Eurovision 2024

[Marc Meakin]

Not heard any songs yet but I may make the effort to hear Ollys effort.
I'm sure some of you here have some tips on who should win
I'm guessing Israel might get one or 2 nil points

[Rhys Benjamin]

This is one of the widest open years in a long time. There is a small format change which now means the big five will perform during the semi final entries (the UK will be performing 5th tonight).

Italy, Croatia, Netherlands, Switzerland all will do well and it is so hard to call a winner this year.

The Israel situation is an interesting one and the police presence here in Malmo is very large indeed. They do have the best ballad in the competition and will probably be top 10.

The UK won't be last (that'll be Germany, almost certainly) but apparently the staging is so good they're now talking about the UK being up at the sharp end. I can't see it myself, but I do think we'll be solidly mid table.

Predictions for tonight:

Cyprus, Lithuania, Ireland, Ukraine, Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, Finland, Portugal, Luxembourg

I have ranked all 37 entries in reverse order, which you can watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbRzXNJ-c4s

[Gavin Chipper]

here in Malmo

Say you're at the Eurovision Song Contest without saying you're at the Eurovision Song Contest.

[Rhys Benjamin]

This is one of the widest open years in a long time. There is a small format change which now means the big five will perform during the semi final entries (the UK will be performing 5th tonight).

Italy, Croatia, Netherlands, Switzerland all will do well and it is so hard to call a winner this year.

The Israel situation is an interesting one and the police presence here in Malmo is very large indeed. They do have the best ballad in the competition and will probably be top 10.

The UK won't be last (that'll be Germany, almost certainly) but apparently the staging is so good they're now talking about the UK being up at the sharp end. I can't see it myself, but I do think we'll be solidly mid table.

Predictions for tonight:

Cyprus, Lithuania, Ireland, Ukraine, Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, Finland, Portugal, Luxembourg

I have ranked all 37 entries in reverse order, which you can watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbRzXNJ-c4s

9/10 for me.

[Rhys Benjamin]

Tonight’s prediction: Malta, Switzerland, Czechia, Austria, Denmark, Armenia, Georgia, Belgium, Israel, Netherlands

[Rhys Benjamin]

I got a paltry 6, but how on earth did Latvia make it?

The Israel reaction in the hall was odd. There were loud vocal minorities on both sides who kept trying to drown the other side out with boos/cheers as appropriate. I had two very loud Israelis behind me so it was hard to tell who won that battle.

[Martin Hurst]

https://www.reddit.com/r/eurovision/com ... g_tonight/

Israel could walk it based on this

[Gavin Chipper]

https://www.reddit.com/r/eurovision/com ... g_tonight/

Israel could walk it based on this

Interesting, but co-ordinated voting is likely to make much more difference in the semi-finals with only 9 viewers.

[Martin Hurst]

https://www.reddit.com/r/eurovision/com ... g_tonight/

Israel could walk it based on this

Interesting, but co-ordinated voting is likely to make much more difference in the semi-finals with only 9 viewers.

Will be interesting what happens - when Ukraine absolutely dominated the public vote in 2022 they got 24.5% of Italy's public vote in the semi final and 29.5% in the final (fact stolen from one of the comments).

[Gavin Chipper]

2nd favourites behind Croatia according to Oddschecker.

[Marc Meakin]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9rz5dp467lo
Could you shed any light on this Rhys ?

[Elliott Mellor]

The Dutch act won't perform tonight, though Israel apparently will.

[Marc Meakin]

The Dutch act won't perform tonight, though Israel apparently will.

Don't bring politics into Eurovision , like that's gonna happen.

[Rhys Benjamin]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9rz5dp467lo
Could you shed any light on this Rhys ?

So...

Joost Klein, the Dutch artist, objected to a Swedish producer putting a camera in his face for the @Eurovision socials for his immediate reaction after performing (as they have done for everyone). He is alleged to have "unlawfully threatened" her, and she called in the police - which is the key point. Swedish police have passed the file over to Swedish prosecutors, but because the case is active, the EBU (I think correctly) said he could not continue in the contest.

I think a lot of countries may get sanctioned and fined next week for rule breaches.

[Dan Byrom]

I'm absolutely delighted by the result this year. Switzerland's entry was so far ahead of the competition and the stream of 12-pointers from the jury was completely deserved. A similar thing happened with France in 2021, whose act was easily the most impressive and beautiful (obviously somewhat subjective but the jury agreed), and were some distance ahead before the public vote, but were toppled by a fairly generic and uninspiring rock song from Italy. At the time, I felt disappointed and disillusioned. This time, however, the public weren't able to overturn the Swiss lead. Overall, I think the standard was much higher this year than last, and I found that, while there was the expected portion of dull entries, there was quite a lot of decent stuff that was hard to separate in the middle of the pack. Here was my top 10:

1. Switzerland
2. Ireland
3. Norway
4. Estonia
5. Croatia
6. Italy
7. Finland
8. Luxembourg
9. Sweden
10. Ukraine

[Gavin Chipper]

I thought the Switzerland winning entry was decent enough. It had good staging and a good performance and was memorable etc., but I did think the song was a little bit weak. I didn't think it was a great winner, but I did think it was a bit of a weak year all round.

I was watching with two other people and we scored all the songs out of 10. I ended up with Lithuania and Croatia as joint top. I think Lithuania was an understated and indeed underrated catchy song. I was supporting Croatia out of those in contention, but actually I do think it was really just a poor man's Cha Cha Cha from last year. I think it was outrageous that that lost to Sweden's generic Europop entry by the way.

The only 0 I gave was to Greece. I thought it was an offensively bad song.

Of the three of us watching, Croatia ended up with the highest total, followed by Estonia and then UK. Estonia was a bit of a joke entry, but it was fun and enjoyable and what Eurovision should be about. The UK's entry (which made the top 3 in our voting based mainly on not me) I think was probably an above average song, but the vocal performance was weak. There was something about the microphone pack falling off in rehearsals, but just based on the final it came across as weedy. Contrast that with France which was nothing much as a song, but purely carried by the vocal performance.

Portugal had the lowest total of the three of us watching. It was a complete nothing and I was amazed to see it came 10th. Sweden also came 9th with an incredibly tedious entry - the ironically named "Unforgettable". But I think possibly the biggest outrage was possibly Ireland coming 6th. It was just a cacophony. I mean, gimmicky can sometimes be good, but this was just taking the piss.

I think this year's ChatGPT award goes to Armenia. It managed 8th place on just "Please make something that sounds a bit jolly". Honourable mention to Croatia for "Make me another Cha Cha Cha".