Skip to main contentSkip to navigationSkip to navigation
Athens winners ... Lordi, the prosthetic-wearing rock monsters, are providing comfort for devotees.
Athens winners ... Lordi, the prosthetic-wearing rock monsters, are providing comfort for devotees. Photograph: LEHTIKUVA/REUTERS
Athens winners ... Lordi, the prosthetic-wearing rock monsters, are providing comfort for devotees. Photograph: LEHTIKUVA/REUTERS

Boom-bang-a-bang Covid-19! Eurovision warriors refuse to be silenced

This article is more than 3 years old

The song contest may be cancelled due to coronavirus, but heartbroken fans, plucky contestants and prosthetic-wearing Finns are partying on regardless. Full marks everyone!

For the casual viewer, the Eurovision Song Contest happens on one ridiculous, strobe-lit night in May, accompanied by a bottle of fizz and the sarcastic commentary of Graham Norton. But for the true devotee, the contest starts months earlier, with hot rumours and endless speculation about leaked demos, not to mention the precision tracking of every country’s heats and hopefuls.

For those diehards, the cancellation of the show due to coronavirus was devastating. Not only is the grand final in Rotterdam not taking place for the first time in 65 years, the same fate has also befallen the many pre-parties planned around Europe. At these jubilant jamborees, 2020 acts would have performed their entries, while forgotten Scandinavian contestants from the early 90s would trigger hysteria just by strolling on stage, and a single spin of Katrina and the Waves’ 1997 winner would spark uncontrollable sobbing.

However, the show isn’t quite over. The artists who were meant to compete have been fighting back through the power of live-streams and video-conferencing. Daði Freyr Pétursson was one of the favourites to win, his song Think About Things having gone viral before it had even been selected by Iceland. The video shook social media, thanks in no small part to the band’s quirky dance routine and pixel-art jumpers, as well as their strange keyboard-saxophone instruments and smouldering looks to camera and wind machines. Everyone from Russell Crowe to James Corden tweeted their approval. No nul points here.

Unable to take Think About Things to Rotterdam, Daði Freyr has turned to YouTube to give a bit of Eurovision back to the fans, performing covers of such contest classics as Lipstick by everybody’s favourite bequiffed Irish twins Jedward. In another life, Daði Freyr’s quarantine versions of bygone offerings could have won the contest.

“The Eurovision community has been a big part of why my song has done so well,” he says. “I wanted to do something for them. Also, I’ve been doing video covers for five years. It’s not just something that has come with quarantine – although I’m close to 40,000 subscribers now. I didn’t have 1,000 before.” Daði Freyr is planning a live-streamed concert this month ahead of the contest, although the details have yet to be ironed out. “I’m just going to press the button and see what happens.”

Victoria from Bulgaria was another hot favourite with Tears Getting Sober, a touching ballad about mental health. She has been performing online concerts as replacement therapy for the pre-party addicts, as well as participating in Eurovision At Home. In this series, streamed on the official Eurovision YouTube channel, past stars perform in isolation, letting fans pick which songs they sing.

The results have been tremendous. A Sámi joiker (a traditional singer) from the Norwegian band KEiiNO has rapped along to Hatrið Mun Sigra, an industrial track from pro-BDSM, anti-capitalist art collective Hatari, from Iceland. And on 16 May, meant to be the date of the final, the show’s organisers will air Eurovision: Europe Shine a Light, a celebration of the 41 fallen songs, that promises to include a crowdsourced karaoke version of the 1980 winner, Johnny Logan’s sax-and-flute scorcher What’s Another Year.

Ballad about mental health ... Bulgaria’s 2020 entrant Victoria. Photograph: Lora Musheva

What of this year’s UK entry James Newman, who was hoping to break the UK’s string of bad luck with his love song/ode to deep sea diving My Last Breath? Well, Newman will also be getting his time in the spotlight, speaking to Graham Norton on the night of what would have been the final and tracking his scuppered road to Rotterdam for a BBC documentary, as well as singing a Eurovision classic from the vaults for the home concerts.

“I was gutted about the cancellation,” he says. “I knew it was coming, but when I found out, I had to pull over and have a little minute. But I’m still really busy – it’s just all from my front room on video calls.”

Even outside the official channels, Eurovision is alive and well thanks to thousands of fans who are using the past to fill in the gaps of the present. These stalwarts, as well as former contestants, have been sync-watching vintage contests, casting their own votes afresh in an online poll and trending on Twitter with #EurovisionAgain.

They’ve rewatched Lordi – the prosthetic-wearing Finnish rock monsters – triumph at Athens 2006. They’ve picked over UK hopefuls Scooch floundering at Helsinki 2007. And they’ve swayed along to Malena Ernman, mother of Greta Thunberg, representing Sweden with a dance-opera-bop at Moscow 2009.

Opera-bop … Malena Ernman – AKA Greta Thunberg’s mum – competed for Sweden in 2009. Photograph: Oleg Nikishin/Getty Images

“One of the things I really love about Eurovision is chatting about it as it happens on Twitter,” says writer and Eurovision Again mastermind Rob Holley. “When you rewatch a year, there’s always stuff you’ve forgotten, so to go back and tweet along is really fun.

“When we did it that first week, it started trending alongside Ant and Dec and Doctor Who. I wasn’t hugely surprised, because the Eurovision fandom is hugely enthusiastic and the group viewing experience is unique. But over the past few weeks, it’s just got more and more popular.”

The European Broadcasting Union, the body behind the contest, got in touch – not, as Holley thought, to issue a cease and desist, but to help. They ensured that high-quality streams of contests were available on YouTube, and shared a countdown on their official channel to 8pm, so that Eurovision fans around the world could all sync their viewing for the ultimate simulcast experience. “I can’t imagine the Olympics producing all of this content to replace the competition,” says Holley.

That celebration of the 41 fallen songs will be the last that will be heard of them, contest-wise anyway: the rules state that they can’t be reused for 2021. This is why the decision to completely cancel the show has so divided fans: many believe that remote performances could have been possible, allowing the songs to be aired and their singers to do battle.

No second chance … Daði Freyr and his band perform online. Photograph: YouTube

Although Daði Freyr seemed on track for a high-placing finish, he backs the rules. “I wouldn’t want to bring Think About Things back next year. The song would be more than a year old, and the performance as well.” Nor does he like the remote option. “If the contestants aren’t all singing on the same stage, with the same lighting, cameras and production values, then there’s not really a competition.”

Fans may have been robbed of a chance to witness Europe’s best, bravest and most bonkers musicians battle for glory this year, but the cancellation won’t stop them from celebrating Eurovision – they’re just going to celebrate, say, the 2006 contest instead. After Lordi’s historic victory that year, Finland broke the world karaoke record, when about 80,000 people gathered in Helsinki’s Market Square to sing Hard Rock Hallelujah. Changed days indeed.

This article was amended on 18 May 2020 to follow Icelandic naming conventions throughout.

Comments (…)

Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion

Most viewed

Most viewed