Over its long history, Eurovision (also known by its previous title, The Sweden Show) has cultivated a strong reputation as being a one-stop-shop for the most intense camp Europe has to offer. This reputation is entirely deserved; most of the fun of tuning in each year revolves around guessing which country will throw out the most over-the-top production design and effects and which singer/singers will provide the Most Gay (key point: these two are often combined into the same number).
The downside, of course, is that the fact that the competition is supposed to center around music often gets lost amidst the (literally) blinding lights. Once the show ends and the artificially-induced seizures fade into dull headaches, approximately 95% of the individual songs promptly vanish into the ether, never to be recalled by anyone involved. With more and more of the effort going into transforming the performers into either animorphs or literal exploding stars, most of the songs tend towards the entirely generic, especially in recent decades as the technology available has rapidly advanced. Just go back and watch the original performance of ABBA's seminal superhit, Waterloo. What, no 10-foot CGI Napoleon leering out of the stage to grope the ladies? WEAK, 0 out of 10, would not recommend.
Even the winning songs usually fall into this trap as well. There are exceptions, of course; the 2016 contest, fresh in the wake of Russia's invasion of the Ukraine and illegal annexation of Crimea, had a particularly thrilling final vote count where the Russian entry lost out to the Ukraine's song, which had been sung by a Crimean Tartar in the Crimean language. Not only was it a transcendant moment of rare poetic justice, the song itself also happened to be the year's best.
Still, when trying to access the musical value of the actual music being played, I often find most Eurovision lineups to be rather frustrating parades of middling non-entities that don't give me anything to chew over for more than a minute, much like the lesser Marvel films. Nevertheless, there ARE usually a few songs each year that manage to sneak in that are actually fine, and sometimes even quite good! Here were this year's crop that are actually worth revisiting outside the gaudy pageantry (though the pageantry certainly doesn't hurt).
Honorable Mention: "Technicolor" (Australia)
This one ultimately didn't qualify for the finale, meaning that pretty much no one bothered to listen to it. Which is a shame, because it's quite good! It's got great synth vibes and really haunting vocals in the intro, a perfect spot-on transition into the chorus, and it looks as if the entire 80's suddenly lurched out of its grave and vomited all over my laptop screen. Plus, I find this song extremely emotionally resonate, because a) right now everything is indeed frustrating, and b) it is always, ALWAYS, time to take off your clothes.
"Love Is On My Side" (Portugal)
It didn't score very well, but this is a great little piece I can imagine hearing in a dimly lit jazz club somewhere in New York City. Or maybe as the background piece t a low-key, romantic drama starring George Clooney.
"Voila" (France)
I see France sent their finest Edith Piaf throwback this year, and it's a solid one. I very much appreciated the fact that this was one of the entries that didn't try to overwhelm all five senses at once. They trusted in the song and in their performing artist to sell it with old-school theatricality, and hey, it damn near won!
"10 Years" (Iceland)
This song is Nerd Heaven and it is Perfect.
That is all.
"Shum" (Ukraine)
Awwww yeah. This, for me, is the epitome of what Eurovision should be. A big, adventurous mashup of various bits of a country's folk songs or similiar musical or cultural traditions, sung entirely in the native language and meshed together with the best that European techno/dance/hip-hop fusion has to offer. No random English phrases thrown in with the hope of pulling in an American audience later on, just a full-throated celebration of whatever is unique or downright weird about your country. Less of the other stuff and more of just about everything Ukraine is doing, please.
Also, I highly recommend the accompanying music video for the song. It's literally Mad Max Invades Chernobyl and it is everything.
-Noah
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