Saturday 17th May was a strange day. All the local football leagues had finished for the season, Tynemouth 1s were away and Tynemouth 3s inactive, so it basically left me at a loose end. Well, after the final rehearsal for Scratch & Reflect ensemble, the Cornelius Cardew inspired musical project I’ll be blogging about in a few weeks once we’ve given our debut live performance at Dunston Staithes café on Thursday 29th May at 2.30pm, anyway. The practise session went 80% well and I popped into town afterwards to collect my new spare pair of specs and buy a guitar stand for said live performance, before heading home.
Shelley was at a medical appointment with her sister, so I had a quick snooze before settling down to watch Palace win the FA Cup. I’m glad they did, though Henderson was desperately lucky not to be sent off. Amusingly. I managed to miss the goal as I was hanging out some washing in the back garden, typically enough. Anyway, come full time it was the point in the day to make a decision. The social calendar offered us the chance to attend the Percy Main end of (relegation) season awards, which we decided may be a little too solemn an occasion. Hence, and I still can’t believe I’m typing this, I agreed to sit down and watch Eurovision with Shelley, nibbles, dips and a prodigious carry out. Guess what? We had an absolutely blinding night, which I’m about to tell you about.
Despite actually recalling hearing Cliff Richard’s 1973 entry “Power to all our Friends” at the time it was released, I don’t recall the actual contest, as my relationship with Eurovision began in earnest the year after, when Abba won with “Waterloo” and Olivia Newton John didn’t with “Long Live Love.” In 1975, aged 10, I actually quite liked “Ding Ding A Dong” by Teach-In, the Dutch winners who had little in common with Golden Earring or Focus, while “Let Me Be the One” by The Shadows was an awful dirge. Mind, it was Stockhausen on acid compared to the 1976 winner “Save All Your Kisses for Me” by the Brotherhood of Man. Come 1977, punk had landed, and my musical sensibilities had been changed forever, so I didn’t watch another contest until 2025, though I was vicariously conscious of a few of the subsequently entrants and winners. Most joyously, fans of Bohemians singing celebrity fan Johnny Logan’s “Hold Me Now,” the 1987 winner, on the regular occasions we beat Shamrock Rovers, which is grand. I suppose the likes of Bucks Fizz and Katrina & The Waves were almost ubiquitous on British telly and radio at the time of their participation, in 1981 and 1997 respectively, as were other winners such as Nicole and Celine Dion, whoever she is, but I certainly have zero recall of Sweden’s 1984 winner “Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley” by Herreys, for instance.
So, parking my natural cynicism to one side, loading up on hummus and pretzels and sinking a few tins of Almasty, Shelley and I watched the 26 acts that had been selected to entertain us. Since the passing of that notorious Lundy Terry Wogan, the torch of British revenge for Sir Roger Casement has been passed to Graham Norton, who unfortunately hadn’t paid a visit to Dignitas while he was in the area for this year’s broadcast. As ever his comments were mean, bitter and unfunny, but that’s what we’ve come to expect from that talentless oaf. Being honest, he was Walter Cronkite and Richard Dimbleby reincarnated compared to the three Swiss hosts, attired in shoulder pads Victoria Principal or Gloria Hunniford would have been proud to own, who were as wooden as cuckoo clocks and tasteless as fondue.
The format showed a short promo video of each of the 26 acts interacting with local proles and doing something typically Swiss, almost inevitably involving cheese (to the great chagrin of this lactose intolerant viewer), before the “live performance.” I see that many countries have gone back to singing in English, rather than their native tongue. It’s just par for the course I suppose as the songs themselves divide into frenetic, Hi-NRG, landfill techno bangers with sexually suggestive lyrics, overwrought, orchestral power ballads with crashing key changes and sombre, shallow lyrics, or anthemic indie rock plodders, entreating us to all embrace change and face the future. Of the 26 entrants, there were 5 I didn’t actively dislike: alphabetically we’re talking Albania, Estonia, Italy, Latvia and Portugal, but now I’ll go through the entrants in chronological order. Oh, and when I say there were 5 I didn’t dislike, it doesn’t mean I liked them, just that I didn’t feel the urge to projectile vomit all over the telly when they were strutting their stuff.
First up were Norway. A bought in the box, pouting teenage pretty boy in a taffeta Game of Thrones costume. It was shit. So was Luxembourg’s forgettable 1970s pop throwback. The first number I actively sat up and listened to was Estonia’s Tommy Cash; a stand-up comedian and Paul Calf body double with an ankle length tie and a Dirty Sanchez tache whose number “Espresso Macchiato” was a grossly offensive parody of Italian culture and society. I liked it tremendously, like a retread of Jim Davidson’s seminal “The Devil Went Down to Brixton,” which is strangely elusive on You Tube…
The next act were Israel. I left the room during this number.
Lithuania
were represented by a bunch of brooding, floppy-haired indie kids, who had
obviously grown up on a steady diet of U2, RHCP and the sort of trite, earnest
guitar rock peddled by MTV in the noughties. Spain were disastrously bad. A
throbbing Hi-NRG
soundtrack, complete with castanet flourishes, accompanied an almost total striptease by a woman who looked as uncomfortable to be there as I was watching it. At that stage, it was unquestionably the worst number of the night, an accolade that was only later wrestled from her by some real, howling stinkers from Iceland and San Marino. Ukraine were crap. A non-event of a song by performers in Bee Gees style flares. Enough to make you root for Putin. And then there was Britain.
One of the effects of a decade and a half long recession and the utter destruction of the social fabric of this country, is that even middle-class youngsters are questioning whether third level education is for them. Hence, we’ve got loads of semi-posh kids opting not to throw sixty odd grand down the drain on a degree in putting up badminton nets at Luton University, who instead embrace a lifestyle based on an extended year out principle, aged 19. They live at home when they aren’t partying hard or farting around Australia and the Far East. Eventually they have to settle down, which is when the music lessons at a minor girls’ public school pay off for the likes of The Last Dinner Party. All these Mirandas and Phoebes can fall back on their Grade 4 violin skills to make a couple of albums to fill in time until the Trust Fund kicks in. Remember Monday, with their raucous non-song “What the Hell Just Happened?” probably only made it into the choir at their school by default, as they opt for declamatory shouting rather than considered breathiness, but here they are, making memories for underachieving poshos everywhere by bawling inanities about a weekend on the lash at an unimpressed crowd of pan European bobby-soxers who, without giving the game away, awarded them a resounding nul points in the audience vote, which they took with the kind of grace Pep Guardiola had exhibited hours earlier after the cup final.
Next up were Austria. The most extreme, hysterical, overwrought, operatic power ballad imaginable. It was almost frightening how it ticked all the boxes, and I knew this was the winner. You couldn’t say that about the next act. Iceland had selected the Volcanic Jedward to proffer up an unpalatable slice of landfill Euro disco, unnecessarily augmented with violin scrapings. It didn’t go down well anywhere. I actually quite liked Latvia’s ethereal, anthemic updating of “Pure Shores” by All Saints. Possibly the nearest to an original song all night, with a certain degree of artistic merit. The Dutch entry fell far below the legendary efforts of Mouth & MacNeil’s stellar “I See a Star” or the aforementioned Teach-In’s winner. Instead, we got some smoky elevator jazz from a bloke in his pyjamas, whose MOR dross had me almost asleep.
Finland, once represented by the iconic “Pump! Pump!” by Freddy and Friends, went hard on biker chic, with Bonny Tyleresque roaring from une femme d’un certain age and her collection of firework-powered phallic mic stands. Italy were genuinely interesting. The poor bloke’s Swiss cultural experience involved punching tickets on a tram, while he appeared stick-thin to the point of skag boy cool. Attired in a Mick Ronson Spiders from Mars jumpsuit with white pancake makeup, this was Bowie 1973/1974 reborn, with “Rust Never Sleeps” giant amps behind him and a harmonica solo. The only song all night to make you want to get the Rizlas out.
Poland had a 52-year-old female singer who’d obviously spent more time in the gym than the rehearsal studio. A total non-event of a song was overshadowed by her attempts to get a tune out of an Alpine horn. If that slice of uncomfortable parping had been the entry she might have done better. I’d have voted for her anyway. Germany were crap. Greece had a young lass in Nana Mouskouri bins as big as my new pair, and a set that included her sitting on what looked like a giant lump of coal. The Armenian entrant got to meet a goat herd who looked like Ian Beale then revealed his stage act was getting in his 10k steps by running across the stage to bad operatic soft metal. The host country’s entrant had a pre-task of landing a shipping container on the dockside, then did a one take video, which Norton compared to “Adolesence,” for a song so bland it didn’t even register with me I’d heard anything. The Maltese entry made me cross. A helium voiced Britney Spears soundalike bouncing round on a space hopper to little good effect, before the Danish entrant came barrelling in like a prop forward in a pub fight. I bet you she scared the Portuguese lads; a sensitive bunch of librarians and geography teachers with specs, curly hair and checky shirts, they made a pleasant enough mainstream C86 influenced noise that was rather sophisticated compared to what had gone before, but perhaps not what Eurovision called for.
We were on the last lap now. France took us unpleasantly back to the world of overwrought power ballads, before San Marino were hands down the worst thing on all night. Reviving early 90s Italian tinkly piano house, another 52-year-old, this time a DJ, tried to get that old Ibiza party spirit going, to no negligible effect, despite having a bunch of backing singers attired in what looked like Sam Smith’s cast offs. Truly terrible. Last up were Albania, who I liked for using a mandolin and having Una Thurman’s hair double on vocals, with an old bloke giving a menacing spoken part and then laying hell out of some timpani. Very enjoyable, or perhaps the fact we’d done the cans in and were on the wine made me more suggestible to the discreet charms of Shqperian pop music.
Before the voting started, I predicted Austria to win and Portugal to come last. Shelley opted for Sweden as winners and Norway as the runt of the litter. Yes, Sweden; I somehow failed to make any notes about their jolly, novelty song about a sauna. Sorry about that. I’m sure it was wonderful. Then were had the 2023 and 2022 winners, attired in false Kneecap style balaclavas, doing a pretend rap battle while attired in padded boiler suits. What a load of absolute tosh, but it kept the show on air until the results started rolling in.
After the panels from all 37 countries had voted, including the hapless 11 nations who’d been eliminated at the semi-final stage, with results presented by a whole litany of women in red dresses, augmented by shoulder pads, Austria were just on top. Sadly, the democratic principle then reared its ugly head, and the public votes counted. Suffice to say, it was a massive relief when Austria picked up enough votes to overhaul Israel. Norton skulked off in a huff when Celine Dion failed to appear. We had a whiskey nightcap and looked back on a fabulous evening in the house. See you in Vienna next year.
Vom Land zum Meer.
Here as I sit
At this empty café
Thinking of you
I remember
All those moments
Lost in wonder
That we’ll never
Find again
Though the world
Is my oyster
It’s only a shell
Full of memories
And here by the Seine
Notre-Dame
Casts a long
Lonely shadow
Now only sorrow
No tomorrow
There’s no today for us
Nothing is there
For us to share
But yesterday
These cities may change
But there always remains
My obsession
Through silken waters
My gondola glides
And the bridge
It sighs
I remember
All those moments
Lost in wonder
That we’ll never
Find again
There’s no more time for us
Nothing is there
For us to share
But yesterday
Ecce momenta
Illa mirabilia
Quae captabit
In aeternum
Memor
Modo dolores
Sunt in dies
Non est reliquum
Vero tantum
Communicamus
Perdita
Tous ces moments
Perdus dans l’enchantement
Qui ne reviendront
Jamais
Pas d’aujourd’hui pour nous
Pour nous il n’y a rien
partager sauf
Le pass
Tous ces moments
Perdus dans l’enchantement
Qui ne reviendront
Jamais
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