it, that’s essentially what their national final was again this year. Just without much of the triunfo.

And so to the points...

1 point goes to Austria

2 points go to Serbia

3 points go to Switzerland

4 points go to Ireland

5 points go to Azerbaijan

6 points go to Georgia

7 points go to Italy

8 points go to Bosnia and Herzegovina

10 points go to Germany

and finally...


12 points go to...


Slovenia!


The wooden spoon goes to Belarus, with an honourable mention for Croatia.

2010

A lacklustre year musically, but one which reinforces that: 1) however good a job the 50/50 voting does of jettisoning the dross at the semi stage, the draw in the final still plays a huge part in a song’s chances of success, relative or otherwise; and 2) performances are as capable as ever of lifting or sinking a song’s chances, however good they are to begin with.

01 Moldova
B: Unbending, if clumsy, these lyrics.

A: Which belie the upbeat way they’re encased, to some extent. This is not an entry to dispel the idea that Eastern Europe is at least 20 years behind the Western world: it sounds like something Guru Josh would have released as an unsuccessful follow-up to Infinity. There’s very little that’s intrinsically attractive about it, bar the harmonies.
V: Blue eyeshadow was a good idea in the ’70s, and it’s the only thing from another era about this stage act that still more or less works. It goes without saying that they “have no progressive future” when they’re dressed like that. The vocals are fine but nevertheless sound rather flat.

02 Russia
B: I like the fact that this just repeats itself over and over, in much the same way as the tormented thoughts that bounce around your brain in such situations. The “What are you doing, man?” interlude anchors the melodrama in a moment of reality before it spins off again in its whirlwind of emotion. Not that they probably thought about it in that much depth. Mind you, the best parodies are those that are the least distinguishable from the original.
A: Lush vocal and instrumental arrangement here, which is only something you’ll appreciate if you can surmount the sheer oddity that is the song and its purpose in life. There’s nevertheless something authentic about it, and it has one of the best final minutes of any entry this year.
V: Sounds great. If only they’d made more of the ‘photo’.

03 Estonia
B: Unlikely anthem. Largely autobiographical, too, I’d wager.

A: What a glorious oddity. It’s a bit of a cacophany in the studio, and you can understand why most people would just be perplexed by it, but you’ve got to admire its integrity. The fact that it is what it is and does what it does without any concession to the medium it’s being broadcast in can only be a good thing for the contest, whether or not you actually like the song.
V: Very much a performance song, this: it transforms on the stage in a way you never expect it to. But whereas they got it spot on in Eesti Laul, here they overegg it – probably from having gone through the motions so many times – and overact their socks off. Incidentally, I was stood next to Robin in the post office the other day. He looked like Flat Stanley with yellow hair: two metres tall and half an inch thick.

04 Slovakia
B: I’m not sure I get what this is all about. I’d be tempted to suggest an environmental message, given all the greenery, and the oddment in the music that is the little porpoise squee post-middle eight, but by then it’s gone all ‘haleluja’ on us. So is it a Garden of Eden thing? Kristina herself admits “Na tráve ležím a snívam / O čom sama neviem” though, so it probably doesn’t warrant a furrowed brow.

A: I once described this as “the song this year most likely to win the award for forgetting to actually be one”. Which is possibly a little harsh, but I stand by it. You can see where it’s going, and why it wants to go there, and what it wants to achieve in getting there, but it never does. Its minimalism is effective for what it’s saying as a song, which is why I have more time for it than some other 2010 entries, but it remains little more than some synths and percussion barely held together by a vocal arrangement of which you’ve heard everything you’re going to within the first few bars.
V: Remarkably consistent vocals from Kristina, considering she’s not a particularly good singer. The routine patently wants to be more effective than it is, but I don’t know who to attribute the blame to. The stage is rather dark again, which doesn’t help.

05 Finland
B: This one’s a bit of a head-scratcher, too, but showcases Finnish in all its agglutinative glory. Who else would or could give us lines like “Sadetta ja myrskysäätä ylle kaupungin / Reikähousupelimannille pennin lantin”? (The latter of which is the first indication lyrically of the year’s multidisciplinary datedness.) The entire fourth verse – “Mitä minä laulan kun… / Mietin miksi aina uutta laulua mä teen” – could be a scene lifted wholesale from the deflated haze of non-qualification.
A: There’s something judderingly twee and off-putting about this song, not helped by the fact that it’s being sung in one of the least attractive languages on offer in the contest. I’m not qualified to question its Finnish folk credentials – there would be very little point in doing so in any case – and I’ll happily admit that it does make me want to clap along every time I hear it, but that pull is only as strong as the desire to simultaneously punch the song in the face.
V: It’s like finding yourself in the midst of some bizarre country wedding. I’m glad they drafted in the backing vocalists-cum-dancers. They all look and sound like they’re having fun, but I’m not convinced many of those watching would have been doing anything other than shaking their heads and frowning.

06 Latvia
B: “What for are we losing? / Only Mr God knows why.”
A: This is mesmerising musically, to such an extent that even the vocals (or at least the lyrics) tend to pass you by. I’m particularly enamoured of the way the accordion here is used so completely differently to the jolly outing it’s taken on in Työlki ellää.
V: Mr God’s phone isn’t the only thing that’s off the charts here, and the explanation is entirely mundane. By rights it should be a triumph, but we all know it’s not, and we all know why: Aisha can’t sing for toffee. You might argue that this is in keeping with the naivety of the lyrics – which she milks for all it’s worth in her performance – but if that were the case, why’s the studio version so polished?

07 Serbia
B: The assertion “Ljubiš me k’o balavica” implies at least two interesting things about Milan Stanković: that out of context, at least, he should be kissing a boy when saying it (why else make the distinction?); and that he’s kissed enough girls to be able to make the comparison in the first place. One of these seems less likely to me than the other. Even if it is just a case of personification.
A: I never thought farty synths would come as such a welcome change. Every Eurovision of late has had this kind of song, destined to finish mid-table in the final because its feelgood factor only extends to selected households beyond the Alps. Accomplished in its genre, but rather limited in scope.
V: You can dress this up any way you want, he’s still off-key. Not that it really matters: it’s that kind of song. It’s also the first one to make (or be granted) full use of the possibilities of the stage and lighting, and would’ve caught the audience’s attention for that alone – never mind the queer theatre playing out on stage.

08 Bosnia and Herzegovina
B: Given the rocky nature of the relationship at the heart of these lyrics, which are really rather good and much more multi-layered than they initially appear, there’s a remarkably subtle shift in tone between the studio version and live performance which changes the balance of the thing entirely: “Say just one more word” becomes “Say another word”, and suddenly Vukašin goes from being the hopeful but resigned figure of the original who will back down on the say-so of his ‘better side’ to a more forceful presence saying “we can make this work, but drop the attitude, or I’m gone”. I have no idea whether this was Dino Šaran’s intention in changing the words, but I’d like to think so.*
A: There’s stuff to like here if you pick it to pieces and sift through them, but overall it’s less than the sum of its parts. I think its biggest problem is that for a song called Thunder and Lightning it’s surprisingly backwards in coming forwards, even with the makeover. Great ending though.
V: *Since it fits the harder, more together and less compromising edge the song brandishes on stage. This is the first and possibly only true contender for the 2010 Silk Purse/Sow’s Ear award, with some very attractive backing vocals (and vocalists) and effective lighting. I was happy to see Vukašin ditch his original stance there at the end, where all through the rehearsals it looked like he was itching to pick his nose.

09 Poland
B: “Morał z tego taki jest że / Nie spodobał się rycerz jej” – hardly a moral, more a statement of the bleeding obvious, and one which underscores the slight creepiness of the song at that. I don’t think we’ll be seeing The Legend of Peacock Feather in the Little Golden Book series any time soon: it’s aiming for fairytale, and more or less gets there, but it’s grimmer than Grimm.
A: When it’s all medieval chanting and women wailing, this is great. There are also some lovely individual moments of strings, woodwind and acoustics. But Poland should have learnt from Time to Party that awkward changes in pace mid-song don’t work for them, especially when they’re structured around a largely tuneless mess they throw everything at to distract your attention from. Under any other circumstances a Eurovision entry with five key changes – count ’em! – should see us wetting ourselves, but no.
V: How... mysterious this all is. Our lead looks lush, the outfits are gorgeous and the whole thing’s a vocal triumph. But then the direction, both literally and metaphorically, gets very strange and you don’t really know what you’re meant to do with it. I love the way Marcin screams and jumps up and down in the green room afterwards like a kid who’s had too much sugar.

10 Belgium
B: A set of lyrics this indulgent should irritate me, but the message is too honest and artlessly presented for me to take against it. It also surprises that something this egocentric is so accessible, as summed up in the line “There’s so much more to life”.
A: There’s an interesting parallel thing happening between this and the entry that follows it, in that essentially they’re both about the performer being self-important, and yet they never overlap. Malta’s take on it is all big strings and swirling orchestra; Belgium’s is him and his guitar: much more subdued and therefore much more palatable. And none the less accomplished for it, with beautiful acoustic and string lines that complete each other. Even the Walking in Memphis bit feels right in context.
V: The gentle orange glow suits this perfectly. Tom seems sweet and genuine; there isn’t a hint of conceit about the whole performance. The song sounds great, so it winning its semi comes as no surprise. The patented Olsen Giggle in the final is lovely.

11 Malta
B: It’s interesting (or perhaps hypocritical on my part) that I have less time for the more obvious anthem when it follows on the heels of the Belgian entry. And I think it’s because My Dream isn’t couched in the same personal terms, ironically. The intimacy which draws you in to Me and My Guitar is missing here, and the result is just meh.
A: Meh with the requisite symphonic pretensions.
V: Meh with a seagull. That said, I was sure Thea had sung this into the final: she’s note-perfect, and does this endearing little thing whenever the opportunity presents itself of squinting her eyes and giving a little smile at the end of a line. Even the pyrotechnics are effective for being so understated.

12 Albania
B: Two years in a row of mid-to-low-table results with made-to-measure English-language pop might see them change their tune on the “Don’t wanna ever go back / Never ever go back” front. (Unless that’s the point they’re making and they have no greater ambition than to keep qualifying and coming 16th in the final.)
A: Within its opening 30 seconds, this has all the hallmarks of something that should be really annoying for slavishly following the Europop rule book, and since it isn’t all that astounding an example of it, it should fall a lot shorter than it does. But there’s something about Albania doing this kind of thing, for whatever reason, that makes it work.
V: I don’t know how much it cost them to ship this new line-up of The Rounder Girls in from New York, but they’re worth every cent: best backing vocals of the contest (and almost the only ones heard in the final until they adjust the sound mix). Ms Pasha is more dependable vocally than her hairstyle is aesthetically, and sells the song with ease.

13 Greece
B: Politics! I wonder if “Plirosa oso hrostusa ke ta dhanika” falls into the category of ‘dream’ or ‘nightmare’. Probably both.
A: Everything I said about Serbia applies to this except ‘welcome change’ and ‘accomplished’, and even then they were only relative terms. There’s an undeniable appeal to this for what it is, in the chorus at least, but there’s next to nothing to it.
V: This is that amazing kind of camp you only achieve when trying to prove how macho you are, but (and?) makes sense pretty much immediately. Giorgos at times looks like he’d rather be anywhere else than on stage. The singing in Greek here is less of an issue than singing in Serbian, simply because of what the song’s saying.

14 Portugal
B: There’s both a lightness of touch and a complexity to these lyrics that offset the (almost literal) hand-wringing of lines like “Gastámos as mãos / Tanto as apertámos”. It’s fairly straightforward as wretched ballads go, but it has some pertinent things to say about relationships.
A: Even without the language giving it away, you’d be able to pinpoint this as the Portuguese entry without much difficulty. I’m not sure the literally plodding opening is a good idea when you’re confronted with Filipa’s vocal gymnastics – if they’re accomplished enough to be called that – in the opening bars. The way the strings carry so much of the song should see me doing cartwheels, but perhaps for the first time ever I don’t find them very attractive. The whole thing’s all too easy to overlook.

V: Funny how a smile, a pretty dress and some camera savvy can save you, isn’t it. The fact that it’s so pink and fluffy tends to draw your attention from the foibles of the song itself.

15 FYR Macedonia
B: “Studen kamen ti do mene si” certainly tops ‘ball and chain’ as a put-down!
A: This is another solid and unassuming slice of pop-rock from the Macedonians which was always going to go pfffft on the scoreboard rather than set it alight. The rap works better than you might reasonably expect it to. Neither genre though is one with a good track record at Eurovision, and this would have to have pulled off a major coup to change that.
V: Which it’s obvious within moments of this performance they were never going to. Vocally it’s great, but the choreography (which at times seems to wonder what it’s doing) and the poleless pole dancers just make the whole thing seem sleazy.

16 Belarus
B: The imagery here is rather nice as songs of its ilk go, although the third line of the chorus is crying out to be “I believe our wings will open up”. It makes a nice counterpoint to their 2009 entry (“…thinking I would never fly / Then you looked and saw my wings…”); if only it showed the same grasp of language.
A: I heartfully wait for this to do something to surprise me, each and every time, but it never does. Which is not to say it’s not nice in its way, but it plucks at my strings about as authentically as it does its own: given what it’s pretending to be, the fact that so much of it is synthetic is unforgivable. If fitting.
V: Is Robert Wells in cahoots with the dictatorship, or just the Russian composer? Awful accents, but that comes with the territory. And fair dos to them: they get as close here to the proper pronunciation of ‘imagine’ as they’re ever likely to. If anyone had had any sense, or for that matter any say, they should have given the whole song to the Armenian one, since even when the five of them are at their best, they’re still not brilliant. But the wings thing works well enough, and could have been a whole lot tackier. And the stage looks lovely.

17 Iceland
B: These lyrics could have been a lot more perfunctory than they are. I rather like them. The chorus is a bit lazy.
A: As well as she intends, there’s little Hera Björk can do to lift this, the (very) poor cousin of This Is My Life. It’s many times better than the original, needless to say, but even the chorus sounds like it’s apologising for its own shortcomings: the plinkety-plonk of the piano seems to be saying “I’m doing my best here, but it really doesn’t get any better than this”.
V: This isn’t just diva disco: it’s gay diva disco with schlager stylings and the Scandinavian touch, right down to the choreography and the arrangement (and strength) of the backing vocals. Closing the semi, looking and sounding as solid as it does and getting that level of support from the crowd, it was a shoe-in for the final. Equally, once it got there, it was always going to come down to context, and stuck in the middle with It’s All About You for company, it was never likely to amount to much.

18 Lithuania
B: Now this is clever: superficially scathing and self-pitying, but ultimately tongue-in-cheek and self-deprecating, and bathetic for all the right reasons. For anyone who still doesn’t get it, the clue’s in the title.
A: No musical slouch, this: fun and brainless on the surface, poking fun at times, but underneath there’s a smart and effective arrangement.
V: They’re playing on much more than just words here. I love the backdrop. Uniformly good vocals, and I still think the routine works, although it does get a bit busy in the second verse.

19 Armenia
B: Eva’s mother must have been a barrel of laughs, what with all the embittered pontificating. “Mum, I’m hungry!” “Silence, child! Our world is cruel and wild. To make your way through cold and heat, love is all that you need… In the meantime, here: have an apricot.” It’s a slightly bemusing concept, even for an ode to the motherland – the ultimate diaspora song, really, given who it’s being sung by – but that also makes it interesting. I love the line “I’ve got an avatar of my love to keep me warm”.
A: Now this is a treat and a half if, like me, some acoustics, strings and percussion will do you. It soon retreats behind MOR ethnopop lines, and not coincidentally sounds exactly like Armenia’s debut entry, but at the same time it’s more all-encompassing than some of the stuff they’ve given us so far.
V: There’s way too much going on here: as if two metres of Angelina Jolyerevan and her layers of make-up weren’t enough, we have to contend with an old guy smoking a super-sized cigar, a fireworks display, a bubbling water feature, a guy dancing around holding an urn and a fortune cookie that erupts into a cherry blossom tree. At least the backing vocals are good.

20 Israel
B: It’s clear from the translation on Diggiloo that the poetry of these lyrics doesn’t, well... translate. There are some very distinct concepts that just seem a bit odd in English, although I’m sure it sounds magical in Hebrew. The bridge is very powerful for being less flowery in its honesty.
A: From the off, this has to work hard not to come across as overblown, and it’s only really Harel’s measured delivery of the vocals for the first couple of minutes that rein in the excesses it otherwise threatens to shower us with. And indeed I could do without the shouty ending, since there’s enough genuine emotion on display elsewhere. The orchestral arrangement, as orchestral arrangements tend to be, is captivating.
V: It looks like you could fry eggs on Harel’s forehead under those lights, by which he’s mercilessly outshone as he overreaches himself – twice – in his big moment.

21 Denmark
B: “Da da-da da da da-daaaa-da / Da da-da da da da daaaa / Da-da da da da da daaaa-da / Da da da da-da daaaa da.”
A: The blatant ‘referencing’ this does (not to mention the rather charmless duo fronting it) means I should turn my nose up at it, but you can’t deny that it succeeds at what it’s trying to do. It’s schlager at its most calculating and effective, and therefore least appealing.
V: Plod, plod, plod. The direction’s the best thing about this. Could two performers be any more off-putting? I don’t think we see either of them blink. I keep urging N’evergreen’s glass eye to pop out at some point as a metaphor for the fact that it doesn’t really look like he wants to be there and is just going through the motions, literally and vocally. It all gets very shouty towards the end in the final.

22 Switzerland
B: As if it wasn’t gay enough basically calling a song Golden Shower, it then drips with ‘secrets communs’ and ‘regards échangés’. Very romantic though, in every sense of the word.
A: If this was sung by a woman, or by a man who didn’t sound like one, I’m sure I’d find it far less annoying. There’s something about Mr von der Heide’s voice that simply makes me not want to listen to all three minutes of it, despite the song holding its own. The triangular balalayka thing is a nifty inclusion.
V: Albeit one that got them nowhere with the audience it was presumably meant to speak to. Because this is all just so utterly Swiss. The hair and fashion are from another era, and so’s the song. I don’t really get why the backing vocalists are there, since Michael sings over the top of them virtually every opportunity he gets. They only come into their own at the end.

23 Sweden
B: Load of bollocks, these lyrics. They’re aiming for deep and meaningful, but are very much in the shallow end. The only point at which they come close to doing what they set out to is in the middle, with lines like “I don’t wanna win, I don’t wanna lose / I don’t wanna play, I just wanna remember / …my name”.
A: Each time I listen to this I like it more – there’s certainly a lot to admire in the ingenuousness of its composition. But sometimes you just have to go with first impressions, and mine were that it was both a little bit dull and a little bit irritating.
V: Still, it deserved a place in the final ahead of at least a couple of other songs here on the strength of this performance, if nothing else. Red and black phasing to white makes a great colour scheme. Why do so many of the teenage girls this year look twice or three times their age?

24 Azerbaijan
B: In the pre-contest conviction among many that the Azeris were a shoe-in for victory, people were quick to discount Drip Drop as being deserving of just about anything, and yet lyrically at least it’s an accurate depiction of a relationship that’s falling apart. One line that’s been the subject of particular derision – “You smell like lipstick again” – strikes me as being very believable as reactions to the situation go. The bridge resonates, too.
A: Without doubt the entry trying hardest this year to sound like something you might actually hear being produced in 2010, but for all that – or possibly because of it – it’s a little underwhelming. It also suffers in its final 30 seconds from having to adhere to the three-minute rule, feeling cramped and awkward. Not in a way that detracts from how obviously well produced it is, mind.
V: Eurgh, that glove. The rest of it’s alright, although Safura’s vocals are tested by the routine as much as her balance is on that staircase, and the ending’s a bit of a mess, so it’s nice to see her smile finally. Their choice to soften the vocals on the ‘drip drop’ bit is an interesting one. The backing vocalists look like they were left over from a Spanish entry ca 1989.

25 Ukraine
B: This has come in for a fair bit of stick of its own, rather unfairly if you ask me. Alright, it doesn’t read like something a native speaker would pen, and lines like “Must you go on killing / Just to pass the time” jar, but the message is pertinent.
A: As much as this makes me roll my eyes, I have more time for it and the way Alyosha delivers it than the drowsy approach taken by Anna Bergendahl. Social conscience with loads of reverb: by no means a favourite, neither this year nor among Ukraine’s body of work at the contest, but I have a respect for it I doubt will shift.
V: Alyosha might write her own songs, but does she also run up her own clothes, or was her outfit cobbled together from whatever was left of the Ukrainian purse strings? It’s an unwanted distraction in what is otherwise a powerhouse performance – one that gets even better between semi and final – which looks amazing.

26 The Netherlands
B: If only the line in the second verse had remained “Of kwam het uit een café in zo’n straatje, we waren in Leningrad” the song would have been just as successfully carbon-dated by its lyrics as it is by its music.
A: Who would ever have thought, given the pedigree of the men involved and the similarities in the selection process, that the Dutch entry would end up being so much better than the British one? Not that that’s much of a yardstick. Why the TROS board thought this would be a good idea remains a mystery: it’s wrong in just about every respect. And yet there’s something about it that raises a smile, however grudging; “het gaat niet uit m’n kop” indeed. I was hoping it would qualify and then be drawn first ahead of Spain for the full 1973 effect.

V: Colourful, and Sieneke is surprisingly strong. But this performance, and by extension the entry as a whole, is summed up by the look on the face of the guy playing the clockwork drummer on the street organ. I hope this doesn’t prove to be the highlight of his career in light entertainment.

27 Romania
B: Tut @ fire/desire/higher, although “If we get together now, we’ll burn this place down” is the perfect lead-in to the chorus.
A: This is bombastic in a way that has become something of a trademark with Romanian entries, and is all the better for it, given the rest of the field. It may not be very challenging, but it’s solid, it’s immediate, it has plenty of hooks and it’s playing to an audience from Iceland to Israel.
V: Paula’s semi-final hair and make-up are a TV disaster: it looks like she just got out of bed. Her vocals, needless to say, suggest otherwise, as she nails the high notes. Together, she and Ovi (who proves to be the first of two Norwegians this year to take an interesting approach to their English) give a professional if rather static performance that’s more cohesive vocally in the final.

28 Slovenia
B: Well, it makes a whole lot more sense when you know what they’re on about.
A:k.a. the song that came second-last in the Yugoslav final in 1988. How it managed to win the Slovenian selection so overwhelmingly boggles the mind, although I suppose it has a certain charm. A bit like the Netherlands, it’s easy to sing along to because it repeats the same handful of notes over and over again, especially in the chorus. I like to strip it of its rock trappings and imagine it all in terms of Y así polka fabulousness.
V: Credit where it’s due: as wrong as this is on so many levels, it’s right on the rest.

29 Ireland
B: Without doubt the least palatable of the 2010 anthems: any set of lyrics that paints the performer as such a self-righteous saviour is going to get my back up.
A: It’s a bit churlish in Eurovision of all things to criticise songs for lack of originality, but come on, we’ve heard this kind of thing a hundred times before: you can’t help but line it up in your head against all the other anthems that sound exactly like this. The drummy bit at the start of each chorus is a mistake, adding to the excess of heralding.
V: Purple and orange never look good together, and neither does the mouldy cheese backdrop, although it seems somehow appropriate. Niamh looks like she’s strapped onto a board, and is not nearly as convincing vocally as anyone might have expected her to be: from the key change to the last note she’s as flat as a tack in the semi, and doesn’t quite get the big last note either time. The whole thing comes across as a pale imitation of what Ireland would have done much better about 15 years ago.

30 Bulgaria
B: More of a ballad than an anthem, but in any case it has the advantage over It’s For You immediately by being “Ljubovta ti go dokazva” rather than “My love proves it”. And for being so understated, given what it’s saying.
A: This builds superbly, and by the time the beat comes in you’re convinced it should be the best example of trashy pop of its kind you’ve ever heard. Then it forgets to have a chorus.
V: Miro could have gotten around this by using it as an excuse to invoke some audience participation, getting everyone to sing along to his challenging lyrics, but I suspect he was more concerned about his spray tan (when he should, evidently, have been concerned about his hideous hairdo and Elvis outfit). None of the oomph of the strings is lost in the performance, thankfully. The fact that the English verse is given a completely different vocal arrangement is a boon.

31 Cyprus
B: “I hope someday you’ll spot me in the crowd / Smile and say you miss me” is lovely for being delivered without a shred of bitterness. You’d have to hope most people have been lucky enough at some point to identify with the ‘make me immortal with a kiss’ thing.
A: Those backing vocals in the first verse thrust us back into the 1970s with aplomb, offsetting the more contemporary boyband sound of Mr Lilygreen’s delivery. But the whole thing, right down to the sentiment, is a throwback, so the vocal arrangement is just right. (And of course it also means that it fits in perfectly among the rest of the 2010 field.) The chorus does everything it can to persuade you to remain interested, and more or less does. Somehow the overall effect is to give the song a genuine emotional tug that most of its rivals lack.
V: Delightfully homespun. You just want it to do well, don’t you?

32 Croatia
B: Ouch: this has the honest precision of a self-inflicted paper cut. It’s pathetic, too, but in a good way, since ‘na licu mome piše izdaja’. The whole third verse – “Zadnjim snagama sad stojim tu pred tobom / Dušu razdiru mi bure nemira / Teže mi je riješit ovu bol sa sobom / Jer ti si prevaren a mene ubija” is a torturous triumph.
A: This pushes more of my ballad buttons than anything else on offer this year, but it’s quite clearly Molitva-lite. More modern in its approach, though, and neatly self-contained, which I appreciate.
V: The new one’s an effective anchor for Neda and Pamela, who tend to let their excitement run away with them at times, but in harmony they sound great. Pity about the croaky bit. A very pretty performance, and there’s another modern touch in the choreography.

33 Georgia
B: While this is probably the most accessible of the anthems on offer this year (albeit again without the personal touch of the Belgian entry), I’ve found myself wondering whether it isn’t a metaphor for the Georgian struggle for self-assertion in the face of Russia’s grandstanding. But then it was written by a bunch of Norwegians, so probably not.
A: This is far more attractive a prospect than Peace Will Come, precisely because it’s not being layered on with a trowel. Despite the standard approach, there’s a welcome contemporary edge to this that sets it apart from all of the other anthems being rolled out in Oslo.
V: Waaaaaagh, not the Eurovision wink! This is an engrossing piece of theatre otherwise, with sparkling vocals from one and all.

34 Turkey
B: Quite clever in the sense that you can interpret it just about any way you want, making it a perfect Song for Europe. Or at least Western Europe, when you consider who the majority of countries were who didn’t give it any points.
A: It’s For Real and Deli with the excesses – and let’s be honest, much of the character – stripped back to produce something designed to appeal to a much broader swathe of Europe than most Turkish entries do. And as contrived as it inevitably comes across, it still works; it just feels a little flat and lifeless in places when it should be anything but either.
V: They could be playing on a completely different stage. The lighting is just what the song needs/an epileptic’s nightmare [delete as appropriate], and the song itself sounds huge. Welding Woman and her robot antics are a bit pointless, however: the way her helmet falls off in the semi says it all.

35 Spain
B: Piles and piles of words, as is so often the case with the Romance languages. There’s a lovely rhythm to them in the verses. The way the ultimatum is delivered in the lines “En tus manos tienes la occasion / Hoy decides si quererme o romperme el corazón” is great.
A: This is another of the year’s many entries that transport us, unblinking and unbidden, to a bygone era. It’s rather good in its way, but with limited appeal both generally and in itself: beyond the first minute or so, there’s little to hold the attention bar the way the vocals spiral out of control.
V: Which indeed they do, both times, although Daniel is a consummate professional throughout The Incident. Indeed, no one even seems to notice there’s a dude in a beanie on stage with them. It makes the sudden appearance of the backing vocalist all the more exciting, especially during take two.

36 Norway
B: Although this does what it says on the tin, the effect is as dim and unreachable as the sunset behind that mountain somewhere.
A: Basically the Irish entry without the associations to the Titanic soundtrack. It does nothing you haven’t heard before, takes forever to even do it, and then doesn’t do it any better.
V: Didrik looks pretty, but he lets the occasion get to him to such an extent that what little the song has to recommend it is lost beneath his nerves. It was bound to be warmly received in the Telenor arena, but it’s honestly one of the worst host entries in the contest in a long, long time. And what’s with his diction? If it were any more clipped it would be circumcised.

37 United Kingdom
B: “I can feel it coming together / … / There’s nothing left to do now / … / And we can let the future write itself” and “Anything is possible to do” (and the sheer clunkiness of the latter) are so ironically appropriate they could have discarded the rest of the lyrics and left it at that.
A: Remember when we thought the demo version trotted out on Your Country Needs You was lame? This is sub-Jason Donovan B-side, and that’s saying something. It could, and should, have been so much better; instead, shorn of Matt Aitken’s talents – without doubt the true songwriter in SAW – it’s the worst British entry in decades.
V: Ikea has become so huge it gets its own entry in Eurovision. Josh is charmingly feckless and makes a decent fist of it on the whole, but the backing vocalists hit as big of a bum note at the end as the lad himself does.

38 France
B: “Prends-moi par le côté... / La la, ça va chauffer, je sens le truc monter” is worth a titter or two. Mmm!
A: I originally had this down as “probably the worst song Eurovision has heard since Celebrate”, but the competition for that title with That Sounds Good to Me makes it too close to call. At least Allez ola olé never gets ideas above its station or claims to be anything it’s not. But you’ve still heard all you’re ever going to within the first 30 seconds.

V: It’s like Verka, but not nearly as entertaining. Great colour scheme and lighting. The shirtless backing vocalist should have been given an on-screen credit (and been centre-screen a whole lot more!). Does Jesse actually sing at all?

39 Germany
B: Very neat, mixing the scientific references (which make very good lyrics in their own right: “Like a satellite, I’m in orbit all the way around you” and “…you got me / A force more powerful than gravity / It’s physics, there’s no escape”) with the down-to-earth stuff like blue undies and painting toenails.
A: Mainstream radio’s bread and butter, this. Given it’s Lena’s vocals and performance that sell the song, it’s refreshing to hear the song denuded of them and realise there’s a brilliant piece of music beneath it all that has just as much character of its own. I could listen to the instrumental version on a loop and never get tired of it.
V: For all the arguments about Lena’s accent, this is the most unaffected German entry – and indeed winner – in years. It’s a great song to have won the whole shebang, too, because that’s precisely what it is: just Lena and her backing vocalists on stage. No props, no gimmicks, no special effects. And it’s brilliant.


And so to the points...

1 point goes to Lithuania

2 points go to Ukraine

3 points go to Armenia

4 points go to Sweden

5 points go to Turkey

6 points go to Croatia

7 points go to Azerbaijan

8 points go to Georgia

10 points go to Belgium

and finally...

12 points go to...


Germany!


The wooden spoon goes to the United Kingdom.