Never a nul moment in Eurovision
Ballads, quirky songs and a stage invasion – all the classic ingredients were there, writes Chris Lochery
For once, it looked as though it was going to be a rather politically calm Eurovision Song Contest. There had been a ripple of controversy after the first semi-final on Tuesday, when a Chinese broadcaster took objection to Ireland’s same-sex dancers and refused to air it, but everything seemed to have been settled by curtain-up in Lisbon’s Altice Arena on Saturday.
Then the UK took to the stage. Surie was well into the show’s ninth song, Storm, when an invader rushed the stage and snatched the mic from her hand. The man, a serial stage-crasher who goes by the name Dr Activist, shouted what sounded like “For the Nazis of the UK media, we demand freedom,” into the mic before he was grabbed by security.
Remarkably, Surie managed to pick the song back up and finish it (high notes and all) to a rapturous ovation. And very few votes.
The commotion didn’t throw the contest off its stride for long, however. After a bit of impromptu host-and-crowd patter – which is almost uniformly awkward and uncomfortable to watch, even when things are running smoothly – proceedings were quickly back to normal.
The competition was filled with the usual fare we’ve come to expect from these cross-continental events – a base of standard dance-pop songs and a smattering of dreamy/dreary ballads seasoned with a couple of truly standout stage-shows.
Eurovision’s 2018 final kicked off with a blast of fire as Ukrainian goth-vampire Melovin emerged from his piano crypt, whipping up the crowd with Under the Ladder,a high-octane singalong.
Host nation Portugal suffered the infamous winners’ curse, entering a rather forgettable bit of balladry that sank to the bottom of the scoreboard (a similar fate to that of Austria in 2014, and Ukraine in 2017). Moldova snatched the crown for the night’s most ambitious staging, acting out an entire end-of-the-pier farce in their three minutes, complete with body doubles, costume changes and a bit of Paul Daniels magic thrown in for good measure.
The juries fell hard for Austria’s impressive vocals, as Cesar blasted out his Sam Smith-sounding entry Nobody But You; as well as Benjamin Ingrosso’s Bieber-lite pop jam, Dance You Off, which was exactly the sort of masterclass in pop production for which Sweden is known.
As is often the case, the music industry’s favourites sat at odds with audiences at home.
Millions of viewers across Europe and beyond (hello, Australia…) voted in their droves for Italy’s plucky little banjo song, Non Mi Avete Fatto Niente, about the recent spate of terror attacks in Europe – which ended up fifth. Cyprus’s Beyoncé-esque dance number Fuego took the silver medal – but the evening’s runaway winner with 529 points was Israel’s Netta.
Dressed like a butterfly in a black and pink kimono-style dress, against a back wall of Japanese maneki-neko “beckoning cat” ornaments, her song Toy was nothing if not arresting. Starting out with the looped sound of her making noises as if she had just sniffed pepper, Netta sang a quick chorus about her Barbies and Pikachus before breaking into a very peculiar chicken clucking bridge and then an arena-filling chorus.
Netta had been the bookmakers’ favourite for months, but in a field of 46 songs there was always room for a last minute crisis of confidence.
Israel’s fears can’t have been allayed by the latest scoring system, where the hosts read out the juries’ scores first. Austria and Sweden looked all but unshakable, so it wasn’t until we got the results from the viewers at home that Israel barrelled to victory.
Triumphant, Netta took the hallowed trophy and thanked Europe for embracing diversity and taking a chance on someone like her.
Sadly, the stage invasion didn’t engender a sympathy vote for the UK, but we did avoid the dreaded “nul points”. Surie’s song came 24th, ahead of Finland and Portugal.
As the winning nation, Israel is now invited to host the 2019 contest. Although probably not authorised, Netta suggested in her victory speech that Jerusalem should be the host city. That remains to be seen – but it doesn’t look like the show’s politics are going to dampen down any time soon.