Australia’s Go-Jo out of the 2025 Eurovision grand final in a stacked semi

Australia’s Eurovision contestant has been eliminated from the 2025 competition, breaking the hearts of diehard fans for the second year in a row.

Australia’s diehard Eurovision fans have had their hearts broken again with Go-Jo failing to advance to the grand final.

The indie pop artist Go-Jo delivered a high-energy, colourful performance of Milkshake Man in the semi-final in Basel, Switzerland, which featured a stacked field of 16 strong contenders vying for the final 10 slots for the weekend’s finale.

The 10 qualifiers are Lithuania, Israel, Armenia, Denmark, Austria, Luxembourg, Finland, Latvia, Malta and Greece.

Go-Jo’s pop earworm had struck a resounding chord with European audiences at the event’s pre-parties, generating more than four million streams on Spotify since its release in March but didn’t convert in enough votes to get him across the line.

It’s the second consecutive miss for Australia, now in its 10th year of competing at the singing Olympics.

Go-Jo performing with girlfriend Jenaya Okpalanze (right). Picture: Fabrice Coffrini / AFP.

Go-Jo shaking it up on the Eurovision stage. Picture Andres Poveda

The Aussie performer, aka Marty Zambotto, was joined on stage by his girlfriend, pop artist and dancer Jenaya Okpalanze, and a giant blender prop.

A disappointed Go-Jo said after the semi that he and his team “tried everything we could” to court votes with a five-week campaign before arriving in Basel.

“I went to 15 countries, travelled 25,000 kms, dragged our suitcases up probably a billion flights of stairs, because Europe does not like elevators, to try to get a result that you guys would be happy with,” he said. “But I feel all the love ... and that everyone’s proud, so that’s the main thing.”

He joked he might offer the Big Blender up for sale on eBay.

Israel’s Yuval Raphael, who sang the power ballad New Day Will Rise, survived the Hamas attacks on the Nova festival on October 7 in 2023, hiding under bodies for eight hours before being rescued.

Her performance at an earlier dress rehearsal at the St. Jakobshalle Basel arena was disrupted by six people, including a family, waving oversized Palestinian flags and blowing whistles.

Security quickly identified the protesters and escorted them out of the hall.

Booing and Palestinian flags - during the dress rehearsal of Yuval Raphael at Eurovision 2025

During Yuval Rafael's performance at the dress rehearsal for tonight's semi-final, booing was heard and a Palestinian flag was waved
📸: Shahar Asado, Euromix pic.twitter.com/Stnx24gkmg

— Iris (@streetwize) May 15, 2025

Sweden’s wildly popular act KAJ remain the frontrunners to take the crystal trophy this year with Bara Bada Bastu, a wacky celebration of sauna culture.

Also hotly tipped as a contender at the grand final is Austria’s JJ with his operatic pop ballad Wasted Love despite it being a sonic cousin of last year’s winner Nemo.

Miriana Conte from Malta performs Serving. Picture: AP.

Erika Vikman from Finland belts Ich Komme. Picture: AP.

Unapologetically fierce female artists with sexually-charged songs featured in this year’s second semi, led by Malta’s Miriana Conte and Finland’s Erika Vikman.

Conte was forced to rewrite the title and lyrics of her original song submission Kant – the Maltese word for singing – when the BBC and other broadcasters protested the word sounded too similar to an English expletive and might cause offence to family-friendly audiences.

The singer changed the title to Serving, with the song inspired by a common expression in drag and queer ballroom culture.

Yet Vikman skirted Eurovision’s “keep it nice” restrictions with her song Ich Komme, which translates to I’m Coming, and her performance left no-one in any doubt as to the track’s intentions.

The 2025 Eurovision Song Contest grand final is broadcast from 5am (AEST) on Sunday, and replayed at 7.30pm, on SBS and SBS On Demand.

* Kathy McCabe travelled to Basel as a guest of SBS.

Originally published as Australia’s Go-Jo out of the 2025 Eurovision grand final in a stacked semi