Eurovision Song Contest 2019, Part Four

Part 3:

Iceland is the home country of trolls. ;)

Russia got lots of points but it won’t win.

Czech twinks 7

Did you see the heartbreaking looks on their faces :(

I knew the Czech guys would bomb, they're awful!

Shame about Australia.

Shit, I'm afraid this won't be enough for Italy

Omg, it's going to be fucking Sweden, just kill me.

My heart is racing!

Well at least Italy can't win.

Noooooo, we won't be going to Rome...

Holland got good points

Damn, poor Mahmood.

So your opinions on what Iceland did?

I'm boycotting next year's contest if Sweden wins.

Screw Mahmood, he's a self loathing closest case.

I wanted Norway to win, the cute guy is gay and wrote the song with his husband

r15 Why?

R14 they shouldn't have. Entering is a contract to keep apolitical.

Holland Wins!

HOLLAND!

YAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

I can't even remember the song!

Yes, Yes, Yes, my two faves first and second (it must be the first time)

Omg, did you see Lundcik's face?!

I"M CRYING OMG

Did you see his face??

Oh wow, Netherlands guy is family. Did you see his queeny celebration with his hands?

cant remember a thing about the winning song.

Swedish bottom mortified. Heh.

We're heading to Nederland next year!

Rotterdam is going to be nice, you guys. No political drama and Gay Central.

Ding a Dong! The Netherlands wins!

r27 Yes, he's bisexual and has a boyfriend.

R16: Closet case? he is kissing his boyfriend in the middle of the street, that's not being in the closet.

One and one gay at the first two positions

Is it silly of me to ask if the NL singer is gay?

Holland boy is bisexual.

Sweden bombing in the televote yet another year totally made my night. I think Europe sent Sweden a clear message: FUCK OFF WITH YOUR JURY BAIT GENERIC SHIT POP SONGS! No one wants to hear that crap.

bisexual = really a gay

They had nothing to lose, I suppose.

[quote]Holland boy is bisexual.

Yeah, me too.

I agree Iceland should've kept it apolitical but they are so cliche it's not surprising. It'd be great if they didn't get any media attention like they want.

R16 he refuses to call himself gay or address it publicly and sticks too "i don't want to talk about it". He's a closet case, just like bloody Aaron Cock Gobbling Schock

Israel really pulled it off (apart from the song of course)

Iceland was fucking rude. Like the hamas wasn‘t itching to bomb this show.

r2 Polish public under its right-wing government voted Iceland-Netherlands-Norway, lol.

I'm ranking this year's winner somewhere along with 1944 and Amor Pelos Dois - songs that are objectively good but that I personally don't care about.

His face, omg. I'm so glad he flopped in the televote.

The results being announced in this way is the best, most degrading shit ever. LOVE IT!

Well, at least Icelanders kept their promise of staging a political protest.

I like the winning song, beautiful

The winning song sounds like the male version of Lana del Ray. Hate it.

I think Norway was the overall winner in the public vote.

R47 Yikes, something tells me I'll start to feel sorry for Lundvik before the night is over.

R51 Yes, Norway should have won. Their song is actually good compared to this forgettable crap. The cute singer is gay too and wrote the song with his husband.

where can we watch the after-show party?

So we now have a fouth LGBT winner in recent times, after Conhita, Marija Serifovic and Eldar from Azerbaijan. Of course Eldar isn't out but it's obvious that he's a mincing queen.

Also Netherlands guy is gay gay gay.

So.... Dutch bottom won, Swedish bottom lost, Czech bottoms middle, Icelandic botoms booed, fat British bottom last.

The UK got half the points of the second-to-last country. Ouch.

[quote]The cute singer is gay too and wrote the song with his husband.

This evening is what the world would look like if gays were the majority.

R57 Norway bottom robbed?

He's hot

Reminds me why I like arab men

[quote]the UK got half the points of the second-to-last country. Ouch.

He was such an old guy - it's not about the song. Absurd choice.

Let's finish the night with this classic Eurovision song.

♫ SALAD BREAK, EVERY SINGLE STEP YOU TAKE ♫

I was hoping it would go to Rome next year but Italy doesn't exactly have its finances in order so it's probably for the best, really.

UK - next year ---cute gay guy, OK?

WHAT A DAY ON DL!

A Royal Wedding and Eurovision!

r65 do you think it would ever make a difference?

There was a Eurovision shortly before the Brexit vote. Did Europe take the chance to vote for the UK, to show they wanted us? Nope, we got fuck all points as usual!

What royal wedding?

I don't like how Germanic countries continue to dominate Eurovison: since 2009 seven winners came from Germanic countries.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Most disappointed that Australia and Iceland didn't do better. Most elated and relieved that we're not going to Sankt fucking Peterburg next year.

Semi 1 result

1 Australia 2 Czech 3 Iceland 4 Estonia 5 Greece 6 Slovenia 7 Serbia 8 San Marino 9 Cyprus 10 Belarus 11 Polond 12 Hungary 13 Belgium 14 Georgia 15 Portugal 16 Montenegro 17 Finland

They should break up The UK for Eurovision.

I feel so sorry for the UK and Germany. Damn Europe is heartless.

r72 What does that mean - that Australia got the most votes in the first semi?

Good idea r73, like with football.

Semi 2

1 Netherlands 2 North Macedonia 3 Sweden 4 Switzerland 5 Azerbjan 6 Russia 7 Norway 8 Malta 9 Albania 10 Denmark 11 Lithuania 12 Moldova 13 Romania 14 Croatia 15 Latvia 16 Armenia 17 Austria 18 Ireland

Oh, I see - The UK DID have a young gay guy. I missed it. Got confused.

We could try sending a decent song, r67.

Wow, the results really changed for the semis to the final.

I can't believe Armenia ended 16 with that amazing song, and lithuania was the one on the verge of qualify

[quote]Good idea [R73], like with football.

Yes. Much more fun.

R79: The curious thing is UK generally send good singers but with totally dated songs

The UK song didn't even get within the top 70 in the UK charts.

I could have handled another two hours.

Denmark barely made it

and then finished 12th in the Grand Final

Madonna was naughty, too!

She did it twice, in fact.

I haven't actually heard any of Kate Miller Heidke's music, but I was under the impression she was considered a credible musician. I recognise her name from alternative music forums. Surprised she agreed to do Eurovision! But then, Anouk represented the Netherlands a few years ago (and her song was great):

[quote]The UK song didn't even get within the top 70 in the UK charts.

I blame the demise of Top Of The Pops.

r80 In the semis only the countries which are in the given semi can vote. In the Final, all can vote, even the ones that didn't qualify. That can really change the results,

Most of the good performances are from second semi. It's no surprise they ended up high in GF.

If any of you are ever in Europe when it's on you should go to Malta to watch it. I've never known anywhere so enthusiastic about it.

The '60s - when England ruled the world!!

r92 Probably explains why they burn so much money on advertising their song. And yet they finished 16th.

Probably don't send teenage boys/girls to Eurovision. They rarely win.

San Marino won the televote in 3 countries in the semifinal

So Netherlands didn't win either the jury vote or the televote and yet still won in the end. Apparently Norway won the televote? Is that right?

R97 Yes. Similar to 2016.

So Sweden is the jury's choice and Norway the people's choice. And yet it goes to the Dutch guy in the end. I'm kinda annoyed by that.

televote

Norway 291

Netherlands 261

Italy 253

Russia 244

Switzerland 212

Iceland 186

Australia 131

Azerbjian 100

r100 Okay, that does put things into perspective when you look at the jury vote as well. I guess The Netherlands was the first song where the two votes met.

But fuck Sweden and their jury brownnosing. Also Macedonia.

Armenia coming 16th in the semi - I was totally justified when I was asking about the gay dancers from her music video. Her stage was EMPTY! Quite literally for a couple of seconds. Hope they learn from this.

Norway won televote in Semi II. Juries ranked them 11th

Juries had Moldova #8 and Romania #10 with Norway and Albania just out (11-12th)

Lithuania (7) would have gone through instead of Denmark (11) for the televote

In Semi I Czech Republic won the juries and Iceland won the televote

Juries would have elimiated San Marino (15th) with Hungary qualiyfing (10)

Televote had Belarus out (11th) with Poland in (8)

norway had a problem in the semi jury rehearsal and asked to perform again but wasn't granted, right?

r105 No, that was in the final jury show yesterday, which is even worse!

However, it has to be said that juries are instructed to disregard technical issues, so it probably wouldn't have made any difference. It's obviously just not a jury-friendly song.

Some Brits I follow on Twitter blamed the UK’s entry on “poor staging,” which is bullshit. The song was mediocre, the performer looked like shit and didn’t sing it particularly well.

The juries were reintroduced to reduce the effect of neighboring countries voting for each other.

[quote]Yes, Norway should have won. Their song is actually good compared to this forgettable crap. [bold]The cute singer is gay too and wrote the song with his husband.[/bold]

In other words, they should have won for PC reasons -- the very stuff DLers always decry.

[quote]the performer looked like shit

r108 I couldn't believe someone from the UK was dressed so poorly on the stage. Same for the Dutch guy. The staging was generic but fine.

[quote]and didn’t sing it particularly well

That shocked me as well. And it only happened this week as he was flawless before. I think the AC and/or overperforming might have damaged his voice.

I have found it hilarious how the Dutch presenter has humiliated Madonna - 'thank God for Madonna's auto-tune!'... LOL!

Her performance has been one of the least interesting things ever. The song is tuneless, airless and boring, and not even the spectacular setting could save it. Also, she has found a way to suck all the life out Like a Prayer, which was always a fantastic song. Well, even so, this time things have been more lively and interesting than her $5 million fiasco at the BMAs, which was downright embarrassing.

And R50 is right: the Dutch song "Arcade" is mediocre at best. I think it's weird that you're all outraged at how generic the Swedish entry is, but are praising this equally nondescript drivel. Also, in terms of attractiveness (and that seems to be the only criterion that many of you are applying) John Lundvik is a million times hotter than Duncan Laurence, and also has a better voice. If we're meant to vote for sugary pap anyway, at least let's vote for songs that are delivered by someone with more talent and who is more attractive.

Still, there were songs that were much more deserving of the first spot than the Dutch or Swedish entries: Norway and its simply brilliant, catchy and original song, the lovely ballad by Australia (which reminds me a little of Kate Bush) or the spectacular number from Serbia by Nevena Božović, are all better. As for the always gorgeous Sergey Lazarev, the very dull and mediocre song they've selected for him didn't do him any favours. He ought to have brought a better ballad like Dima Bilan's "Believe", or an impossibly catchy song like in 2016. As it stands "Scream" is just an overwrought filler track.

The UK's entry was, in my opinion, pleasant enough and Michael Rice has a nice voice, even if he has screamed most of his high notes. Still, it isn't something noticeable enough and it would seem that the UK always expect to win by doing the least possible amount of effort, and then react with anger and disappointment when they see negative results. Just as it happened with Brexit, when they voted to leave the EU but still wanted all the advantages of being part of it while giving nothing in return, they don't seem to understand that thinking that they're still an empire won't save them from having to work for what they want.

As for Mahmood, I am surprised by how well that incredibly uninteresting faux-R&B "Soldi" song has done. His voice is nothing to write home about, the music is generic at best and the lyrics, pretentious. I am shocked that it qualified at all in the first place, to be honest.

On that note, I'm leaving with who should have won the contest.

I think the public vote for Australia’s outstanding effort reflected what I feel strongly-that Australia doesn’t deserve a competitive slot in something called the Eurovision Song Contest. Here’s an analogy you might find ridiculous but which I think expresses how I feel about this: Oprah, a non-actress, read the novel The Color Purple and was desperate to not only be a part of it, she wanted to play one of the main roles in it, Sofia. She wrote to Spielberg. She was already a media celebrity. She got the part, beating out many accomplished actresses who could really have made the most out of that opportunity. But Oprah actually thought she deserved to get that role for the sole reason being that she wanted it so badly. Australia doesn’t “deserve” a competitive slot in Eurovision and being responsible for actual European countries not getting votes THEY deserve.

No-one in the UK expected to win, R112.

I love the new vote reveal system at the end because it's so nail-biting but showing the faces of contestants who obviously weren't going to win many points from the public just seems cruel. Tamara, Michaela and Lake Malawi's reactions were all so sad to see. We don't need to see that.

The Duncan - Lana Del rey comparison is downright bizarre, to be honest, as she doesn't sing in this genre at all.

He sounds more like Mika, back when he was huge.

Lake Malawi's reaction when they realized they only got 7 points from televote was priceless. I honestly don't like them because they're acting like so straight.

[quote]Tamara, Michaela and Lake Malawi's reactions were all so sad to see. We don't need to see that.

r115 That was my favourite part!

I thought Tamara took it in stride. The look on the Swedish performer’s face was priceless.

Loved the guys on the livestream cringing at the thought of next year's show taking place in Norway as everything is so damn expensive there.

Someone said Duncan was arrogant at the presser. I'll have to see it for myself.

The guy from Sweden should have seen it coming since there weren't many points left from the televote.

R121 what you just said doesn't really make sense, but I think what shocked the Swedish guy so much wasn't the fact that he lost but that the public gave his shitty song so few votes.

The reason the UK, France and Germany always have such shitty songs is that they don't have to qualify, because as the largest members of the EBU they automatically compete.

Yep, R122, the poster upthread put it best when he deemed the Swedish entry to be generic pop jury bait, which it was.

If you were jotting down the scores like this guy, you could tell the Swedish score was going to be low. He calls it immediately after the scores for the Dutch guy come in, at 8:08.

R122 He should have known that too exactly how many points he got before the announcement simply because he was the last.

*Sorry, he called the low vote for North Macedonia. But he still knows it'll be Duncan.

[quote] They should break up The UK for Eurovision.

Nah, that wouldn’t work. IIRC even fellow English-speaking Ireland didn’t give Britain ANY points.

I loved Graham Norton’s droll commentary about Ireland giving Britain’s song the cold shoulder: “Thanks for nothing, neighbours!” or smthg to that effect, lol.

Britain’s song was boring & forgettable this year, even by Eurovision’s low standards. THAT was the real problem. A union country that producers some of the top names in music (like Adele, etc) keeps putting forth such ‘meh’ acts for this contest.

The way they announced the scores was slightly different than the way they did the past two years when the procedure was radically changed. Anybody here to tell us?

*produces

R128 It's considered toxic by most professional musicians in the UK.

Madonna has come under fierce criticism from Bobby Gillespie who branded Madonna a 'total prostitute' who is 'desperate for publicity'.

The Primal Scream frontman attacked the US singer for choosing to perform in Tel Aviv as it helps to 'normalise the state of Israel'.

The lead singer also said the state sits on 'stolen land' and he believes 'in the rights of the Palestinian people'.

But when confronted about his seemingly anti-Semitic views he claimed all his heroes are Jewish - including Karl Marx and Bob Dylan on his list.

Speaking to Kirsty Wark on Newsnight, Gillespie said: 'Madonna would do anything for money, you know, she's a total prostitute.

'And I've got nothing against prostitutes. The whole thing is set up to normalise the state of Israel, and its disgraceful treatment of the Palestinian people.

Madonna just ended whatever career she had left in Europe. lol. The biggest trainwreck of her career.

Neutral Netherlands next year is going to be positively balsamic after Tel Aviv. And the gay fans attending should have triple the fun as well.

I'm kinda glad Mahmood won't be saddled with representing Eurovision for one full year. That would probably have ruined him.

[quote] much more deserving of the first spot than the Dutch or Swedish entries: Norway and its simply brilliant, catchy and original song, the lovely ballad by Australia (which reminds me a little of Kate Bush) or the spectacular number from Serbia by Nevena Božović, are all better.

Very good analysis, R112. Norway, Oz and Serbia were my Top 3 faves as well.

Already suffering from an Assi withdrawal. Did you know he donated his entire salary from this hosting gig to an LGBT charity?

What a perfect man he is. Kobi is the sweetest as well.

Could bisexuality be the future (of Eurovision)? The missing link that brings us together and saves us all in the end?

Douwe Bob is also bisexual. We could have two bisexuals hosting next year but I'm not sure Douwe is still interested in anything related to Eurovision.

See you all in Rotterdam! Woohoo!

I really liked the spanish song, shame it did so poorly,.

Most of the euros bitching about The Netherlands are going to sleep on it and wake up tomorrow grateful that it'll be the Dutch footing the bill next.

r139 Yes, see you next year! These threads are always so exciting to me and I'm already dreading the terrible lull between tonight and the next Oscar season.

[bold]The Netherlands Wins Eurovision Without Usual Kitsch or *Gimmicks[/bold]

Lol at this one-sentence paragraph:

[quote]Many critics said that Madonna, appearing at around 1 a.m. Israel time, sang out of tune.

*That ball seemed pretty gimmicky to me? And the piano that's not plugged into anything... that as well.

Televotes : Jury vote comparison photo

[quote] So.... Dutch bottom won, Swedish bottom lost, Czech bottoms middle, Icelandic botoms booed, fat British bottom last.

The majority of Eurovision participants are gay, bi, closeted or ‘fluid’. Even the Russian top singer (the very sweet Sergei Lazarev) is well-known to be family and sings in gay clubs. So is his professional mentor and former Eurovision participant, the Bulgarian Philip Kirkorov (seen sitting next to Lazarev this eve). They’re closeted, but so unabashedly publicly flaming that it’s visible from outer space.

Surprisingly, the Ukrainian cross-dresser Andriy Danilko a.k.a Verka (performing tonight in that group song-swap segment, as the 2007 runner-up) claimed to be in a relationship with a woman, but I highly doubt that.

I didn't realize Mahmood is also a bottom.

It must be a bit embarrassing for Israel to be a host country and only get (one?) other country’s jury to give their song any votes.

Their song wasn’t horrible, but it was very nondescript. Again, even by Eurovision standards.

I don’t get it - Israel created such a beautiful setup and stage for the contest, but didn’t seem to put much effort into their own song or its visual presentation. So no wonder they finished close to last.

Can YOU imagine avowed bisexual Duncan Laurence with a girlfriend? He may be 80/20 or 90/10, I suppose.

He has severe Dutch gay voice, stereotypically so, and any woman who dated him would have to get used to lots of raised eyebrows and snickering.

It's only polite for the host country to field an entry that has little chance of winning.

Lol, yes, but that little? Their song only received some save-face points from 1 country out of all 26.

And when their closest neighours remaining in the final, Cyprus & Greece, didn’t give them any points at all, there seemed to have been a bit of booing in the displeased audience.

Those gurls linked @ R125 are the gayest thing of the whole evening,

Here it is again.

r149 Yes, that little. There's really nothing embarrassing about the host country bombing and is a bit of a tradition at this point. They're fully focused on hosting the event and the exposure they get from that. And they were treating their singer as warmly as their winner Netta even before the competition anyway (also a tradition), so it wouldn't have mattered at all in which place he finished. I actually think the hosting country should always get only a couple of symbolic points regardless of the quality of their song. No one pays attention to their song and we all know they're not going to win again so it just eats into the other countries' placements.

The Cyprus and Greece booing had more to do with them giving 12 points to each other.

r147 I admit I keep trying to picture him working a clit and... I just don't see it. Then again, it's Netherlands, so why would he be hiding his actual sexuality? I guess it's just what works for him at this point in time.

I disagree, R151. Not getting almost any points from ANY European country just feels isolating, on top of political protests against them.

The Israeli singer erupting into tears at the end of his very mediocre performance was also hilarious in this context. Here was a grown-ass adult full-on weeping on stage, but his song didn’t touch almost anyone.

[quote] so it just eats into the other countries' placements.

Huh? Outside of the Top 5 or Top 10, who cares how the other 16 “place”. They don’t get any trophies for placing 23rd instead of 24th.

It's very important for countries how they place. Some aren't even aiming to win but just want to place in the Top 10, for example.

r153 I disagree. You can't be isolating towards someone whose event you're currently attending and who literally won last year. The latter in itself is the proof that they're not being snubbed in any way.

R155 - I highly doubt e.g. Italy publicly said: “Welp, we’re just hoping to make Top 20 out of 26. If that happens, we’ll be content with that!”. Every country wants to be #1, not #26. As I said, after Top 10, no one will care about “placements”. No one goes around and proudly says: “I placed #19 in Eurovision”.

R112: Frankly being critic of the Netherlands quality to praise Australia is hilarious

[quote]Then again, it's Netherlands, so why would he be hiding his actual sexuality?

He probably thinks he's keeping his options open. And I'm from the Netherlands and can assure you that there are still plenty of closeted celebrities here, for any number of reasons.

R156, 2018 is not “proof” of anything. We’re in 2019. Israel’s song bombed - because it was one of the worst last eve. And “attending” is not “proof” either. We’re talking about jury and popular votes, not about participants’ decision to attend or not.

R160: Sorry but you are reading too much into eurovision results.

Israel won last year and the politics were exactly the same, and it won due to televote.

Nobody in Europe seem to have nothing against Spain, in fact it's the most visited country in holydays, but they don't vote for Spain on eurovision

R161, you’re reading too much politics into my post. I didn’t say voters ignored Israel because of “politics”. I actually think voters & juries often vote based on how much they like the song/performance. And Israel’s song was one of the worst / least entertaining that night, along with Britain. Obviously Israel wouldn’t win again, but this year’s song could at least be less mind-numbingly BORING. It was clear that (based on the hollow song quality and eyeroll-inducing ‘weeping’ performance) Britain and Israel would be somewhere in the rear, with little public interest in such forgettable tunes (even for Eurovision standards).

After a rapid check, in the last decade, only 3 host countries placed in the top 10 (Lena#2, Babayeva, Fran).

Austria got 0 points when they hosted

Maybe because they had supremely crap songs the year they hosted? The quality of songs varies wildly year-to-year.

And probably on purpose. Hosting 2 years in a row is not so welcomed. Ask Ireland

Lol, presenting a good ENTERTAINING song does not ‘automatically’ mean they’ll “host 2 years straight”. In fact, the odds of that happening are very slim. So there’s no excuse for a boring song.

Could someone explain why the cute Swedish guy performing for Estonia in a CGI thunderstorm wasn’t more popular with the voters?

I thought he’d be a surefire hit with the hetero female voters. But apparently I know nothing about the hetero world.

My mind changed considerably between the 1st hearing of our(Israeli) song and the 20th. I think it will catch many more ears eventually.

As for the political issue, I think Europe missed a very good opportunity to make it an evening against the occupation. Not just Palestinian and Israeli flags hidden here and there, but sing and speak against occupation, against war, against tyrants, against terror. That's universal, not specifically political. There was nothing the EBU could have done about that, and I think it could have sent an important message.

Well, Iceland did and it seemed to annoy the audience. Lots of booing. Bar Rafaeli also seemed a bit frazzled by the stunt.

when staff members were trying to get Hatari's flags before the callings

R168 doing that kind of political stunt would have been really rude towards the hosting country. Palestinians voted in Hamas.

Thank you for everyone contributing comments live last night. It was great banter in this thread.

I wasn't able to go to a friend's Eurovision party as I had committments, so it was nice to share thoughts and comments on here.

R110 No, as I stated they should have won because their song was actually good. The reference to his gay husband was because this is a GAY FORUM and people might have been interested to know he's family.

I would have liked for Mahmood to win tbh, but oh well...The N guy is cute hahaha.

R112 Hah, I'd never seen the official video. What's with two of them turning into furries...

The Norwegians had such a lovely positive energy going on, I'm glad the audience rewarded that by giving them the moral win.

r174 Coming in second is the best possible scenario for Mahmood. His image has been boosted and he can now focus on his own stuff, without the circus of Eurovision hanging around his neck for the rest of his life.

R176 Yeah, that too, really curious to see what he does next.

R147 He came out late so it seems he's doing that old stepping stone... A Tom Daley "bi"

R159/Dutchie, is it really true that Gerard Joling still hasn’t come out? He’s such a queen! And is there any chance Jeroen Pauw has had the homosex? I’m sort of in love with him even though his speaking voice is terrible.

The Old Guard in the showbiz will remain closeted until they die out, no matter the country. That's their right and sort of understandable, it's just a shame there aren't enough role models for the young gays on the same scene, and so they often feel the need to follow the established pattern.

But even that will change eventually, I'm sure.

R171, the Palestinians are to blame for a lot, no doubt about that. If the occupation ends tomorrow, there will be Israeli casualties because the Hamas and Islamic Jihad will not stop being a fundamentalist terrorist organizations. Iranian attempts to influence will not stop. Demonization of Israelis in schools will not stop. Those will remain a long time. Maybe, in time, the Palestinians will be able to choose democracy and peace. maybe.

But, the Gaza siege is inhuman. It has to stop. The settlements are a stick in the wheel of any attempt to end the conflict on pragmatic grounds. They must be stopped.

[quote]Maybe, in time, the Palestinians will be able to choose democracy and peace. maybe.

Getting your own independent country is usually a nice first step in that direction, speaking as someone who was alive to witness our own country achieving its independence (through war). You can't really choose democracy and peace if someone is blocking you from having your own country. "Behave nicely fist and then you'll get a country" is not really something that works for a constitutive nation clamouring to achieve statehood.

It's doubly sickening to see the same ones who had been oppressed throughout history doing the oppression now, but I guess that's human nature for you.

*nicely first

Right now Arcade is number one on itunes on 9 countries, Soldi in 4

[quote]Dutch sign language interpretation of all the finalists' songs

I love this.

Can smn explain why the national professional juries liked the Dutch song so much? It’s a decent song, but it gives me Coldplay vibes and I thought Coldplay is passé now.

The whole world doesn't listen to the same songs, different styles come and go out of fashion in cycles etc...

I'm much more curious about them liking the Swedish schlock so much. I understand Macedonia as the vocals were possibly the best of the night. Though I'm most curious about the Norwegian, Hungarian, Georgian, and Slovenian juries giving the Czech republic 12 points. How does that happen?

I still want to know why the Swedish singer had an American accent during his interviews.

Happy with 5th place. At least we beat Sweden.

r188 He's composed music for some American productions in the past and presumably listened to American music growing up, so it's not hard to assimilate the accent that way. I sound like QEII in person, even though I'm not English.

I love how prevalent the saying "At least we beat Sweden" is among the Norwegians and the Finns. I've noticed those two groups bonding over that shared sentiment on Reddit today. Listen, I love them, but their THIRST this year was unbearable. No one likes a teacher's pet.

I still maintain those four backing singers were too fabulous for words and should return to Eurovision with their own song, sans Lundvik.

R179: Gerard Joling came out years ago, although he may claim to still have sex with the occasional woman.

Jeroen Pauw has a reputation as a pussyhound (by his own account has bedded 300+ women), but said in an interview once that he can appeciate the male form (specifically, a nice male torso). (But then, who can't, right?)

I haven't watched this in decades - and came in after the the last song when I saw you gurls were talking about it...and saw all the kitsch between that and the voting, which was plenty.

It was great fun and the gayest event I've ever seen in my life. It was like walking into a Gay-Never-Never-Land I didn't know existed...through the gay looking glass I went. I've been re-acclimating myself to the str8 world all day. Lucky it's a Sunday.

The Dutch singer Dave (who has lived in France since 1965) also claims to be bisexual: he's been in a relationship with a man for decades, but asserts that, when he "plays away from home," it is always with a "girl." And this guy is as queeny as Edward Hibbert. Go figure.

[Quote]Loved the guys on the livestream cringing at the thought of next year's show taking place in Norway as everything is so damn expensive there.

Well, he's not wrong.

[Quote]I love how prevalent the saying "At least we beat Sweden" is among the Norwegians and the Finns.

Can you blame us though? The Swedes were openly hating on our song for weeks. Saying it was a bad song. They are ALWAYS like this. Thinking they are so much better than everyone else. They don't know what humble means. Fuck them. I'm glad we beat them. The schadenfreude is tasting extra delicious today.

[quote] Fuck them. I'm glad we beat them. The schadenfreude is tasting extra delicious today.

Enjoy it while it lasts.

Are you THE Norwegian of the weather threads?

There’s darkly funny BBC footage of Israeli cops trying to clear religious Orthodox Judaism protestors yesterday (who were clinging on to street lamp posts (!), as the cops tried to drag them away).

Why did Israel hold the contest on Saturday (Shabbat)? They could’ve just moved it to Sunday. Or did they do it on purpose to stick it to the Torah thumpers?

Wow. Such an excruciatingly bland song won. Exactly why Eurovision's attempt to expand to America will be an utter failure. Trying to listen to the finalists and so far only Italy doesn't make me cringe.

[quote]Trying to listen to the finalists and so far only Italy doesn't make me cringe.

Wait until you get to the American entry! The cringe there is stronger than with just about anyone else. And yet she's still made it in the US, so who knows, the American singing competition just might work.

I was a bit surprised to see Bar Rafaeli presenting. She was in hot water years ago for faking a marriage to dodge the mandatory draft.

When quizzed about it, I loved her no-fucks reply. She said smthg like why should she risk dying in the military when instead she can live it up in NYC.

[quote]Why did Israel hold the contest on Saturday (Shabbat)?

Because the vast majority of the viewing public isn't of Jewish faith.

It's always held on a Saturday.

R201 now she is on hot water for unpaid taxes on international revenues

Thanks for the speedy response, R192! I like to think that at the occasional orgies he participates in he’s not exactly opposed to some male attention, too.

Eurovision is costly to stage for the host country.

To the point that some countries don't want to foot the bill and it's in their interest to not send a song that may win.

You could argue the hosting nation doesn't want to have to host the show the following year again at some expense. Wise to enter a song that doesn't humiliate, but mediocre enough that it doesn't win, and they face the costly exercise again.

I posted this article in the second thread already. This whole thing can turn into a nightmare for the public broadcaster if the hosting country isn't prepared to write it off as an investment into tourism or some similar bullshit like that.

[quote]Israel is the first country in the contest's 64-year history to fail to financially support the event, said Eldad Koblenz, the CEO of the Israeli Broadcasting Corporation. "This entire process felt strange," Koblenz said. "We are fully financing this one-night event with a budget intended to support our original programming for the upcoming decade."

[quote]Governments traditionally give anywhere from 30 percent to full financing for the contest, Koblenz said. But about two-thirds of this year's budget of $33.5 million are government subsidies in the form of a loan from the network that will need to be repaid in 15 years.

Swedes actually have the nerve to judge other people's songs?! I hate those uppity meatball-eating fuckers even more now. And congrats to Norway for winning the televote. I'm glad people still like a good old-fashioned disco banger.

All in all, I think this was a pretty good Eurovision year and a fun show last night: a decent song won, there were quite a few good bops I have on repeat in there (I can't stop singing "Chama-chameleon" today), there were plenty of hotties for us to gaze at, the hosts weren't nearly as terrible as those in the past few years were, we got to see the Palestinian flag displayed, Madge gave us even more reasons to hate on her, they really scaled down on the number of those annoying wide shots in the end and we made it to the historic Eurovision thread #4 on DL.

The only complaint I have are the jury results. Sweden finished in top 3 with the juries for the fifth time since 2014, with yet another crappy song. But luckily people are starting to notice how terribly overrated Sweden is with the jurors year after year, hence the backlash with the public.

And Michela's Chameleon isn't the only thing I have on repeat today - I also keep starring at this gif and giggle like a maniac while doing so. Swedes should work on their gracious losing faces more, because those fuckers aren't winning again anytime soon (at least not until they manage to fix the televoting results as well).

Where can Americans watch it?

Bland + bombastic = recipe for Eurovision "victory."

That said, I haven't been able to get the winning song out of my head since last night.

It was a fun Eurovision year, both the lead-up to it and the final week. Not nearly as problematic or depressing as I thought it would be back when I learned it would take place in Israel. I think the event being set in Tel Aviv and not Jerusalem, but most importantly Assi Azar have done the most to achieve that pleasant and relaxed atmosphere. That man is a national treasure.

[quote]and we made it to the historic Eurovision thread #4 on DL

Five parts next year!

r209 You can watch the full show in HD on YouTube if you have a VPN. Using the free one that's built into the Opera browser is the easiest way.

r209 You can also watch it here but it comes with Swedish commentary. They're quiet during the songs, of course.

Livestream from Schipol Airport waiting for Duncan to land

By the way, the quality of the Swedish recording switches to HD ten minutes in, before the songs start.

Here are the countries which failed to qualify, ranked from best to worst.

27. Poland

28. Hungary

29. Lithuania

30. Moldova

31. Romania

32. Belgium

33. Croatia

34. Sakartvelo

35. Portugal

36. Latvia

37. Armenia

38. Montenegro

39. Finland

40. Austria

41. Ireland

The last place doesn't surprise me. Their song really wasn't that bad and I liked that whole 1960's diner theme but that woman looked totally lifeless and bored onstage. But I am shocked to see Austria finishing second to last. I honestly thought she'd qualify. I also feel sorry for poor Darude finishing so low - it was obvious from the interviews that he didn't really take Eurovision too seriously but something tells me he was secretly expecting his old fans with nostalgic memories of "Sandstorm" to push him through to the finals in the end. I didn't like the Finnish song but at least their singer managed to improve his vocals from the national finals quite a bit, so their performance wasn't a total disaster.

Is Duncan wearing Mahmood's shirt right now?

This was actually a fun one, far fewer horrible songs than usual and, amazingly, I could imagine listening to one or two outside of the Eurovision context. And the hosts were great.

Italian dude FTW, though. He was hot.

[quote]34. Sakartvelo

I didn't know that was another name for Georgia

Lol, R208. That was great moment. I was shocked that he was even in contention.

[quote] Wise to enter a song that doesn't humiliate, but mediocre enough that it doesn't win

R206, why do you think that entering a half-memorable, fun song would automatically mean Israel would win again? Do you seriously think they’re that ‘inescapably amazing’ at Eurovision that they INTENTIONALLY need to jeopardise & dumb down their own song so as to avoid the ‘oh so troublesome burden’ of wining again and again and again every year?

Lol, oh please. Israel is not [italic]that[/italic] great at entertaining songwriting to have to ‘worry’ about winning again this year.

Nothing “wise” about the current entry. They just couldn’t come up with a more memorable, better song. Even their previous ‘winning’ song was so-so. They got lucky last time. But luck doesn’t often strike twice.

[quote]But I am shocked to see Austria finishing second to last.

Gurl... that bum note during the semi was the bummest note that ever did bum. Even a tone-deaf person recognised deep down on an instinctual level that it was a crime against nature itself. So much worse than Ireland vocally, though that chick looked like Anna Nicole in her final days, which turned off people even more I guess.

[quote]I didn't like the Finnish song but at least their singer managed to improve his vocals from the national finals quite a bit, so their performance wasn't a total disaster.

I shudder to think what he sounded like during their national finals, then. Because Rejman killed that song in the semi, and not in a good way. Totally off-key from beginning to end and one of the worst vocals of the entire competition. That man should not be singing.

A Swedish juror voted backward during the semi. And she totally looks like someone who would do that.

R223 Isn't that the chick from Alcazar?

Did she vote in reverse order intentionally in the semi or was she having a brain-freeze moment?

Miki of Spain looks like someone who could single-handedly fertilise the entire population of a small country - men and women - so maybe that's why he bombed? Because people were intimidated by his overwhelming sexual presence?

I feel bad for him. He was giving it his all, just like the Swiss guy.

R224 yes, she is

R255 A juror from Denmark a couple of years ago admitted to have voted backward by mistake

The Swedes managed to say this:

[Quote]Båda våra grannländer gick också vidare. Grattis, det är alltid trevligt när grannar lyckas. Men hur det gick till är totalt Kalle Anka.

They congratulate the neighbor countries by getting through to the final, but they don't understand how.

[Quote]Det är exempelvis lite ledsamt att inte ens en stolt popnation som Norge kan hitta något rimligare att skicka än en antik eurodisco-jojk. För att inte tala om den trallande danskan på sin höga barnstol... Vad fan är det som pågår hos Sveriges goda grannar? Ironi? Uppgivenhet?

They don't understand how a proud pop nation like Norway can't send something better than an antique eurodisco-joik.

Great thread from my fellow Eurovision fans!

r227 I mean, I'm sure it's always by mistake.

r228 Omg, those nasty comments about the sweet Danish girl! They're horribly ungracious, and I'll be enjoying that gif of Lundvik's losing face even more now.

I heart Madonna represented US? Where did she placed?

Graham Norton was quite droll last night. He called the Oz act: “that’s what would happen if windscreen wipers could sing”. Lol.

Asshole Swedes:

[Quote]Vad fan är det som pågår hos Sveriges goda grannar? Ironi? Uppgivenhet?

What the fuck is going on with Sweden's good neighbors? Irony? Giving up?

What did the Swedes say about the Danish singer?

Why was the twee Danish Amélie singing in French?

The U.K's best ever entry in 2007.

I think that "We escaped Swedish clutches!" holiday Norway just celebrated additionally fueled them to write such nasty comments about KeiiNO.

r237 What absolute horseshit!

I LOVED the unintentionally hilarious part when the American rapper was being interviewed before his gig with Madonna and the clueless rapper said smthg like: “Yeah, my MOM is a big fan of hers, she’s been listening to Madonna for ages”.

Both I and Graham Norton chuckled with glee at the faux pas. Madge must be thrilled to be reminded so innocently that she’s ancient.

Ooooh, I remember that entry @ R237.

Well, at least it was memorable. 12 years later and it’s still burned into my memory. Can’t ever unsee a cheesefest like that.

R237 sorry but my underwear are still the best thing UK produced on Eurovision stage

Another reason to hate on Sweden is the fact that they're the only country (together with Azerbaijan, which at least incorparates mugham singing in their songs often) that hasn't used a single word of their native language in their songs in the last two decades (Denmark would be included too, but Leonora actually mumbled a few words in Danish in her song this year). It's all generic songs in bloody English for them.

It's funny but the only time we've heard Swedish on Eurovision stage since that language rule was abolished was in 2012, when Finland sent a Swedish-language song to Baku. But we've seen this year that Swedes obviously copied last year's jury winner (and that worked well for them) so maybe next year they'll copy this year's televote winner and send something a bit more ethnic-sounding to Eurovision.

R186: In my opinion it's very obvious why profesional juries voted for The Netherlands or Italy, it's way less obvious why they voted for Australia or the Czech Republic.

I think the televote reflect that for some eurofans Sweden is terribly overrated. I think Sweden was top 5 for juries the whole decade (apart of 2010 of course) and in some cases it's quite difficult to explain.

I understand Sweden being high a lot of years because they take the song contest seriously, but the juries love is simply too much

One of the Tolmacheva twins ranking in the final was

1) Malta

2) Greece

3) San Marino

4) Azerbajian

5) Belarus

15) Italy

17) Netherlands

The other Tolmacheva twin voted

1) Italy

2) Greece

3) Azerbajan

4) Cyprus

5) Belarus

19) Netherlands

25) Australia

In England THIS is the most famous UK entry and winner - even 52 years on.

Sandie is well known in Spain too, there are a spanish version of that song

This is interesting.

[quote]Graph over televote/jury split per country in the final since the introduction of mandatory combo voting (2009-2019)

[quote]The number on the bars is the ratio: below 1 means that juries generally vote that country's submissions higher than the televoters, above 1 means that the televoters rate that country's submission higher than the juries. The number above the bars are the total number of votes the country has received in this period. Not all countries have performed in the final every year, which means that the data will be stronger for some countries than for others.

You can see who would have an interest in the current system continuing. And looking at the Russia love from the public, I'm kinda glad the juries are there to thwart it winning constantly.

When I lived in Brighton I used to walk past the Brighton Dome on my way to work every day.

What it must have been like to be in the audience on the evening of 6 April 1974.

One thing I really dislike about the Italians is how their juries deliberately downvote songs that are the biggest threat to them each year - they gave Holland 0 points. Cloggies still played a fair game and gave Italy 6 points.

Portugal did it in 2017, zero points to Italy, zero points to Bulgaria.

And interesting: Portugal jury gave zero points to Spain (never a good sign), in semis Spanish jury gave zero points to Portugal (never a good sign either). On televote 12 points from Spain to Portugal, and 12 points from Portugal to Spain

The Netherlands jury also gave their 12 points to Sweden, arguably their biggest competition.

Fun video taken in the green room, of contestants reacting to different songs. Best part starts at 3:00, when they form a choo choo during Miki's song.

We've come a long way, haven't we?

Cloggies said we'll get first details about the upcoming Eurovision in a few weeks. Prepare for a Eurovision 2020 thread next month!

Wow, those Swedish shitheads really like to throw shade around. Now they've published a whole article on John Lundvik complaining about Michael Rice's performance of the song he had penned.

I totally called Michael having problems with his voice; it's the only thing that explains his performances this past week. Maybe he shouldn't have sung at the embassy and all those other venues, and instead saved his voice? It's crazy to me that he has these problems at 21 already.

Michael should have eased up on downing all them sausage rolls at the embassy as well.

r256 Oh, and that article seems like a hit piece on Duncan as well. So he declined to sing at the presser because they always sing at a special club for the press later on. How horrible of him. I agree that journos and fan blogs shouldn't be asking the singers to sing a little snippet of their song for them. They're going to ruin their voice by singing at an inappropriate venue just so you score a couple more clicks? That's so gross to me.

I saw a clip of Crone singing his song for the Wiwibloggs on some balcony and of course he couldn't hit the high note. He said "I can't do it" and that then started circulating around, as if to prove he's a shit singer.

Apparently Michael nipped into the Tel Aviv branch of Gregg's for a pre-show steak bake!

It mustn't have agreed with him.

The stress of it all and constantly switching from the heat outside to the over-cooled interiors probably did it. Doubt he's used to that.

R261 That's a good point. Slovenian zombie girl wasn't the only one who complained about the air-cons; Sergey Lazarev did it too. And the climate change must have been stressful for people's vocal chords as well, because most of them aren't used to the humid Mediterranean one. The only one who probably felt right at home there was the Maltese brat.

Holy shit, I just realized this was the last Eurovision contest in the 2010s. I hope someone does a thorough study of the 2010-2019 results, to see which countries did the best and which ones did the worst in this era.

Michael Rice should at least be happy that they changed the voting system a few years ago, because I believe he'd receive 0 points by the old one.

r262 I just checked and it's been a decade since Rybak's win already?! Well, shit. And then I looked up our own "sisters" just for fun and realised I also watched that show live in 2002 and that was almost twenty years ago. Too scared to look up even older acts now.

I'm feeling so nauseous right now. Is there a bigger bitch than time? Which is also what Madonna has been asking herself all day today, I'm sure.

I think Madonna’s fine. Her capacity for self-examination appears to be severely limited.

Jurij stayed behind for the Grand Final. I stan a supportive queen! Very much not looking forward towards never seeing or hearing from him again, I have to say.

r265 Yeah, I was just joking. Madonna's more than fine, it's her management that sucks. Losing perspective is what inevitably happens when you're surrounded by Yes people most of your life.

Is this real life? Majority of the comments of the winner's performance are positive. The like to dislike ratio is not bad either.

why is that so surprising to you R267 ?

R268 Because the last three winners have been considered quite controversial and divisive. Netta's performance from last year's grand final even has more dislikes than likes. Jamala has plenty of dislikes as well.

John Lundvik with his "life partner". What a manly-looking woman!

[quote]Wait until you get to the American entry! The cringe there is stronger than with just about anyone else. And yet she's still made it in the US, so who knows, the American singing competition just might work.

She's always been more successful in Europe than she was in the US. Her contemporaries such as Janet, Whitney and Mariah, who always outsold her in the US, were never as big in Europe. Her "music" is made for European ears because Americans have been done with her since the '90s.

Ireland, The Netherlands, and Switzerland all stick out historically.

R269: There are reasons for that.

Netta song was not everybody's cup of tea from the very beginning, so it was expected a bad reaction to her win.

Jamala song was controversial from the beginning too, because the song is clearly political. I have to be honest, i think the song is great, but i think that now, when i watched the song contest i found it incredibly boring and her performance pitchy. I was very surprised that she won because in my opinion (at least the night of the show) was that Australia and Russia were very superior.

And with Salvador is a different case, Amar pelos dois just bashed the competence, he won the juries vote and the televote by miles (and that with Bulgaria being one of the best results for a second ever). The problem seems to be that the song is not eurovisive and some (very vocal) eurofans hate it. Salvador didn't helped with his snobbish attitude.

Arcade was popular from the beginning, the song is very pleasant. I doubt it'll be a controversial winner unless something weird will happen

So little discussion of who’s hot here? Europeans. 🙄

It was high time for a non-controversial winner, let's be real. Normalcy is good now and then.

r274 How do you mean? We've had four threads now of calling out the guys we find hot before and during the main Eurovision week. You didn't bother checking out those raunchy, totally NSFW posts but instead opted for some weird stereotype? Bitch, we're as thirsty as you are, believe me.

[Quote]Sweden bombing in the televote yet another year totally made my night. I think Europe sent Sweden a clear message: FUCK OFF WITH YOUR JURY BAIT GENERIC SHIT POP SONGS! No one wants to hear that crap.

PREACH!

[Quote]Still, there were songs that were much more deserving of the first spot than the Dutch or Swedish entries: Norway and its simply brilliant, catchy and original song, the lovely ballad by Australia (which reminds me a little of Kate Bush) or the spectacular number from Serbia by Nevena Božović, are all better.

Thanks :)

If the jury : televote split were more reasonable, say 25 : 75, Norway would have won. Of course, Russia would probably win more often under that system and I for one am not prepared to pay that price.

With the old system the results were more or less the same, i think Norway was ahead of Switzerland but that's all.

I like the new system, sometimes a decent act gets vindicated llike Poland in 2016 and Norway this year.

And i know spanish song was not good, but it's difficult to understand why he got 7 points from juries while Czech Republic got more than 130

R278 No, Norway wins only if the televote accounts for more than 85%.

Yes, The Netherlands would have won by 62 points. I don't know why I said Norway. Maybe because people keep bringing it up.

Voting for Barbara Dex award is now open!

I couldn't decide between Eliot and Sebastian Rejman. It would be nice to see the award going to Barbara Dex' homeland for the first time since 2000 but I still voted for Finland in the end - no outfit this year (not even Eliot's or Conan's praying mantis dress) came even close to the hideousness level of those pants.

During the show the spanish host commented that Tamta was a firm candidate to the Barbara Dex award

Tamta looks fine to me? Sure, it's a bit busy and try-hard but in comparison to Duncan's... whatever the hell that was, she was more than fine.

I was split between Miki and Lundvik because performing in a simple black shirt seems worse to me than trying too hard. I understand why Miki did it as his staging was so garish this was the best way to stand out. But what was Lundvik's excuse?

I voted for Finland in the end because it's the worst dressed award, not the "tried the least" award. Sebastian looked like a tired-ass showgirl.

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned. Here's the alleged boyfriend of Duncan.

r285 I've been googling his boyfriend last week but couldn't find him. Cute!

I was googling him too and without results. Cute guy, indeed.

He's the one in red in this clip. Notice how tight he hugged Duncan and wouldn't let it go for some time and touched the neck afterwards.

Late night host Jeroen Pauw devoted a full hour to Duncan yesterday. It was sweet. Duncan seems nice in a self-deprecatory sort of way. I don’t find him attractive at all, though.

Norway were robbed.

That is very much true, R290. I suspect that if the juries hadn't voted in the very bizarre manner they did, Norway would have shot to the very top.

Did Duncan meet his bf at his orthodontist's office? They both have ginormous front chompers.

The robber and the robbed.

r288 Wow, imagine your boyfriend allowing you to come to Eurovision with him. Must be nice...

Everybody knew that juries wouldn't vote for Norway. In the best case scenario they could have got the points that went to Czech Republic.

The same way that it was totally expected the juries voting massively for Sweden (and the televoting result for Sweden was not a surprise either).

Eurovision has it's suprises (i doubt nobody thought North Macedonia would do so well with juries), but it was clear that the only countries that will score high with juries and televote would be Italy and The Netherlands

Sweden and their ranking with the juries over the years. 'Nuff said.

2012: 1st

2013: 3rd

2014: 2nd

2015: 1st

2016: 9th

2017: 3rd

2018: 2nd

2019: 1st

So the dump girl from Alcazar didn't understand how to vote in the semifinal and ranked Netherlands-Switzerland as 17-18th thinking it meant 17 and 18 points

Apparently a juror of Czech Republic is suspected to have done the same thing in the semifinal.

And even EBU may have awarded the Belarus fake points to the bottom 10 rather than top 10 of their simulation.

Don't let other details distract you from the fact Eurovision 2019 is won by gay/bi men not only the actual winner but also the runner-up and the third place.

R298 And a gay guy in the last place as well. That's a perfect bookend.

So I guess I was the only one who liked San Marino's happy happy song. Know anything about Serhat?

Eurovision’s Sanitized Vision of Israel

[quote]The 2019 Eurovision Song Contest, held at Expo Tel Aviv, seemed intent on presenting Israel as miraculously untouched by political tensions.

What they expect. It's supposed to not being a political event.

I know Israel government politics are dubious (and that being generous) but this is hardly the first country with dubious politics to host eurovision in the last two decades.

Every country try to show the best face of the country.

The number of gay people in the first positions this year is pretty high, but this is probably the year with more openly gay/bi singers. Other years there were obviously gay contestants but from pretty homophobic countries.

I heard the rumours about Sergey here for the first time (of course i didn't followed that much 2016 contest). I thought he was a father (and i supposed he was married)

It's a complicated discussion. You could argue this event is inherently political because of the political voting that takes place at the end. Some of the more homophobic countries could argue that those rainbow flags and the general gay friendliness are very much political statements. Also, a Brazilian flag was allowed but a Palestinian wasn't?

r302 I think I read somewhere his child was born using a surrogate, but I could be wrong.

[bold]EBU issues statement on Eurovision 2019 Grand Final jury result[/bold]

Norway now officially sixth, behind Sweden! And the UK humiliated even further...

[quote]"The Belarusian jury was dismissed following the reveal of their votes from the first Semi-Final which is contrary to the rules of the Eurovision Song Contest. In order to comply with the Contest’s voting regulations, the EBU worked with its voting partner digame to create a substitute aggregated result (calculated based on the results of other countries with similar voting records), which was approved by voting monitor Ernst & Young, to determine the Belarusian jury votes for the Grand Final."

[quote]"The EBU can confirm, following standard review practices, we have discovered that due to a human error an incorrect aggregated result was used. This had no impact on the calculation of points derived from televoting across the 41 participating countries and the overall winner and Top 4 songs of the Contest remain unchanged.

[quote]To respect both the artists and EBU Members which took part, we wish to correct the final results in accordance with the rules. The correct jury points have now been added to the scoreboard and the revised totals for each participating broadcaster, and their country, have been published on eurovision.tv.

[quote]The EBU and its partners digame and Ernst & Young deeply regret that this error was not identified earlier and will review the processes and controls in place to prevent this from happening again."

Macedonia, Serbia, San Marino, and Belarus jumped one place, and Cyprus and Malta both two places. So that's nice for them, I guess.

Probably the most important thing after that adjustment is that Macedonia won the jury vote, not Sweden.

Of course, we'll never know how the Belarus jury would have actually voted.

[ quote]Norway now officially sixth, behind Sweden!

yikes, are the Norwegians gonna revolt?

I'm almost glad that score mix-up happened: it would be very painful to see Tamara's low result from the televote revealed as last and we wouldn't get to see John Lundvik's hilarious losing face. But on the other hand it would be nice to see Macedonia named the juries' winner. Another thing that sucks about the new vote reveal is that they never proclaim who the televote winner is, so poor KeiiNO didn't get a chance to bask in the glory for a few seconds.

[quote]Another thing that sucks about the new vote reveal is that they never proclaim who the televote winner is, so poor KeiiNO didn't get a chance to bask in the glory for a few seconds.

I think that would take too much away from the eventual winner. You'd be explicitly saying they're the People's Choice (which they are) and basically the co-winners of the contest. I think the host delivering the result in an enthusiastic way was enough. Also, the countries coming after them would feel deflated a bit if you pointed that out.

On the other hand, the hosts did menton Sweden was the jury winner, didn't they? So that's a double standard right there.

This was actually the second time Tamara has been screwed by those Swedish fuckers: she came 10th in televote in 2008 semi final, but 2008 and 2009 had a stupid rule where only 9 qualifiers got selected by the public, with the one in the 10th place replaced by a song that was picked by a special jury.

It was obvious that rule was implemented only in case one of the Scandinavian countries (Sweden, in particular) failed to reach top 10 with the televoters and to the surprise of no one they traded lovely Tamara with alien look-a-like Charlotte Perrelli and her awful song. Tamara's horrible dress aside (she looked like a bloody Sicilian widow), this was a fantastic song and so much better than that Swedish crap.

And to make matters worse, the exact same thing happened to poor Macedonia the next year as well, when they were once again10th in the semi final but the juries replaced them Finland.

Jonida Maliqi dancing to 'Soldi'. God, I love this woman (fake tits and all)!

r311 That was cute. She's growing on me and her vocals were incredible when it mattered the most.

If I were one of the acts in that section, I'd be dancing like crazy to every song, even the shit ones. Okay, maybe not to the Israeli and the Austrian and the Slovenian one.

Eurovision stage is no more; they've already demolished it. Is this the most depressing photo possible or what?

R312: There's only two options you can sit and wait the results (probably getting more and more nervous) or enjoy the show. It seems this year most people really have a great time

I am in love with Mahmood.

^^ He seems to be on cloud nine right now, what with his music charting so high internationally.

The Azerbaijan guy is fucking hot!! Is he family?

I'm getting straight douchebro vibes from the Azeri guy.

Yeah, he's straight. Don't let that falsetto fool you, he still dances like a common jock.

I know some of you made fun of him. But the guy from Lithuania is actually gay?

His Insta is completely neutral and I still think he's gay based off his mannerisms in the interviews but... he's also [italic]really[/italic] into guns, so that's odd and deplorable, especially for a European.

Eurovision contestants are so boring these days and their instagram accounts put me to sleep. Does anyone remember Mihai Trăistariu from 2006 Eurovision? We need more shameless whores like he was to make things more interesting.

Israel/Tel Aviv broadcast a spectacular production, I'll say that.

r322 Or even last year's Swedish twink...

... #NeverForget.

Juicee tittays

R324 Still haven't gotten over the annoying Swedish twink, I see. I was just thinking about him the other day too; I was thinking how fun it would have been if the new vote reveal system was introduced a year earlier. Seeing his losing face when his lousy televote points were revealed would have been the highlight of the night for me.

But he does have a nice dick, gotta give him that.

He is [italic]always[/italic] in my mind and heart! Though I kinda hate his cock pic as I just can't with foreskins covering the hard knob. Retract that shit like your momma taught you.

I admit I would have LOVED to see his stupid fucking face crack live on TV as he's definitely magnitudes more punchable than Lundvik for me. But he's also thrown delicious shade about the other songs that year, and what has Lundvik shown in the way of personality, exactly? Seems like such a well-meaning but bland dude to me.

R328 Now that you mentioned his momma you got me thinking about Benji's ex-stepfather. He broke up with Pernilla years ago and left her heartbroken. I'm sure poor Benji was upset to lose such a manly role model as well.

r329 Shiiiit, that is a MAN right there!

Top 10 most watched acts of this year on the official Eurovision YouTube channel (music videos + all performances), in ascending order:

[quote]Norway, Malta, Iceland, Cyprus, France, Switzerland, Spain, Russia, Italy, Netherlands

Sweden found dead in a ditch. Sad about Australia.

Spain always does great on youtube views (unfortunately that doesn't translate on jury votes or televote)

R331 The Swedish song (despite the low YT view count) is one of the most downloaded songs of this year's contest on iTunes and has charted in quite a few countries. I don't think youtube views matter much, because they can easily be bought (as was the case with Malta this year) or are just the result of that artist coming from a huge country (Polish song is one of the most viewed from the first semi final and they didn't even qualify, but their songs always have lots of views thanks to 50 million of bored Poles who have nothing better to do).

R330 He was definitely a big improvement over Benji's father, wasn't he? Looks like Benji's dad frequents the same teeth whitening shop and tanning salon Miss Jonida Maliqi does.

r333 Damn, you can see so much of Benji in that face. Except for the gapped teeth, that is. He looks like a proper sleazeball.

[quote]I don't think youtube views matter much, because they can easily be bought (as was the case with Malta this year)

Per the video description, YouTube advertisement views have been deducted from the total amounts. But of course the size of the country does explain Bilal's views, for example.

So many of the songs were not ready for prime time, but we love them for that. The "dance" intros were craptastic. Parkour on ancient temples or churches? Bravo, shameless producers.

I adored the postcards this year and don't think dance as an artform diminishes any place it's performed at.

I usually prefer the postcards that are filmed in artists' home countries. The ones this year were cute but they felt like tourist ads for Israel. Israeli Tourist Board is working super hard on promoting Tel Aviv as a party destination, because they also have ads on international TVs running right now.

[quote] don't think dance as an artform diminishes any place it's performed at.

Of course it can. I remember how outraged Aborigines were when this happened a few years ago:

[quote]The ones this year were cute but they felt like tourist ads for Israel.

I think the host country should get as many perks as possible as a reward for their win and also as a way to cover the costs of the hosting, so showcasing their tourist attractions seems like a no-brainer to me. I want the sights and sounds of a new host country every year, otherwise what's the point? We might as well have the contest in Düsseldorf permanently and call it a day if what's outside of the arena doesn't matter.

[quote]Of course it can. I remember how outraged Aborigines were when this happened a few years ago:

Well, that's striptease, so not exactly an artform. You can always find the most extreme example of something to support your argument, but that's just disingenuous at the end of the day.

Nooo!

[quote]Portugal have won the Barbara Dex Award 2019. Their entrant Conan Osiris received the highest amount of votes. He’s been chosen as the worst dressed contestant of the Eurovision Song Contest in 2019 and becomes the successor of Eye Cue, who won the award last year.

[quote]Where Eleni Foureira finished second at the Eurovision Song Contest, Tamta finished second on the Barbara Dex Award. Her latex outfit with dress change did not go down particularly well. In third place, we see another girl with high boots: ZENA from Belarus.

[quote]Furthermore, Eliot from Belgium and Tamara Todevska from North Macedonia complete the top five. In total, Songfestival.be received over 4000 votes for the award, which has become a tradition in the aftermath of the Eurovision Song Contest.

I regret voting for Finland and don't know how the Belgium twink managed to hide from me on that list.

Why do people hate Tamara's gown so much? It was far from beautiful and a bit too matronly-looking but why on Earth did she get more votes than Sebastian Rejman's kinky boots did?

Jacques Houdek is not happy that some Croatian newspaper accused him of using Roko for his own promotion and hogging the spotlight:

[quote] I don’t know what did you expect from me? To get invisible? I am very charismatic person and yes, I have talent and I have my opinion. And I am very powerful even without trying to make an effort. I have used all these characteristics in order to promote our Roko and to serve our song and our Croatia. Because “The Dream” was our common project. Thanks to all of you, who have recognized that.

Well, he has a high self esteem, that's for sure

r341 Bitch is so clueless. Everyone but him sees he's used the quiet Roko as his promotional tool. No doubt he'll insinuate himself into the next year's delegation as well. He's tasted international fame once so of course he wants more.

Azerbaijan - Chingiz - Truth - The only Eurovision 2019 song I wanted to replay.

r344 Such a nice voice and he's come a long way; it's crazy to hear those traditional sounds in a totally different genre.

So what's next for him? I assume ten to twenty kids?

I can't believe people actually like Chingiz's song. Sure, he's super handsome and a great singer but c'mon - the song itself was totally bland. No one would care about it if it was sung by someone less attractive.

I rewatched the grand final yesterday and I still can't believe the Netherlands won. I actually had to fast forward through Duncan's performance, that's how boring it was. Italy was robbed!

R346: i'm the oppossite, i think he is one of the most deserving winners this decade. In fact this is probably the year i'm more happy with the results. I don't think my favourite and my second favourite ended first and second ever

R345: It seems Chingiz has a thing for traditional music. He sang flamenco on one of the parties. And it's curious that his favourite eurovision song of recent years was Spain 2012 (or at least that's what he said to spanish press, maybe he had a different favourite song for every country)

How did Australia and Israel get into Eurovision?

Israel is a member of the European Broadcasting Union and Australia got invited.

Chingiz sounds like a jerk who thinks a bit too highly of himself to me. Just read these excerpts from a recent interview:

[quote] A very strange thing happened. Four days after the competition, they make changes. These changes only affected me. They didn't affect the other participants.Azerbaijan has switched places with Macedonia. All Europeans say that they acted unfairly with me, that I had to take a higher place. But everything happened differently. For me there is no difference. Anyway, I didn't become a winner. Subsequent changes are also irrelevant. There was an injustice against us in the competition. We wanted to win! The seventh place was not ours, but the eighth place - even more so. Therefore, I wrote on an Instagram page that the contest was over, but the results are still changing. How correct is it? That's a problem, this is such a big competition. I don't understand what is happening, and I don't know what changes will happen next week. I don't know if there was a falsification, but we couldn't have taken the seventh place. Many Azeri people living in Europe voted for me enough. I think that the votes were incorrectly counted. All have seen it. I have nothing to say.

What do you think about Duncan's winning for Netherlands?:

[quote] The song was good, but the staging was weak. I think our performance was better. We thought we will win. But it turned out different. The main thing is that we performed well and represented Azerbaijan proudly. Although the contest is over, but as a musician I am still in demand. I received many new offers from Europe. Soon I will go here and will spread my art.

Did you want to get votes and support from the sexual minorities with your half-naked pics on Instagram?:

[quote] Believe it or not, after posting these photos I couldn’t log in to Instagram without a fear, because what was written and sent to me was really unpleasant. They wrote very obscene things. Ye beni Recep, öp beni Recep (Eat me, Recep, kiss me, Recep). The purpose of these photos was to attract the attention of not only sexual minorities, but also normal people. If your body allows and there are no flaws on it, then there is nothing wrong with that. Normal people were okay with that. They liked it, commented. I admit that my photos caused a big noise in Europe.

R352: It's a song contest, not a staging contest, someone should tell him about it

He's such a simpleton judging by those quotes. And I totally called that he's as dumb as a box of rocks when he flashed his biceps in the green room during the Grand Final.

[quote]The purpose of these photos was to attract the attention of not only sexual minorities, [bold]but also normal people.[/bold]

Oooh, bitch, you are so fucking cancelled, it's not even funny. DEAD to me, you piece of shit.

Chingiz should do porn.

[quote]Chingiz should do porn

But only normal people can watch!

Forget Chingiz. Listen to Duncan.

Does Duncan ever sing in Dutch? I'm not a big fan of continental singers singing in English.

I also wonder why so many of the contestants performed in English. Are they hoping to enter a bigger market by doing so? It is the thing I liked most about the guy from Italy. He sang in his own language.

There's one. Here a duet. I heard from some Dutchies that songs sound awful in Dutch.

Thank god Duncan sings in English. Dutch - especially when sung - freaks me out, just like Danish.

I've listened to songs in hundreds of languages so far and even the ugliest of languages usually sound tolerable when they're sung (with the possible exception of Greenlandic and German).

People who think Dutch sounds ugly should listen to some Boudewijn de Groot. He's pretty much unknown outside of Holland but cloggies absolutely worship him and they will fall in love with you if you'll name-drop him in a conversation with them.

Not languages have the same musicality, while romance languages (italian, spanish, portuguese, french) usually sound well singing, it doesn't happen the same with other languages, german is great if you are into hard rock, but not that great for ballads or dance music.

MOst countries went with english because frankly english sound way better than their native languages (i doubt Sweden will dominate eurovision if they send songs in swedish every year)

Speaking of songs in different languages, this song R358 was the one he's written and sold to K-pop boyband TVXQ. The lyrics were slightly changed and translated to Korean.

[bold]182 million tune in to 64th Eurovision Song Contest as young audience numbers surge[/bold]

[quote]The Grand Final achieved, on average, a one percentage point higher TV audience share year on year of 36.7% - more than double the average prime-time viewing share for the same group of channels (16.7%).

[quote]Younger audiences are watching the Eurovision Song Contest in ever greater numbers too. On average, 45.3% of 15 to 24-year-olds watching TV in 40 markets enjoyed the Grand Final; 2 percentage points higher than 2018 and four times higher than the broadcast channels average (11.7%).

[quote]Online, the Eurovision Song Contest had 40 million unique viewers on YouTube from 225 territories, during the week of the event. 72% of live show viewing on YouTube was by the under 35s.

182 million is nothing to scoff at.

Keiino & Saara Aalto remix. It's great in some places and not so great in others.

I still feel bad for Saara coming so low last year with her fun little bop.

Argument over which Dutch city should host. The black guy is insufferable.

I just listen Soldi on the most important pop radio in Spain. It's a half spanish half italian version, it's been a while since the last italian singer had a hit in Spain. Last year it was the second place the one whogot more attention too. And talking about Eleni, she will be one of the singers who will perform in the Pride this year. Mikolas Josef is other of the singers that will be at Pride in Madrid this year

Mahmood still being dreamy. He's apparently really into Pokémon?

r369 I love the Spanish hybrid version of Soldi.

[quote]Mikolas Josef is other of the singers that will be at Pride in Madrid this year

Good for him. I see his Insta is still thirst central.

It's starting to look like we're going to Rotterdam next year. That's going to be the ugliest city to host Eurovision since Dusseldorf.

Called it! Both of the guys at r368 are annoying but they also present some very good arguments. It's a historic occasion so it's weird that it wouldn't take place in the capital. On the other hand, it wouldn't be a precedent, with Tel Aviv being the most recent example of that. And the two cities are so well-connected, both the fans and the singers will be able to visit Amsterdam as much as they'll like.

This year there'll be a very eurovisive Pride in Spain because Luca Hanni will be there too. Duncan Laurence has two concerts on autumm

Is the Spanish Pride always this huge or is it just this year? Do other Eurovision acts perform in other capitals or do they mostly stick to the same Pride event, is what I'm asking I guess.

I think it's huge every year, but now there's a conservative government in Madrid who knows what will happen in the following years

KEiiNO and Tamta will be at Madrid Pride too. Tamta will perform also at Barcelona Pride.

Michael Rice to headline Stoke-on-Trent Pride...Newcastle Pride....and whatever small city Pride he can get!

Well, it’s about fucking time!

No mention of Netflix also premiering a spoof of it starring Will Ferrell.

r378 I can't believe this has actually happened!!!

[quote]Netflix, which is not in the live programming business, has no plans for live Eurovision broadcasts; its rights are for VOD only.

Well, shit. Better than nothing, I guess.

Oops, my bad, the article does mention the Will Ferrell film.

I’m wondering now if they’ll use any commentary when they release the 2019 semis and finals. Graham Norton’s or no commentary at all?

Started watching final on Netflix. It looks like there’s no commentary at all. Shame. That’s part of the fun. I’d love to have heard Graham Norton’s.

I don't like Norton's commentary at all. He constantly shits on every country as if they're from another planet, but presents the British act as the greatest of all time. He is supposed to be a commentator, not a cheerleader. And now other commentators are starting to copy him as well, which is a shame. This event should be about music and celebration, not blatant nationalism. Leave that to the sporting events.

r383 Oh, and is this your first time watching this year's final? Who is/was your favourite?

No, R385, I watched the final live via a Swedish TV app. It was great. The Swedish commentary was a tad intrusive, though. My favorites were Italy (Mahmood!), Norway, Switzerland and The Netherlands.

I re-watched the second semi-final, too, mostly for the Shava Band performance of “A Mllion Dreams.” It’s very moving.

r387 Thanks, I'll have to watch that performance as I usually take a bathroom break during interval acts.

Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams apparently play singers from Iceland in the Eurovision film.

We should know soon whether Rotterdam or Masht got the nod, no?

Sorry, Maastricht.

[quote]Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams apparently play singers from Iceland in the Eurovision film.

Ha! That doesn't surprise me at all for some reason. And yes, we should know by the end of August which city won the bid. Still hoping it's Rotterdam because I want to feel smug as I called it immediately after Duncan's win.

I like Maastricht’s pitch video more, though, R391. Rotterdam’s was trying too hard to seem “edgy” and “street.”

Netherlands is getting ready...

Het Grote Songfestivalfeest (The Road to the Eurovision Song Contest) concert to be held in Amsterdam on 15th December

Cast

Anne Marie David (Luxembourg 1973 winner )

Charlotte Perrelli

Corinne Hermès (Luxembourg 1983 winner)

Dana International

Dima Bilan

Edsilia Rombley (Netherlands 1998 and 2007)

Eimear Quinn (Ireland 1996 winner)

Ell & Nikki (the Azeri duo who won in 2011)

Emmelie de Forest

Izhar Cohen (Israel 1978 winner)

Katrina and the Waves (UK 1997 winner)

Keiino

Lenny Kuhr (one of the 1969 winners)

Loreen

Marie Myriam (France 1977 winner)

Marlayne & Mandy (who?)

Netta Barzilai

Niamh Kavanagh (one of the Irish winner in mid 90s)

Ruslana

Ruth Jacott (1993 Dutch entry)

Sandra Kim (Belgium 1986 winner)

Sergey Lazarov

Getty Kaspers (Teach-In) (one of the Ding-a-Dong winners)

The Olsen Brothers (Danish 2000 winners)

Nicole (Germany 1982 winner)

Willeke Alberti (a Dutch entry in the 90s)

Gali Atari (one of the Israeli 1979 winners)

Serhat (so random)

Mahmood

Eleni Foureira

Verka Serduchka

Some of them are coming directly from their retirement home!

Also starring: a méga-camion of Max Factor.

This is our singer next eurovision. He is very good live. He tried to go to eurovision some years ago as a member of a boyband (Auryn, you know that every boyband has a gay member, well, this one had one straight member).

This is the first time that Spain sends a commercially successful singer who is in a good moment of his career in a good while

His face looks like at least 2 botched plastic surgeries.

Hungary is not going to participate this year. It seems the show is too gay for them

Yes, someone made a thread about it yesterday. Good fucking riddance.

R393 Johnny Logan and Linda Martin added

who is still live and hasn't got invited and/or accepted?

Someone should start the official 2020 Eurovision thread. Looks like the drama is starting early this year.

Mahmood at the eurovision concert they did in Netherlands last weekend

Some of the old winners tried to sing it live. I guess it is better than lipsyncing over their 70s version

In Netherlands for the holidays and Duncan Laurence is all over the TV like a bad rash.