Eurovision entered the future in
1988, with its first computer-generated score-board, augmented by the
Tron-style stage-set. Cyprus had to drop out of the contest at the last
minute when they realised that their entry this year had come third in
the national final four years earlier (or at least when they realised
that this was quite an obvious breach of the rules). That's twelve
points Greece won't be getting back.
Spain raided their museum of national costume for a song subtitled
"Made in Spain". It was a fairly bland post-Wham electro-pop affair.
The excitingly named (though blander to look at) MFÖ made their
second appearance for Turkey with a song full of eastern promise upon
which it never really delivered, but there was a rather sophisticated
sheen to it all, like a '70s disco anthem but without the groove.
Greece's entry was interesting, not least for stealing the laugh
(Kasper Hauser-like) from Dschinghis Khan. A tap-dancing female clown
(looking more like Worzel Gummidge) turns up three quarters in and is a
bit off-putting, but not enough to put us off totally. The feel of the
rest of the song is quite old-fashioned; almost '60s-ish, and that's
not just on account of the dresses; it has a certain Scandinavian
tweeness redolent of that era.
Israel impressed yet again, this time playing the Iberian card with a
gypsy number and not just one but two accordions. It's good stuff, as
one might expect; appropriately sephardic and featuring a sirtaki
sequence for good measure. They came very close to making it four in a
row with the AView jury, but they were pipped to it by Denmark. Denmark
dug out a heavily pregnant Vivienne Westwood-alike surrounded by tutued
backing dancers interacting with a stage full of rather dangerously
pointy fake yellow electric guitars. The song itself is very much in
the Bobbysocks mould of cod-rock'n'roll, but better. At one brief
point, a man comes on and performs a duet. It's all rather whacky, and
one could easily disregard it were it not so strangely enjoyable and
terribly well done, including the slapstick conclusion where one of the
ballet dancers throws her guitar into the orchestra and it decapitates
the conductor.
Europe, of course, went with another power-ballad. They chose unknown
French Canadian chanteuse Céline Dion, curiously dressed in a
double breasted blazer and a short but voluminous mesh skirt making her
look a little bit like a rocket. The song is a pale imitation of the
great Luxembourgian power-ballads of old, and feels a bit like
someone's put them in a cement mixer and hoped for the best. Trouble
is, if you put a lot of cute kittens in a cement mixer, what comes out
is a mangled mess of flesh and fur, and a similar effect (though by no
means as extreme) occurs here: the song is comparatively shapeless and
lacks any real heart. It's hard to be dragged along with it in the same
way as we could be with some of the earlier power-ballads in
Eurovision. That is not to say that it's terrible; we gave it 4pts
which means we thought it was the seventh best song on the night. It's
just that if power-ballads are your thing, and clearly they were
Europe's thing for a very long time, then this is hardly a great
example of the genre; all it really has going for tiare its suspensions
and even those don't resolve in a particularly
fulfilling manner. It's just a bit limp and wet, like an old lettuce.
For each year's songs we apply our points in the 12-10-8 style of the
modern contest, irrespective of how the voting functioned at the time.
In brackets is the position the song came on the night:
HERE
ARE THE VOTINGS
OF THE AVIEW JURY:
|
12pts
(3rd)
|
DEN |
Hot
Eyes
"Ka' du se hva' jeg sa'?" |
10pts
(7th)
|
ISR |
Yardena
Arazi
"Ben Adam" (בן אדם) |
8pts
(17th)
|
GRE
|
Afroditi
Frida
"Clown" (Κλόουν) |
7pts
(15th)
|
TUR |
MFÖ
"Sufi" |
6pts
(11th)
|
ESP |
La
Década Prodigiosa
"La chica que yo quiero (Made in Spain)" |
5pts
(20th)
|
FIN |
Boulevard
"Nauravat silmät muistetaan" |
4pts
(1st)
|
SUI |
Céline
Dion
"Ne partez pas sans moi" |
3pts
(14th)
|
GER |
Maxi
& Chris Garden
"Lied für einen Freund" |
2pts
(6th)
|
YUG |
Srebrna
Krila
"Mangup"
|
1pt
(16th)
|
ISL
|
Beathoven
"Þú og þeir (Sókrates)" |
Europe had the UK second, Luxembourg fourth, Norway fifth, Ireland
eighth, the Netherlands ninth, France tenth, Italy and Sweden
joint-twelfth, Belgium and Portugal joint-18th, and Austria last with
nul points.
|
Our winners, Denmark's Hot Eyes.
Close: Israel's Yardena Arazi.
"Ha ha ha ha!" Greece's Afroditi Frida.
Spain's La Década Prodigiosa.
The Turkish entry, MFÖ.
 Don't
laugh, she's Canadian.
|