Semifinal One: The Aftermath

Hooray for the ten finalists!

Well, I just shocked myself.  I took a look at the list of songs I selected to make it through to the final, and I got nine out of ten correct.

Here are the ten finalists:

• Armenia
• Belgium
• Greece
• Estonia
• Serbia
• Hungary
• Russia
• Albania
• Romania
• Georgia

The only one I missed was Albania.  I had the Netherlands in instead.

But for those of you who aren't interested in watching the whole thing, here's some of the highlights of the contest.

The Biggest Surprise:

Elhaida Dani   "I'm Alive"   Albania

I'm happy that Albania has made it into the final.  But Dani got really lucky because her final performance was off key and rather stilted.

My guess is that she had a superb performance last night and she scored well with the juries.  It's the only explanation for the qualification.

The Biggest Disappointment:

Trijntje Oosterhuis   "Walk Along"   the Netherlands 

I'm certain that Oosterhuis and the Dutch team wanted to make the final, and the vocals were superb.  But everything else chosen was chosen to make people not vote for it.  The clothes, the camera shots, and the lighting all were weird for no good reason.

Had she performed the song as she had on The Voice Holland this would have been in the final.

The Song I Would Have Voted For:

Boggie   "Wars For Nothing"   Hungary

I enjoy watching the semifinals without knowing much about the final performances.  That means a song that I didn't necessarily rate will get my vote.   Like last year's San Marinese entry, I didn't rate Hungary's song highly.  But when seeing this live, this was the song I would have voted for.  A simple song performed perfectly will get my vote.

The Can't-Miss Song

Eduard Romanyuta   "I Want Your Love"   Moldova

It's a rare song that makes you feel like you could get a STD by watching it.   Good job Mr. Romanyuta.  You made me feel like taking a course of antibiotics.   And now you need to watch it too.

Eurovision 2015: Hungary

When it comes to Eurovision, Hungary always seems to march to the beat to their own drum.  Over the past couple of years, they've had a lot of success with not following Eurovision trends, getting critical and popular support for their songs, with two consecutive top ten finishes..

The Hungarian national final took place back on February 28th, and it had the requisite mix of pop rock bands, dance tracks, and even a former Hungarian representitive.

Kati Wolf    "Ne engedj el"

But the winner continues a trend of interesting, idiosyncratic songs from Hungary:

Boggie  "Wars For Nothing"

Instead of a pop duet with a country feel or a dramatic ballad, Hungary has sent a message song.  Message songs were big during the late 80s and early 90s in Eurovision, but with the end of communism and breakup of Yugoslavia, they became a rarity.

So this profoundly antiwar song is an oddity and a welcome one at that.  "Wars For Nothing" stands out starkly from the rest of the songs in this years contest.    It gets major points from me on that fact alone.

Yet I don't see people actually going out of their way to vote for this song.   This is a song you respect but don't vote for.

I hope the jury vote will get Boggie into the final, but this could bet the first time since 2009 that we won't see a Hungarian song on Saturday night.