WEEK 3 - Now I could discuss all the good entries that stand strong against those of popular chart music until the end of time but Eurovision would be a sad sad place if you didn't get a sprinkling of utter insanity, weirdness and plain campy crapness somewhere in the mix. I'm probably going to offend the populations of five nations but I'm sure they'll all get over that when they see the light post-contest plus I thank them for making Eurovision a much more zany place (although if any of them win I may go on a rampage of destruction in their respective capital city - just saying). These five entries could very well be the stand-out performances of their semi-finals - for all the disastrously wrong reasons: Trackshittaz - Woki mit deim Popo (Austria) It's not very often you come across a song where the band's name describes it perfectly but here, case in point, we have
Trackshittaz from Austria. After underperforming with a stunning singer last year, Austria seem to have gone to the other end of the scale with
Woki mit deim Popo, a song loving translated into english as 'Shake your booty' with a potential stage performance of pole dancers with glow-in-the-dark lines enhancing their bums and breasts. It is literally as if this song had been dreamed up by a couple of bored teenage lads in their bedroom who couldn't get past the parental locks on the family laptop. This could very well be the case considering Trackshittaz consists of two male 'rappers' who are clearly lyrical geniuses with lines translated into stuff like
Noodle soup gang, whats up? and everybody shouts: Ho, ho' which is just bizarre and comes nowhere close to following any kind of logical rhythm. The actual chorus, which you could say is the selling point of the track - loosely, sounds very close to '
F*** him in the poo-poo' (although it's in german so clearly that isn't what they mean, I hope) which causes all kinds of unintentional problems especially with the two lads lasso-ing to their hearts content and the constant Woop Woop's flying about. I can only imagine where they will take this to on the stage at Baku but the fact they only won their national final by 2% says to me that if this is a marmite song in Austria (where they're actually quite popular - number ones and everything), god knows how the rest of Europe will take to it.
Odds of Winning: 150/1 - i'll be shocked if it qualifies but it is repulsively catchy so who knows. http://youtu.be/BKQf8Z5uWQ8 Anri Jokhadze - I'm a Joker (Georgia) I really don't know where to begin with this one. Georgia have never sent a male vocalist to Eurovision before and after hearing this I realise why.
Anri Jokhadze -
I'm a Joker is a hodgepodge of everything that was wrong with music in the late 90's/early 00's and is the very opposite of cohesive. Vocally, its all over the shop from high to slow to bored to aggressive to plain unneccessary warbling with lyrics that proclaim that Anri is a broker, womaniser, poker (Eh?), smoker and, what sounds like, street-walker which all combined don't scream Eurovision winner or a-very-nice-man-i'd-like-as-my-friend. The only saving graces are the pleasant middle eastern strings sections but when you've just got randoms mumbling over the top it kind of ruins their impact. In terms of stage performances, this could be especially barmy especially if the video is anything to go by. It's got women in red dresses and truly garish eye-makeup, the smashing of fishbowls, Anri trying to dance sexily fully clothed (thank the heavens) under a shower and a bit where he basically grabs and thrusts a woman on a runway. Coming from a country who's already been banned from Eurovision once for a political statement dressed up as a lycra bodysuit clad disco song and entering a blind woman singing about peace before stripping her off mid-song to reveal basically a hooker's outfit (the pinnacle of Eurovision bad taste since i've been watching), I am actually scared what we may see on the night.
Odds of Winning: 200/1 - a near-on definite DNQ in every way. http://youtu.be/o1kCgD626Go Rambo Amadeus - Euro Neuro (Montenegro) After a two year hiatus, Montenegro (formerly joined with Serbia back in 2004/5) are back with the audaciously named
Rambo Amadeus who's been in the business for years, is extremely popular in Eastern Europe and is known for his concerts where he improvises alongside using crude humour. Oh. Dear. God. This could be a disaster waiting to happen on live TV and I'd imagine the producers in Baku will be sweating out of every pore until he finishes. So to
Euro Neuro and let's just say I dont think I've ever heard or seen anything like it since I've been watching Eurovision... It starts off like
Borat's version of the Kazakhstani national anthem before turning into a nonplussed free-form poetry reading in a hip jazz club until the chorus kicks in and it's an all out middle-eastern rampage of Yeh-eh-ro Ne-eh-ros. Honestly, the guy likes to call himself Rambo Amadeus the World Mega Emperor and goes from dressing like the ghost of rasputin to a sweaty man down the kebab shop with a pet donkey in the video. The lyrics are utter bonkers (he literally just picks one word and rhymes it with everything he can think of) but the more I listen to it, the less I think it's steaming dung and the more I think it's genius crap. I for one can't wait to see how this is staged because literally anything could happen...
Odds of Winning: 200/1 - could be a shock qualifier but it's on first in the first semi which is never great news. http://youtu.be/D6S-FNLv2jQ Buranovskiye Babushki - Party For Everybody (Russia) As
Boney M once exclaimed in Rasputin '
Oh those Russians...'. Yep, Russia is fed up with playing it proper with songs produced by RedOne and other proper industry people so they're employing Plan G - they're sending in the troupe of disco song wielding grannies from out in the Russian wilds.
Buranovskiye Babushki are trained in the arts of needlework, scarf adornment and singing like an unruly rabble at the local bingo. Ok I'm being hard on them because they are basically a novelty act but
Party For Everybody, on first listen, knocks you sideways when it changes from traditional (painful on the ears) village folk song to disco pop stormer in a totally WOO-I-Wanna-Be-At-Their-Party way. It is just bizarre and it's even more bizarre to think this group are 2nd favorites to win the whole shebang. I'm sure the Udmurt language is great but to an ear not used to it, it just sounds like gibberish which makes this whole thing even more funny. This song beat out Russian Eurovision Winner
Dima Bilan and one of the members of faux-lesbian group
T.A.T.U in the national final which I for one am thankful for because I didn't want to see Dima Bilan and his smug face again - a 6-strong team of Grannies is an improvement in all respects. Joined onstage by something that looks like a rustic washing machine or a little dwarf house on a turntable and complete with backstory (they want to win to raise money for their local church - ok girls this isn't run by
Simon Cowell, no sob story needed), this could actually win. I bet you didn't think you'd see a potential winner in this article....
Odds of Winning: 5/1 - vastly overrated in my opinion. Will no doubt storm their semi but surely the novelty will wear off on second viewing in the final? Still, will finish high regardless. http://youtu.be/WKNRGc71hjc Valentina Monetta - The Social Network Song (San Marino) Now San Marino isn't very well known as a country and hasn't done particularly well in all it's previous entries but this time they're getting far more press. Why? Watch the video and you'll see.
The Social Network Song, formerly known as Facebook (Uh Oh Oh) until they were forced to change due to breaking the rules (no advertising products otherwise Eurovision would be filled with songs like 'Coca Cola Slurp!' and 'New Apple iPad Out Next Week'), is basically
Aqua -
Barbie Girl on children's TV presenter steriods using
Shakira's translation skills i.e. it's full of weird lyrical oddities. Oh and since the rebranding, they thought it wise to throw a ton of the world's worse auto-tune at it. Poor
Valentina Monetta you may think; she can actually sing yet she has to deal with all THIS. Despite that, she's clearly having the time of her life judging by the mental facial expression range she has. It's astounding, hilarious and just the most surreal thing especially when coupled with lyrics like "
Do you wanna play cyber sex again?" and "
Everyone's logging in, for a little fun and cyber sin" which go completely the opposite way to the Blue Peter presenter look Valentina has going. The chorus is addictive in a nonsensical way but was admittedly better when Facebook was involved. I'm not complaining though - I just desperately want to see how they stage this. It feels like an attempt to purposefully NOT qualify and if that's the case, San Marino could be serving up 90's cardboard/crazy costumes/deranged dancing realness with the performance on the night just adding to unhinged chaos.
Odds of Winning: 200/1 - it will never win and I cannot fathom how they're going to do this on stage but with a completely bonkers performance, it could be catchy enough to qualify. http://youtu.be/PqwBh9hq9PE
Next week, it's a case of stolen identity as we delve into the Eurovision crime wave - those songs that deliver a moment of 'Hmm, I swear I've heard this before...'. Expect fake blindness, Eastern European europop wailing, military hats on young girls and more LA-LA-LA's than there are people in Switzerland. Auf Wiedersehen!