Tim: A quick trip to France, where this came in fourth place, and I’ve often (well, maybe once or twice) said that what can really makes a performance is a good “wait, what just happened?” moment. Prepare yourself for multiple ones.
Tom: Good heavens, what on earth went wrong with the live director? “Wait, what just happened” is meant to be because you can’t believe what you’re seeing, not because the director cut away at exactly the wrong moment. There’s points where it’s out of focus, points where its’s not clear what’s going on. All it needs is someone yelling “RUN THE ROLLER” over the top of it.
Tim: Beautiful moment of Eurovision history, that. So, not that it would matter at Eurovision, as hardly anyone able to vote would understand him. but he’s wanging on about a promise he made to be true to himself. The music’s peculiar – starts out a bit gentle dance notes, heads into brief Hoppípolla territory, before bring back into standard guitar and light drums.
Tom: And it feels like a lot of his higher notes are a bit… well, charitably, can I say that they’re enthusiastically strained? Maybe it’s a deliberate choice, but it certainly sounds off to me.
Tim: As for the performance, well, there was an unusually high numbers of acts that night featuring topless men dancing around, but no others got quite so close as to be almost licking him, and that is a bit weird. What I would say, though, is that if you’re doing a ripping the clothes off act, it should be more than just black jacket to black T-shirt – can’t we have a bit more variety?