Eurovision 2015: national pride and guilty pleasures for the ages

The Eurovision Song Contest is bigger than ever and this year Australia joins the party — why is it so popular? Amelia McGuinness takes on the Eurovision phenomenon for the first time, as Iain Shedden explains why the music doesn’t necessarily matter.

As a so-called “millennial”, the way I consume music is cutthroat. I browse the internet until something captures my attention, and with an ever-waning attention span, fuelled by SoundCloud, Spotify, and YouTube, I’ll give it a solid minute or so before finding something else, writes Amelia McGuinness.

Eurovision, however, is as much a visual spectacle as it is a wonderfully kitsch song contest that predates the Got Talent X-Factor Idol shows that have dominated screens for the past decade.

Or so I’ve heard.

I had never seen Eurovision before I started “researching” for this article by watching last year’s performances. I kept an open mind, and I am so glad I did.

I really can’t say much about the music, except that it was terrible, and often in another language. But that didn’t matter. As someone who likes to coordinate my dance moves with the lyrics in a song, I was thrilled by the unashamedly literal interpretations of some of these performances.

Conchita Wurst (pictured below), aka The Bearded Lady, took the stage for her performance of Rise Like a Phoenix. And, staying true to the title, flames burst out as she belted out the chorus, as though she herself was rising from the ashes. It’s such a breath of fresh air from the hipsters who are constantly trying to master the art of not caring. I was engrossed.

Similarly, Spain’s Ruth Lorenzo performed Dancing in the Rain, and — you wouldn’t believe it — she was dancing! In the rain! This was groundbreaking stuff.

Latvia’s Aarzemnieki wanted everyone to know that they’ve “got a cake to bake, got no clue at all” in their song Cake to Bake, and perpetuated gender stereotypes by saying that they need to ask their mother how to do it. What the hell is this? Are they serious? I just … I just don’t know.

I have to admit that I’m a sucker for tacky costume parties, and if I had it my way I’d be wearing as many sequins as some of these contestants every time I go out (the words “cheap and nasty” have been thrown my way before, so it seems illogical that I’ve put off Eurovision for so long). But what I really love is the way men just put their emotions out there like nobody’s watching.

The most you’ll get out of the guys on the Triple J hit list is a few nods of the head.

Malta’s Firelight are the country’s own version of Mumford and Sons, stupid hats and too many instruments, and it’s disappointing to see a performance similar to one that I watched at Splendour in the Grass in 2013. Are Firelight not kitsch enough? Or maybe Mumford and Sons are the kitsch kings of indie music? The lines are blurred.

I am delighted to see France’s Twin Twin performing a song called Moustache dancing around in school uniforms — a costume usually reserved for sexy young women. It’s really hard to tell whether or not these guys are taking the piss. There’s a fine line between extravagant and flat-out ridiculous, but I’m starting to get why everyone loves this show — whether they’re serious or not, there’s no pretence.

Denmark’s Basim look like One Direction but with much better dance moves, and take to the stage to perform Cliché Love Song. I admire the way they just tell it like it is. Iceland’s Pollaponk is definitely having a laugh. The clip for their song No Prejudice looks like a cross between that scene from Austin Powers when they travel back in time to the ’60s and a performance by The Wiggles. It’s all very confusing, but awesome, nonetheless.

By the end I feel like I get it. It’s fabulous, dramatic, and an absolute hoot. Now that Australia is competing, I feel obliged to tune in. And why wouldn’t I? It is so refreshing to see this level of ostentation in a world obsessed with trying to stay cool. Fellow Gen-Y’ers, get involved. Eurovision is my new guilty pleasure.

Why Eurovision has been embraced by Australians

There might not have been dancing in the streets of Sydney, Melbourne or Perth, but in 2011, when Ell & Nikki’s Running Scared won the Eurovision Song Contest for Azerbaijan, there would have been some measure of pride among at least some of the 300 or so Azerbaijanis who live here, writes Iain Shedden.

The opportunity to celebrate the success of a three-minute pop song with nationalistic fervour far away from home doesn’t come up very often, so why the hell wouldn’t the Azerbaijani community go a bit crazy?

Since 1983, when SBS began its coverage of Eurovision, the show has been embraced by Australians for a variety of reasons; European heritage is one of the main ones.

Many of us watched in the beginning to cheer on the Italian or Swedish or Ukrainian or British entry, even when the song had all the artistic grace and nuance of a wardrobe falling down a flight of stairs. It was about taking part and pledging allegiance to the old country, or just to a country that took our fancy because the act had nice glutes or a lazy eye.

It was a bit like watching the world cup for all those years that Australia didn’t qualify. Get up in the middle of the night, switch on the television and support another country, ideally one where you still had family members. Now, however, the playing field has widened, enough for us to have a place on it and that is going to change the way we view Eurovision, for this year anyway.

National pride aside, there are other reasons why Australia has embraced Eurovision. We like a contest of any description. The popularity here of TV talent quests that have followed in Eurovision’s wake are evidence of that. And it’s exotic theatre, some would say a grotesque spectacle, and the merit of the music that emerges from it, whether on its way to the charts or to oblivion, is a secondary consideration.

What attracts us more than anything, however, is that it’s fun, or at least has the capacity to generate fun around it.

Eurovision parties will be taking place all over the country this weekend. They will be celebrating Australia’s part in it; cheering on Guy Sebastian (pictured above) and perhaps those other countries to which some us still have allegiance.

Above all, it’s an excuse to laugh, mock, praise and debate over something that isn’t sport, politics or, let’s be clear, art. Enjoy.

Iain Shedden is the music writer for The Australian. Amelia McGuinness studies Media and Communications at the University of Sydney and is a producer at The Australian who, this weekend, will be watching Eurovision for the first time.

You can listen to the songs mentioned by clicking on the Spotify playlist below.