Eurovision 2008 Semifinal Report (Part Two – “The Bad”)

(As part of our ongoing Eurovision coverage, penned with effortless brilliance by our Euro Correspondent Will, we proudly present Part Two of Will’s report on the second semifinal. Part one is available here…)

THE BAD.

1. Malta missing out!! This is Morena with “Vodka”:

I thought this performance had everything perfectly calibrated – mirrorball boots, a song about a drink enjoyed by citizens of most of the countries that seem to control Eurovision voting, cossack dancing, generally strong stage presence – but it was overlooked! I’m not really fussed but it’s a bit surprising that Iceland took and this one didn’t (though the French commentators noted that Morena “really annoyed” them).
2. The poor old Czech Republic.

Tereza Kerndlova did her best with this and the GDP of New Zealand appears to have been spent on 3 minutes worth of onstage pyrotechnics, but it wasn’t enough. I do like the chorus sentiment “If you wanna have some fun – don’t run!” because it reminds me of poolside instructions received during childhood Vicswim classes and I like Tereza and her giant hairpiece but I think there was just too much going on on stage with this one. The male backing vocals were also rather too aggressive in my view. The chap commentating for French TV noted, “She can’t really sing but she sure is cute.” Charming.

3. The worst performance of the entire Eurovision 2008 “series” so far was Lithuania:

What a dreadful enactment. Thankfully we will never need to hear that again.

It does seem that the final tomorrow is extremely unpredictable – there are several massive songs and it’s shaping up as a battle of the divas (Sweden vs Ukraine vs Greece vs Russia). The Serbian song (a stately ethnic ballad which qualified automatically to the final) will also throw a spanner in the works to some extent – people seem to think they could win again, although I find it to be a toilet break moment. I can’t confidently predict the winner because the contest has changed so much recently and the voting in the final will work differently to the semis – that said, my money would be on Ukraine, but my heart is with Sweden, Greece and Iceland.