The fun is in the dag
May. 10th, 2005 02:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jawnbcOk time to discuss the deep dark underbelly of Eurovision: the dagginess. Truth be told, one can do surprisingly well--if they're so bad they're cute. In a sort of "we-are-so-advanced-compared-to-you-but-you-got=spunk-and-we-like-spunk" way.
Take last year: Albania enters for the first time, and they're so excited they select their singer and song 6 months before the contest (before Xmas). Their choice is their Pulp Idol, Anjeza Shahini. Of course she's got a mop of thick black hair, spots/zits (Clearsil costs a month's wages in Tirana, after all), and the requisite UniBrow™. And it that's not enough, apparently Albania TV doesn't have anyone who can read English...or French...very well. Because they've selected a song that 4.5 minutes long: you only get 3 minutes (a bit longer is OK). I wish I could find "before" photo that did her justice...
Anyway, deep down in that nearly 5 minutes of....ooooow my ears hurt.....is a pop song. So Albania hires some 5th rate Europop producer to chop it down (by speeding it up), writes a bizarre Englesque lyric ("how strange the feeling in your soul, when love invades your very being. Another me, or so I'm told, and life takes on another meaning"), and arranges it to a thump=thump-thump beat. Then they hire the best groomers Albania Lek can buy, which ain't much. This how Anjeza looked for the semi-final (qualifier) round this time last year:
And you thought your aunties burned all their polyster prom dresses back in the 70s? They apparently missed one, the pink one. There is is, shiniing like a $1 Xmas tree ornament, complete with backyard home perm. Anjeza can sing, even if she's not terribly...what's the word, can't be too mean...polished. Yeah, not terribly polished. But she finishes in the top 10 and will be in the final. Woot!
Time for a new look. And for some reason she decides that Eurovision is all about national pride. Not that she sang in her own language, or wore anthing that could be construed as an Albanian ethnic costume. But she's proud dammit, and she's come this far--this one's for Tirana! And maybe her cousins in servitude in Kosovo? So she decides to sing in a dress made from the official colours of Albania. Sadly, due to a poor economy, the government of Albania hasn't been able to re-brand themselves from the communist days, but one's flag is one's flag.
Red and Black. I'm not making this up, I couldn't. And now her hair's straightened, she got less makeup on, and she's going for it. "I know! It's Just! A Dre-eam! I feel! I love! This li-ife!"
7th place, out of 36 countries. Only one place below Sweden's been-working-it-and-trying-to-get-to-the-Eurovision-for-20-years dawdy diva Lena P.
However I fear this year we won't have any daggy-but-darling singers. Of those from whom we expect a tacky presentation, they're either too old (Andorra, and her robopop ice cold Dutch delivery), or a bloke (Slovenia, with his half-shaven chest). Belarus is a tempting bet, but she's stunningly beautiful if tone deaf--and she plays the "I am gorgeous, you want to root me, you will ignore please my singing" card well. Although this year's Ukrainian entry is 3 chubby rapper dudes, whose song was the anthem of the Orange Revolution.
Of course it's not all fun and games. A couple of queens run the annual Barbara Dex Award for the worst dressed entry. Will it be the Austrian chick in the dirdnl? The German, Russian, or Swiss rock chycks? Or maybe we should just hand it over to the four Norwegian faux glam rockers right now?
Nah that wouldn't be fair...it's a contest after all.
Take last year: Albania enters for the first time, and they're so excited they select their singer and song 6 months before the contest (before Xmas). Their choice is their Pulp Idol, Anjeza Shahini. Of course she's got a mop of thick black hair, spots/zits (Clearsil costs a month's wages in Tirana, after all), and the requisite UniBrow™. And it that's not enough, apparently Albania TV doesn't have anyone who can read English...or French...very well. Because they've selected a song that 4.5 minutes long: you only get 3 minutes (a bit longer is OK). I wish I could find "before" photo that did her justice...
Anyway, deep down in that nearly 5 minutes of....ooooow my ears hurt.....is a pop song. So Albania hires some 5th rate Europop producer to chop it down (by speeding it up), writes a bizarre Englesque lyric ("how strange the feeling in your soul, when love invades your very being. Another me, or so I'm told, and life takes on another meaning"), and arranges it to a thump=thump-thump beat. Then they hire the best groomers Albania Lek can buy, which ain't much. This how Anjeza looked for the semi-final (qualifier) round this time last year:
And you thought your aunties burned all their polyster prom dresses back in the 70s? They apparently missed one, the pink one. There is is, shiniing like a $1 Xmas tree ornament, complete with backyard home perm. Anjeza can sing, even if she's not terribly...what's the word, can't be too mean...polished. Yeah, not terribly polished. But she finishes in the top 10 and will be in the final. Woot!
Time for a new look. And for some reason she decides that Eurovision is all about national pride. Not that she sang in her own language, or wore anthing that could be construed as an Albanian ethnic costume. But she's proud dammit, and she's come this far--this one's for Tirana! And maybe her cousins in servitude in Kosovo? So she decides to sing in a dress made from the official colours of Albania. Sadly, due to a poor economy, the government of Albania hasn't been able to re-brand themselves from the communist days, but one's flag is one's flag.
Red and Black. I'm not making this up, I couldn't. And now her hair's straightened, she got less makeup on, and she's going for it. "I know! It's Just! A Dre-eam! I feel! I love! This li-ife!"
7th place, out of 36 countries. Only one place below Sweden's been-working-it-and-trying-to-get-to-the-Eurovision-for-20-years dawdy diva Lena P.
However I fear this year we won't have any daggy-but-darling singers. Of those from whom we expect a tacky presentation, they're either too old (Andorra, and her robopop ice cold Dutch delivery), or a bloke (Slovenia, with his half-shaven chest). Belarus is a tempting bet, but she's stunningly beautiful if tone deaf--and she plays the "I am gorgeous, you want to root me, you will ignore please my singing" card well. Although this year's Ukrainian entry is 3 chubby rapper dudes, whose song was the anthem of the Orange Revolution.
Of course it's not all fun and games. A couple of queens run the annual Barbara Dex Award for the worst dressed entry. Will it be the Austrian chick in the dirdnl? The German, Russian, or Swiss rock chycks? Or maybe we should just hand it over to the four Norwegian faux glam rockers right now?
Nah that wouldn't be fair...it's a contest after all.
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:27 am (UTC)If Morgan Fairchild were gonna adopt an Eastern European it would've been Diana from Platin.
And if you've not been introduced properly, Michéal meet Steve. Steve meet Michéal. You're both homosexuals who are kind of interested in Eurovision. Play nice.
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:33 am (UTC)And who told you I was homosexual?
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:37 am (UTC)Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:41 am (UTC)Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:50 am (UTC)My proctologist looks like David on Six Feet Under (the somewhat cute but wimpy repressed brother). That reminds me, I've been promising to chronicle my last (I swear every word is true) pornorific visit when he used my butt as the training butt for a beefy German intern named Hans (really - I wouldn't lie about something like this). If I thought the the demonstration portion from "David" was an experience it was because Hans hadn't started to the hands-on experience part. The intern was a slow learner. But that was ok. I learned a thing or two myself that day. (And that's also the answer to one of your interview questions that I haven't forgotten about ...)
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:53 am (UTC)Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:56 am (UTC)What please means *thud*?
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:59 am (UTC)I don't like anonymous trolls...prefer having some sense of who the assholes are....
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 12:02 pm (UTC)And also it's just that my bad Swinglish Accent doesn't work so well when I have to post under my real name.
Re: 2004 Top Totty
Date: 2005-05-10 11:57 am (UTC)