This maybe more for our Euro readers, but anyone can appreciate this. The Eurovision song contest has been running for over 50 years is now basically considered a joke by anyone remotely serious about popular music. Every year sad bands out of touch with anything "the kids" might possibly consider cool from every european country vie for the title of Eurovision Song Contest winner. Participants generally take it seriously, the music press laugh their asses off, but your grandma probably likes it. The only credible band ever to come out of it in my memory is Abba with their storming sub-glam stomper Waterloo in 1974. Its no joke though, when it is broadcast live in 38 countries to a TV audience estimated at 100 million! This year - WTF!?! - but the winners are a Finnish "Horror Rock" band called LORDI - who look a cross between GWAR/KISS and a bunch of Klingons! If u know anything about this contest - then u know this win is wildly out of character! Check this link for pics and info: http://www.eurovision.tv/english/finland.htm and some BBC news coverage with video: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4998186.stm CNN: http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/Music/0 ... index.html Some key quotes from Mr Lordi (whose band it is) sum this up: “You know, we are meat eaters in a vegetarian café,” said Mr. Lordi when asked how the band feels to be in Eurovision. On winning: “How weird is this? How cool is this?” said lead singer Mr Lordi, at a press conference minutes after his hard rock band Lordi had won the 51st Eurovision Song Contest. “Think about it, a rock band just won a pop song contest. This is weird, strange, interesting. This is for all rock fans, hard rock fans, metal fans and Kiss fans. And we didn’t just win – we won it for Finland.” He admitted that the idea of competing in the contest was a new one. “We never even thought of joining,” he said. “The Finnish Eurovision board called us and asked us to join the selection contest. We said, ‘Are you sure you’ve got the right number?’ We decided to do it just to promote our album. And then we got 42% of the vote!” And, for all of us Skullbrainers: “Kids love us. We look like their toys.”
I saw this the other day-it was wild-The music was actually pretty tight but the singer and song blow dog...
Eurovision has become a yearly institution for a friend and I. It's a long haul to get through, but as long as you have the UK telecast (their announcer takes the piss out of everyone) it can be fun. Of course, many of the acts are plain comedy in themselves. Lithuania this year basically sung a song that went "We are the winners of Eurovision, so vote for the winners"... they done ok in the votes, but Finland won it from a long way out. It's funny how people pay this out (which is merrited of course) but sit around enthralled in American Idol - which is basically America's version of Eurovision. Same level of talent, just Eurovision hasn't got the pretentious judges.
It's gotta be a Europe thing. and I'm not trying to be disrespectful when I say that. I feel like a lot of stuff is successful over there that would never fly here. black metal was all over the press and magazines and gets played on the radio and tv, right? that stuff would never make it onto MTV here (unfortunately) same goes for most foreign countries. I love whenever I go to Montreal and pick up the local paper and there is an interview with Cryptopsy or some band like that just in the paper, like it's no big deal. that's how things should be here.
Black metal gets zero airplay, and never has in this country. John Peel played some out there stuff like Bolt Thrower etc, but it was a small occurance. As far as scandanavian countries go, the more 'mainstream' BM does get played like Satyricon, Dimmu Borgir but you'll never find stuff like Anaal Nathrakh getting airplay. Plus, they're more receptive to traditional heavy metal, so stuff like Lordi is right up their street. Radio in the UK is quite poor, especially commercial radio. Also Lordi are not really successful, think roughly how many records you think they've sold and its probably around 5% of that.
They got in a couple of magazines but nothing major or any decent radio stations. Plus people who liked BM wouldn't touch them with a bargepole. They did a tv documentary where two completely different sets of people lived together. So a born again christian (I think!) went on tour with them. The only thing to come out of it was that they had more merchandise than records (balzac ) and a t-shirt that said Jesus Was a Cunt.
thanks for posting this Muton. Just finish downloading and watching it. Can't believe someone gave Malta a point. Norway should have won. How can you not vote for 6 hot Norwegians.
There's a little sidebar box (blurb?) on Lordi in the newest Rolling Stone I got in the post yesterday, one with Red Hot Chili Peppers on the cover. The band says they love KISS, the Incredible Hulk, and Freddy Kruger. Their plan was to create characters like ones they love -- "monsters playing 80s rock" or something to that effect. Sounds like fun to me! ^_^
