.........................................
1999.written.by.noah
After watching the
tape of this year's ESC for God knows how many
times, I have finally found the time to write an
extensive review of this year's "most
watched program(me) in Europe."
As probably every
fan has said, the openning was a bit too long and
repetitive. So, what am I to do, but to agree,
even though, I am notorious for being a
non-follower. But, when you have to tell the
truth, you have to tell it. I liked the graphics
bit and I also liked the shots of the Holy City.
It was nice to see the beauty of it.
But, apart from
that, I did not like much of the openning,
especially when the hosts came on. Now, don't get
me wrong. I liked the hosts, well, Sigal and
Dafna anyway. It's just that they kept repeating
the same stuff over and over again and I was
wondering if we were going to start before the
millenium ends. They kept on saying
"Welcome," "Welcome" and it
became iritatiting. For me, at least. This all
was worsened by the fact that they had accents,
something I am not fond of, even though I have
one, too.
Speaking of hosts,
let me give you my few bits on them in general. I
liked Dafna and Sigal and their craziness. It
seemed as though they were the only ones who were
genuinely excited. It reminded me of Croatian
Dora 99, where the hosts were going on and on
about how exciting it all was and when they cut
to the green room, the performers were
"mrtvi, hladni," as we say in Bosnian,
which would mean "cold and dead,"
devoid of any visible excitement. Sigal and Dafna
were also, it seems, more educated about the
whole idea of hosting than the old Yigal was. He
just was too stiff. At times, I wondered if he
were British. But, then I remembered the good old
Terry (Wogan, for all you quasi-fans) and I could
not fathom him being stiff, though he is not
really British, but Irish. Oh, let me stop. This
is getting too tangled! I am confusing myself
even.
So, anyway, Yigal
could have used a shot of Prozac (or one of those
relaxation drugs. Y'all crazy people know what
I'm talking about). It seemed as though Yigal was
making the three host thingy a "one too
many" deal. But, we need more professional,
relaxed people who can handle those
greedy-for-time-so-that-they-can-advertise-their-beautiful-country
spokespersons. And he handled that in a well-done
manner.
All in all, I
would say the hosts deserve a 6 out of 10, with
Yigal hurting their average.
6 out of 10 is
certainly too low a score for the spectacular
stage IBA has created for our color-hungry eyes.
I think that the stage looked amazing, which
contradicts my initial reaction to it when I saw
a model of it at Geoff Harrison's Eurovision
Database. It looked huge, which is always good,
but in this case I would have preferred a bit
smaller stage. Why? you might ask. Because! I may
answer. No, seriously, I think there was plenty
of room for an orchestra, the essential idea of
what ESC is for me. The performers and the hosts
used up hardly a third of the stage, so why not
have it cut in half and make room for the
violins, trumpets and what-nots? Nevertheless, I
am satisfied with the look of the stage.
I especially liked
the changing colors, which made the stage look
anew with each song. The sun in the back was a
nice little thingy that often stole my attention
away from the performers, signifying that I have
seen the contest way too many times. It moved
during ballads, but, to my dismay, it stood
silently (for the lack of a better word) during
the faster numbers. I would have loved seeing it
keeping up with the fast rhythm of All Out of
Luck, but I suspect the weight of the sun
could not handle the movements. Well, DUH!
The supposed-to-be
planets were a bit off course, weren't they? It
would have been nice if Aiste could touch the
Earth and rest on it, while singing a high note.
And Doris could have put her cloak around Saturn.
Now, that would have grabbed some mad votes! As I
write this, I tell myself: where in the hell is
all this crap coming from? I should use the
whatever technique I am using now when I write
essays!
Off to the
performers, at last:
Lithuania: Poh'
little, waistless girl. Could not find anything
better to wear, huh? Oh, don't be sad, little
girl. When you become famous, you will be able to
"ford" many "spensiv" things.
She sounded rather disappointing compared to the
video preview. And she looked very different. She
certainly did not look anything like the small
country girl I saw in the clip. She looked hot,
nonetheless. Aiste could have used a few backing
vocals to help her scream and shout. The overall
performance was average-y, while the voting
result was disappointing as Strazdas was
one of my top 10 favorites. Lithuania cleared its
name of being the worst country in ESC ever,
that's for sure. Go Lithuania, go!
Belgium: The
first thing I noticed was how well and
appropriately dressed Vanessa and her backing
vocals were. They might have looked a little too
serious, but too me they were the best-dressed
act of the evening. The hand dance seemed a bit
dull, but, again, it was appropriate. Like the
Wind was a very good title for the song, as
the melody took on a role of wind a few times,
even though Vanessa's voice seemed more like a
barely-noticeable breeze at times. I had hoped
Belgium would do better than they did, but I
guess 12 out of 23 isn't all that bad. They will
need a storm next time to fight off the curse of
the second-place draw.
Spain: What
else to say, but that the dress was awful! I
mean, there wasn't a trace of fashion in it. It
was obviously a mechanism to steal votes, but it
did not work. As a matter of fact, many will
agree that it resulted in a backlash from
everyone, except from Croatia, who probably did
not realize that the dress was a gay flag (or
they have no fashion radars in their country).
Spain failed to realize that most gay people are
fashion experts and that they would not fall for
this cheap trick. However, if she had stripped
down or sang in 20 languages, she might have
ended up third or fourth. Seriously, the song is
quite nice, but it was not good enough to not be
overcome by Croatia's Marija Magdalena.
She looked very different on the Big Night and
moved rather strangely. It looked as if she just
got out of a bed.
Croatia:
The cloak don't work every time! What a cheap try
(hello Spain!) to lure voters with another strip,
which this time resulted in nothing but a
disappointing "shit, that's all?" from
me. If she had been completely covered in a
cloak, then it would have more acceptable for me.
But, enough about the clothing. I was not too
impressed with this version of the song. It
sounded so much better at Dora 1999, where it was
performed with an orchestra. This version just
irritated the hell out of me with those drumming
sounds. It was so repetitive! However, the song
was obviously one of the best of the evening, and
it deserved its 118 points and fourth place. But,
I have to say a few words (well, more than a few,
so bare with me) about the synthesized voices. I
DO think that those were artificially fabricated
voices. If they were not they would have had the
men singing at Dora, just like some other
performers used four or five backing vocals. But
I saw no purpose why that girl had to be there. I
could not hear her singing at all. But, anyways,
it would be a damn shame if Croatia is to be
disqualified next year, as it would not be the
same contest without the powerful female voices
of Croatia. But, they might send another ENI-like
song next year and then I will change my opinion
about this.
United Kingdom:
Was there any melody to the song? And why were
there five girls on stage? Maybe they were there
to "support" the lead singer? Or to
divert attention away from her yawning? Or to
just simply act cute? In any case, the songs was
very empty without its original melody and beat.
Didn't it seem like the girls were swallowing the
last syllables? If I hadn't known the lyrics of
the song, it would have been really hard to
decipher what the heck they were singing. Not
much more to say about this crap, so let's move
on.
Slovenia:
Another fashion disaster! What is wrong with the
performers? Are they trying to look as
outstanding as possible to win votes? They ought
to think about that more, 'cuz, honey, it ain't
working. I did not like the dress at all and she
laughed throughout the song, which made me wonder
if she really knew what she was singing about.
After all, the song was a sad one and there was
no reason to be laughing. She did though, have
the best voice of the night. The song really
expressed her vocal abilities. But, next time
remember to wear something less yellow, please!
Bit disapointed about the placing and the fact
that Slovenia is really going down on the
relegation scale. With Slovenia and Bosnia out
next year and Croatia on the verge of the
decision, we will only have one ex-Yugoslav
republic in the Contest, Macedonia. How sad!
Turkey: It
would be nice if they had written a song with a
chorus that at least the singer could sing
without any problems, you know! That "al
beni, sar beni..." tongue-twisting part of
the song seemed fine at the Turkish final, but at
the Contest she seemed like she was out of
breath. And those pathetic little people called
backing singers were just plain awful. I was
under the impression that backing vocals were
there to help the lead vocal with the song and to
make the song sound better. But, maybe
"backing vocal" means something totally
different in Turkish. Oh, and the sound! It was
easily the worst sound of the night. Together
with the backing vocals, it completely ruined
this highly-rated fun song. The music was too
silent, making the voices sound excruciatingly
loud. They looked as if they had fun, though and
they engaged the audience, at least the indoor
one. A disappointing result, however.
Norway: In
three words: stand up straight! Get some dance
lessons, boy. Running around and throwing your
(btw, ugly) face into the camera is not cute
anymore. Rock stars have long become rock
legends. And that awful black shirt and the fake
Bulls jockey have got to go. Doesn't he have
anything else to wear? But, I liked the beat of
the song. It would have been much better if a
girl with a charisma was singing it. Stig just
did not have that chemistry. It ended up far
higher than it should have, leaving many better
songs behind. I hope Norwegians stick with an
"Altid sommer" type of a song from now
on.
Denmark:
Next time bring us a couple that sings a love
sings and actually acts like they're loving each
other. Little more chemistry would have done them
some good. But, hey, they, undeservingly so,
achieved a very high position for a song that was
rather mediocre from start to finish. Michael is
a cute lad, but I cannot get over how weird his
eyes look. Speaking of eyes, did you all notice
that butterfly thingy Trine did with her
eyelashes when she was singing the introductory
note. That was so annoying! She sang well, though
she missed a couple of notes and Michael was not
anything special himself. And did Trine eat all
the food Israeli provided for the performers or
what? She must have gained a whole bunch of
pounds since the Dannish final. Nothing wrong
with overweight girls, tough. I just noticed that
she looked differenty. But, anyways, Denmark had
a lot of friends this year. I'll leave it at that
and you think whatever you want :-)
France: I
was very pleasantly surprised by Nayah and her
performance. But, most importantly, the voice
sounded much better. No out-of-this-world
screeching and choreography. I didn't get what
she was trying to say with those African
necklesses, though. Are the French losing their
identity, so they have to reach for other
people's? Back to her performance. I liked the
new version of the song with the genuine French
sound to it. It's been a long time since we heard
a traditional French sound on ESC. And French
language always sounds mesmarizing, as it did
this time. As Belgium opted for English, the
unlikely Bosnia chose French. Good choice. France
disappointed us with the final result, though. I
expected a bit more. Nonetheless, we'll be seeing
the French try out next year again and the year
after that and the year after that and...
Netherlands:
Marlayne looked as awesome as she did at the
Dutch final. But, the act was the same. She talks
to the guitarist, hand-dances around him for a
few moments and than she goes off to do her
thang. Hmm, not too imaginative. Also she sounded
a little worse than at the final. Does "live
performance" ring a bell? She disappointed a
lot of people with the final result, Personally,
I was happy, as I did not rate the song very
highly anyway. It was around place 15 on my
chart. Netherlands might be into the ancient
country rock, but Europe isn't. I am certainly,
not. Shit, if I wanted to hear song like this, I
would listen to Shania Twain, the country
goddess.
Poland:
Boring! Yawn! He looked like he did not get
enough sleep. He's hair was all messed up and his
face was all swollen. These Eastern countries
really have to realize once and for all that
one-man ballads do not do good in Eurovision.
Especially, if it is a ballad based on
traditional Polish sounds. He sang the song OK,
in my opinion. Yeah, I could hear that he had
lost his voice few days before the Big Night, but
it all came out good at the end. Except the
result, which they deserved. No more manly
ballads, for God's sake. I am going to go
straight if I see another middle-aged (woops) man
singing a ballad. All in all, very unexciting. If
it weren't for the pause button on my VCR, I
would have gone to the bathroom during this song
(and only during this song).
L'chaim, the
commercial break thingy: Accents, accents,
accents everywhere. I did not understand half of
the stuff Dafna and Sigal were singing. But, the
song was pretty catchy. I am sure this was a hit
some years ago, but this was my first time
hearing this song. "To life, to life,
l'chaim." As Terry Wogan said: "I still
haven't got a drink."
And the better
half of the Contest was about to start!
Iceland:
Viva la Iceland and those two hotties dancing
behind Selma. I think Iceland put on a great
show, even though they did not use those two fat
ladies from the video. :) Guess they like
athletic manly men better than two old bags! :) I
believe Iceland could have easily won the Contest
and they almost had won it. It would have been so
great to see a country that hasn't won before win
this Contest. It would be the first time after
1989, when the crooked ex-Yugoslavia swept Europe
with Rock Me by surprise. Coming back to
Iceland, I think Selma looked gorgeous, nothing
like the video in which that dreadful black wig
made her look like a bad Caucasian copy of the
Icelandic goddess Bjork.
Cyprus:
What a shame! No-one expected this to happen. I
never nightmared that Cyprus would end up so low
with a song this great. Actually I had a dream
well before the Contest where Israel and Cyprus
were fighting for the first place, much like
Sweden and Iceland did in reality. I cannot
fathom the reason why Cyprus did so badly. Maybe
it was the language? the performance? the backing
vocals? Marlain's voice? the complexity of the
song? All of these and none of these make sense.
First of all, the language should not matter
really. We have had restriced-language rule for
almost the entire longevity of the Contest. We
have had many, many non-English songs win the
Contest over the past 40+ years. We've had
Greek-language songs do very well these past few
years. One may add that we did not employ
televoting until two years ago. But, still, even
with televoting, we've had two Croatian songs
(98, 99), a Turkish song (97), a Greek song (97),
an Italian song (97), two Hebrew songs (98, 99),
and a Dutch song (98) end up among the top 5
since 1997! I do not think there is basis for the
language argument. The performance and the voices
of the performers? Well, remember Dana last year
and her out-of-tune singing througout the song?
It did not stop her from winning. And Marlain did
not give that bad a performance on the Big Night.
In fact, I think that she performed very well and
that they had a great stage presence overall. I
really liked how they danced around. And then
there is the complexity of the song. I think that
this argument has a really strong base. I,
myself, found the song to be rather strange, as
it put two different styles of music into one,
making a symbiosis out of them. I believe that
the televoters heard the first part of the song
and decided that it is not something they'd vote
for. They did not get goosebumps listening to the
song and I believe that that's the only
explanation that is credible, at least to me. All
others, seem inconclusive. Nevertheless, I
compliment the Cypriot delegation on a very good
performance, a great song and a great sport-like
behavior.
Sweden:
Cyprus No. 2, but upside down. Who'd it thought
the Swedes would do it again with an ABBA song 25
years after that very band swept Europe and the
World with Waterloo. Charlotte, the
one-sillicon lady did a superb job. She had one
of the best voices of the night. It was
absolutely flawless. She sang it very
professionally and it helped her to win the
Contest. She looked good also, though a bit (and
say whatever you want about the following
comment, but it is true, you have to admit it)
like a porn actress. Remember Cicciolina? Well,
Charlotte reminds me of her a little bit, thought
the latter is MUCH better looking than the
former. i also was very amused by the backing
singers. In the end, I would have to say that
Sweden, kind of, sort of, like, deserved the
first place, though I would have preferred to
have seen the Contest be in Reykjavik 2000. BTW,
do you all realize that it was the Bosnian vote
that decided the final outcome. And, also,
Bosnian used a jury instead of televoting, so...
Portugal:
Polish guy gone long hair. Yeah, Rui had stage
presence and was all happy and blah, blah, blah.
But did we really have to sit through those three
minutes while this rather pathetic song was
played? I mean, I did not feel anything when I
listened to the song. That's pretty much all I
have to say about this one. Next, please! Oh,
yes, why did Terry Wogan translated Como Tudo
Comecou as Take My Hand? I was under
the impression that it translated as How It
All Began.
Ireland: I
am beginning to doubt Irish have any dance songs
at all! What happened to B*witched, The Corrs,
The Cranberries? The Corrs would most certainly
bring a victory to Ireland once again, but this
time it would be a very much deserved victory, as
long as they send another We Are So Young.
But, we all know Irish aren't trying to win
another Contest for a long time, at least not
until they recharge their budget batteries. '92,
'93, '94, and '96 drained probably half of the
national budget. As for the very strangely-named Mullans,
I think they did Ireland proud with their
performance. I enjoyed it, though I did not fancy
the song itself. So what if the girls were fat?
Does has no impact on me, whatsoever! I only hear
the song and occasionally see the faces. I do not
like deep female voices, though, so that was one
minus toward Ireland on my list. And, boy, did
Lithuania scare the shit out of us. Phew! That
was some scary shit. First douze goes to Ireland
and all of our jaws dropped to the floor. Even
Terry was laughing his ass off. I think there is
truth about the inverted Lithuania voting,
because giving 12 to Estonia, their neghbors,
would make sense, at least this year if not ever.
Well, that's it for Ireland.
Austria:
Was this song called Repetition or what?
Oh, my God, by the time one minute passed, I was
getting sick of the "...the reflection in
your eyes..." Damn, that was some
annoying crap. I liked the beat and Bobbie's
Singing. It sounds very American and ironically
enough it was either written or composed by an
American (well, you'll have to forgive me, I do
not pay much attention to the names.) The
performance looked like an old rock group's gig
in some cheap club. Bobbie looked good, and again
I really liked how she sang the song. She did it
differently this time around.
Israel:
Funny! Very funny! I was laughing my ass off
looking at four grown men singing a song that
would fit only a kid group, perhaps the Teens
of Croatia. It was ridiculous to watch them. They
tried doing a dance routine, but all I saw were
their shoulders moving off-rhythm. "This is
a real Euro song," as Wogan put it. And no
wonder ESC is not mainstream in Europe. Those who
hear songs like this and see performances like
this are immediately going to stray away from
this kind of contests. The fifth place was a
major overstatement. I could not believe my eyes.
The worst part of the song is when that one black
guy was singing "everybody's moving..."
while trying to do some Michael Jackson
movements. I mean, come the fuck on! Ain't no-one
want to see your old ass make a fool out of
yourself. Or, perhaps they do? Very, very
overrated!
Malta:
Israel No. 2. "Malta came very close last
year, but this will disgrace them in 1999."
Took the words out of my mouth, Terry! The song
could have been better if it weren't for the
excruciatingly annoying repetition of
"...believe in..." and
"...baby..." Oh, my goodness. I am
watching the song now and I honestly cannot stand
it! It was in my top 10 all along, but I have
heard this annoying crap too many times! And, was
that a dance they were doing? Or were they
scratching themselves? In any case, it was
cheesy. Malta, try sending a decent up-beat song
next time, if you're not going to send a
respectable ballad, OK?
Germany:
Hey, wasn't that postcard very appropriate? The
Tower of Babel. Ha ha, I could not believe it.
For those of you who do not know this Bible story
(and I am wondering how in the hell I know it),
here it is: humans could not agree on how the
Tower is supposed to look like and God made them
all speak different languages so they could not
understand each other and argue (but, to me, when
someone doesn't understand what I'm talking
about, it is the best way to argue). That's how
we got all these different languages in the
world. Well, it suited Reise very much. On
to the song and the performers: it would have
been nice if they changed the clothes, you know.
It's not like they wore something exceptionally
good that they had to wear it again. The
performance was somewhat off and disappointing,
as some of the million (!) singers they had on
stage sang out of tune. I think that the song
deserved the third position, though MANY of you
would not agree. But, guess what, there is a
thing called Freedom of Speech, you know.
Bosnia-Herzegovina:
Well, well, well. They gave us a superb
performance. We came 7th and we broke the
tradition of being at the bottom. Good job Dino
and Beatrice! We knew you guys could do it! As
for those who think that Bosnia only got sympathy
and the so-called "refugee" votes,
think again. We had far more refugees in Europe
during 1993-1997. The are only a couple of
hundred thousand of Bosnians left in Europe and
they are scattered all over, so they can't make a
big impact, as might Turkish people in Germany.
And what is this sympathy thing? Y'all have
almost forgotten what had happened to Bosnia in
the last few years and could not care less. The
televoters felt the same. If they wanted to award
sympathy points, they would have done so before. Putnici
was a good and, most importantly, a different
song. Surely, it was a big plus that we performed
second-to-last. The already-easy-to-remember
chorus was just helped by this fact. The song
definitely stood out by being a catchy, rhythmic
French number with African and Carribean
influences. I don't think Europe had heard
anything like it. I certainly haven't, as it is
not usually the type of music Dino makes and
plays.
Estonia:
After being swept by the Bosnian performance, I
could have cared less about the last song of the
millenium. But, it would be unfair to exclude
them here. Estonia reminded me of Lithuania, but
only song-wise. It sounded very much like Nocturne
and the performers reminded me of those who
performed Nocturne (what was their name
again?). They even had a violinist who looked
just like the violonist from Norway in 1995.
Well, Diamond of Night is a very nice
song, but as I have heard it trillion times
before, it is really hard to talk about it, as I
got sick of it. But, I will say, they deserved
the 6th place.
Interval act: I
think that this was the best interval act we have
had ever. Even the Riverdance cannot compare with
it. I play the tape almost every day and the only
part of it that I watch is the interval act. The
music sounded awesome. They should have entered a
song with this melody into the Israeli
preselection. I also liked the outside venue. And
who needs a live interval act. Hearing a non-live
song is much better than the live one. The song Free
was the perfect choice Dana made. Can y'all hear
the lyrics? They are so good! Well, of course,
it's Stevie Wonder's song, but still, it really
suited Dana and the message she tried to get
across with it. "Free like a river, floating
free..." Well, I really enjoyed this part of
the Contest. That's it, I believe.
Well, I am glad I
finished this loooong review at last. It took me
a lot of patience and almost a week to do it. So,
please enjoy it and comment on it freely.
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