Besides the excitement of my Eurovision party this weekend, it also happened to be the 60th birthday of one of my Aunts in South London. We travelled down to the windy, isolated suburban council estates of Belvedere - a place I've never been to before, though I shan't say anything rude about it in case any members of my family stumble across this journal entry - to attend a surprise party. It was worth it for the look of utter befuddlement on her bus pass qualifying face. Obviously as the event was in South London, I ended up leaving much earlier than everyone else.
Non-Londoners may be confused by the great dividing force that is the River Thames, but the simple fact remains that North and East Londoners have very little to do with that side of the river (even me, and both sides of my family are from the region). When the underground tube system was designed, only the Northern line and select parts of the District Line bothered to cross to the other side, which has since left travellers at the mercy of the slightly unreliable train and bus services to get back to their homes. As a result, I've a tendency to ignore events I might otherwise attend in South London purely due to the stress of trying to get home again in the middle of the night.
South London is also
different from the rest of London in ways I can't quite adequately describe. Roads twist and wind in nonsensical directions, rough council estates loom up threateningly from distant hills (we were right near Thamesmead last night) and the whole place seems like a brick desert full of houses and small, slightly battered looking pubs. This isn't true of Richmond, Wimbledon or Clapham obviously, but further afield in places like Woolwich I feel as if I've been transported to an entirely different city - not one I like much, I hasten to add. It's a place where empty dockyards, electricity pylons and gas works replace the more familiar and friendly landmarks for which London is known. I don't know if any episodes of The Sweeney were filmed in South London, but it always seems as if they should have been.
As for my Eurovision party, it was sparsely attended as expected (about nine people showed up in the end) but that's more than enough of a crowd to focus on the television set in the corner of my lounge. This year's contest was perhaps one of the oddest but most exciting in recent memory. By the time Latvia's entry came onstage, which was actually quite early in the contest, I began to wonder if I was in fact dreaming. The sight of a bunch of men in white suits singing acapella whilst dancing with a small cardboard robot is not something I ever thought I'd live to see - well, to be frank, I suspect it wasn't even something I'd ever have been able to think up of my own accord. One can only speculate as to where they got the idea from. Perhaps one of their younger brothers had the robot left over from a recent science project at school, and he talked them into using it as a prop.
Lithuania's entry was another genuine oddity, in effect a three minute long advertising jingle consisting entirely of the lyrics "We are the winners/ of Euro-vision!/ So you can vote/ VOTE!/ vote/ VOTE!/ vote for the winners!" whilst a man who looked rather like Harry Hill did some funky dancing. "Random" isn't the word. The unfortunate side effect of being exposed to this song twice in as many days is that I now can't erase the bastard from my head. It is stuck to my brain like the most unfortunate stubborn stain, and nothing will scrub it off. In my dreams tonight, I fear I may see the Lithuanian's faces leering at me whilst jeering their rather rude and presumptious ditty.
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pitcherthis thinks that the track is the Eurovision equivalent of Art Brut's "We Formed a Band", but it's altogether more
evil than that.
Of course, they weren't the winners though. Finnish rock band Lordi rightfully took that prize with an overblown performance of monster masks, fireworks, and sheer brovado. It matters not that "Hard Rock Hallelujah" sounds a little like a cross between Alice Cooper's "Poison" and Survivor's "Eye of the Tiger" to my ears, it's still a marvellous little glam rock track. Chinn and Chapman (who wrote most of Sweet and Suzi Quatro's compositions in the seventies, in case you're unaware) would have happily put their names to a number like this, and it's rightful victory is cheering for many reasons - not least because it may encourage greater variety in what has become a slightly dated contest. As Mr Lordi himself said, there is more to music in Europe than pop and ballads.
The Russians are apparently upset at being denied the crown and are muttering about stitch-ups and conspiracies, but... (don't say this too loudly on Livejournal...) even by Eurovision standards, I thought their attempt was utterly bland. There is no anti-Russian conspiracy in Europe that I'm aware of, and if there is awarding the country second place would be somewhat over-generous. However, I would like to say that Russia deserved points deducted purely for having that ludicrous mime artist stuck inside a hollowed-out piano. Any chance that I was going to take them seriously after that completely collapsed.
It was a brilliant night. I'm determined to go to Helsinki next year and watch the whole thing, but God knows where I'm going to find the money- and that applies even if I do manage to get a good job in the meantime. Finland isn't the cheapest place on Earth after all. Ah well, good luck to them, in my opinion the best country won, and it's not very often I find myself saying that.
