Moisturise your calfs with glitter cream and recruit a small army of backing singers; it’s that time of the year again when all of Europe battles for musical supremacy in this giant sing-off we call the Eurovision Song Contest.

This year has a line-up of a monstrous 43 songs - not since 2008 and 2011 have we had that many different countries participate.

We start what is surely to be the most fabulous week of the year on Tuesday with the First Semi-Final, where 19 countries will be fighting over 10 available spots in the Grand Final on Saturday.

So what is there to say about these 19 contestants? What can we expect to see tonight? I’ve carefully selected a memorable lyric from each song. That way, you won’t have to pay attention to the words tonight - because you will already know them. Like each year, I will also hand out an award to each act. After all, even when your song is abysmal, you must still be the best at something.

AZERBAIJAN | Aisel - “X My Heart”

Summary: A perfectly competent banger, with excellently timed explosions of glitter and lyrics riddled with nonsense.

Mind the lyric: “Luna moon me up” is just one of the many confusing phrases uttered here. Fans have been speculating about the significance of the mysterious lyrics for months. Is the singer serenading the moon (“Misty moon, I’m your loon”), or is this a song about net neutrality (“I tear down the firewalls”)? We suspect that her late husband is somehow involved as well. It explains the first verse; “I can hear you when I wake/I can see you when I dream”. From beyond the moon and stars, Aisel receives her powers to go on. That, or she’s Sailor Moon. It’s either or.

Award for Crushed Expectations: When Azerbaijan announced a jazz singer would represent them with a song partially in Azeri, who’d have thought we’d get another bog-standard, safe pop track? Having never missed out on the final, it’s likely that Azerbaijan continues their streak, even in a semi-final as tough as this.

ICELAND | Ari Olafsson - “Our Choice”

Summary: Corny, dated ballad brought with confidence by a very sweet boy who I would protect with my life.

Mind the lyric: “In every single language/There’s a word for love and for blame.” Clichés are always welcome in our house. He could’ve chosen to sing the song in his native Icelandic, but he chose to commit to English. Do they know it’s Eurovision time at all?

The Hopeless Choirboy Award: To prove how hard this semi-final is to predict, Iceland is literally the only country that I know for sure won’t get to reprise their song on Saturday. Enjoy this throwback to the late ‘80s as long as it lasts, because you’ll only have this one chance to see a new Johnny Logan born.

The Darlingest Darling Award: Ari is the cutest little guy we’ve ever seen. The enthusiasm he radiates with while singing this song of peace and hope is so contagious, but the way he became friends with all the other artists during the promo tour is even more heartwarming.

ALBANIA | Eugent Bushpepa - “Mall”

Summary: What might be the most impressive male voice of the year, this tattoo’d rocker sings a thrusting song about intense desire.

Mind the lyric: “Ky lot i pathare nje dite do shteroje/Nga puthjet e zjarrta qe enderroi” Once again, we’re not sure how good your Albanian is. Ours is all right, so we’ll tell you he sings about a deep yearning, for a lover who is far removed. His tears serve as proof for that love: “This lingering tear one day will run dry/From fiery kisses I dream every night.”

The Underdog Award: Albania is usually the first country to select a song. Ever since december, this song has been on the minds of the fans. Keeping it in Albania was a good move, and we’d all like to see Eugent succeed. If his raw emotion translates, it is not even outside of the realm of possibilities.

BELGIUM | Sennek - “A Matter of Time”

Summary: This year’s Bond song. Sultry and bombastic in the right places.

Mind the lyric: “Sometimes it feels like it’s meant to be broken.” I’ve been told the singer suggested these lyrics after watching co-writer Alex Callier drop a beautiful teapot on the floor and shattering it into many pieces. It was meant to happen, just so this song could be born.

The Perfect Pseudonym Award: That Europe would have a hard time pronouncing “Laura Groeseneken”, was never in question. A good thing then that Laura’d anticipated that. Her stage name is the middle chunk of her last name: from Groeseneken to Sennek.

The Drunk in the Day Award: Laura really did show her best side, these past few months. At all of the pre-Eurovision parties, she appeared with a glass of red wine in hand. I’m told the parody song “A Matter of Wine” is being written as we speak.

CZECH REPUBLIC | Mikolas Josef - “Lie to Me”

Samenvatting: Naughty nerd with a backpack full of equally naughty spaghetti.

Mind the lyric: “I know you ‘bop-whop-a-lu bop’ on his wood bamboo/When you were still seeing me and well he didn’t even knew” Mikolas raps and sings about his unfaithful partner. The song is peppered with raunchy phrases such as “you set my camel in the mood” and “the way she moved got me making a puddle”. A puddle. He knows his girl is cheating on him, but damn if she does not look good while doing it. Might actually be his fetish. Who am I to judge?

Award for the Most Arbitrary Censorship: Although a line like “plenty motherfuckers wanna eat my spaghetti” was too crude for Eurovision and became “plenty of these greedies wanna eat my spaghetti”, there seems to be no such problem with the phrase “god damn it”.

Award for the Trickiest Stunts: During his hyperactive first rehearsal, Mikolas seriously injured himself. To the point of not being able to walk for a few days. The doctors have recommended he leave the backflips to his backing dancers. Unfortunately it does take away some from the performance.

LITHUANIA | Ieva Zasimauskaite - “When We’re Old”

Summary: An intimate, emotional love song about growing old together, which will be guaranteed to make people tear up.

Mind the lyric: “From your very first smile/I knew that I’d walk a mile” Now this is a lyric I can relate to. You’d have to put a knife to my throat to make me run anywhere. No way a simple smile would ever get me anywhere further than the corner store. I’ll go get you some milk, darling, but that’s the limit.

The Shoddy Poetry Award: I know, it’s unreasonable to expect any random European to have a tight grasp on the English language, but the rhymes in this song are borderline pedestrian. Especially “I’ll never forget/that day the first time we met” is miserable.

ISRAEL | Netta - “Toy”

Summary: A feminist shout of anger; clucking and exceptionally talented dancers included.

Mind the lyric: “My Simon says ‘leave me alone’/I’m taking my pikachu home.” Netta uses toys as metaphors to tell especially irritating men off. “I’m not your toy/You stupid boy”, the chorus continues. She is not just an object to be played with, but rather “the Barbie’s got something to say”.

Award for the Fastest Favorite: It only took a few minutes after this song’s release, for Israel to rise to the top of the rankings. Within the hour, she was the favourite with the bookmakers, and it stayed that way for weeks… until earlier today. After last night’s jury performance, things got a little mixed up, and Netta was finally overtaken.

BELARUS | Alekseev - “Forever”

Summary: A dramatic, dark ballad. Not for the squeamish.

Mind the lyric: “It must be something that we call love.” You don’t sound very certain, do you now? The rest of the song is something of a tormented journey, trying to convince himself that he is actually in love and that it’s worth something.

The Bram Stoker Award: Tonight, we’re giving the award to Alekseev. His dark desire to be with his love “forever” reminds us of a very gothic vampire. However, we’ll have to take the award back later, because someone else will be receiving it on Thursday. Eurovision with just one vampire really isn’t Eurovision.

Award for the Bloodiest Ballad: Sometimes one really does say it best when one says nothing at all. There are no words to describe what happens in Alekseev’s act - though I can tell you, if you’ve always dreamt about watching someone get shot by a rose? That’s oddly specific, and also, you’re in luck tonight.

ESTONIA | Elina Nechayeva - “La Forza”

Summary: An Estonian soprano with a killer high note and killer high dress.

Mind the lyric: “Nostro amore/Guida a noi sará/Nell'infinito/Per l’eternitá”, or “our love will guide us through infinity for eternity”. If you’re doubting yourself, no, they do not speak Italian in Estonia. Although, their song last year was called “Verona”, so it makes you wonder if there’s anything in the water.

The Award for the Grandest Gown: The last couple of weeks were exciting, because this act came perilously close to being incomplete. Elina’s impressive dress - enhanced by vivid projections - was too expensive for Estonia to pay for. In the end, sponsors were found, making it so that we will be able to watch her floral prints come to life, watching those colours swirl around as if in a paint mixer.

BULGARIA | Equinox - “Bones”

Summary: A common framework of five unrelated singers, all hoping for the victory with this mysterious, almost supernatural song.

Mind the lyric: “I love beyond the bones.” Love goes deeper than flesh for this bunch. If it’s not a spiritual experience, then don’t even bother with sex. Basically, they want to feel the universe tremble in their ass each time they bump uglies.

The Most Confusing Simile: “Love is like a black hole: everything is dark” might be my personal least favorite lyric in the contest this year. Call me old-fashioned, but I just don’t have that much need for all-devouring holes in my love life.

The “I’ll Be Back” Award (runner-up): Only one of these five, Vlado Mihailov, has been to Eurovision before, as one of Kristian Kostov’s backing vocalists last year. Music and lyrics have been penned by the same team, namely a team of producers mysteriously called “Symphonix” who were responsible for the previous two Bulgarian entries. Their offerings for other countries have failed to do as well, though, so it seems as if the best material is deliberately kept in-house.

FYR MACEDONIA | Eye Cue - “Lost and Found”

Summary: Three songs for the price of one! Come get your songs! There’s a sale on!

Mind the lyric: “You’re afraid that you might suffer/But trust me, what you’ll find/Will blow your mind.” Call me old-fashioned again, if you want to, but that sounds to me like Marija, the singer of this duo, is trying to convince her better half Bojan to be a little bit more sexually adventurous in the bedroom. With her moaning “let me go deeper”, it’s almost impossible to interpret this song differently. Maybe love is like a black hole after all.

The Mixed Genre Award: Don’t get too comfortable, because this duo has decided to implement multiple genre shifts in this song. The chorus gives us a pretty funky, juicy electro beat, which is abruptly interrupted by reggae verses that consistently go on for a bit too long

Award for the Worst Band Name (runner-up): Calling a group “I.Q.” should be a punishable crime in the first place, but turning it into a pun? Go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect any money.

CROATIA | Franka - “Crazy”

Summary: One of those songs about how love drives you crazy and dark, but not a very original one. It’s more or less convincing.

Mind the lyric: “When I saw your eyes, boy/You’re just like a movie/Black and white.” It’s just one of the many lyrics in this song that sound like they’re placeholders. I suppose they really did want to replace the generic “a movie” with the title of an actual black-and-white movie, but nothing came to mind right away, so they left it as was for the time being. And then, kind of forgot about it, the way most people kind of kept forgetting that this song existed. It’s only a theory.

Award for the Most Absent Attention: Frank is a pretty decent performer, but it was hard to find anyone who was talking about her song these past few months. This dark tune was overshadowed by many songs that actually forced you to have an opinion about it, and this one is just so easily ignored. Even an absurd plagiarism scandal resulted in a few shrugs and was forgotten within the week.

AUSTRIA | César Sampson - “Nobody but you”

Samenvatting: Alpine gospel, a sultry voice that feels like a religious experience.

Mind the lyric: “So am I wrong, giving my all?/Making you stay tonight?” Those who listen to the words, will hear a man who is desperately holding on to a lover. As bumpy as the road may be, he is refusing to give up hope, although he second-guesses himself constantly, wondering if his insistence is actually okay. That last part is essential, just in case you’d get a bad feeling about lines like “I’m in too deep to let you leave” or “it wouldn’t be right letting you go, running away”.

The “I’ll Be Back” Award: There’s a slim chance you’ll recognize César, because his time on the Eurovision stage was spent mostly off-camera. He was there in 2016 and 2017, as a backing vocalist for the Bulgarian entries. This is another song provided by Symphonix. The ultimate Bulgarian-Austrian collaboration.

GREECE | Yianna Terzi - “Oniro mou”

Summary: A serenade to the motherland, underscore by spiritual tones and with a solid sprinkling of Greek drama.

Mind the lyric: “Πώς θες να σου το πω/Πως για σένα εγώ θα πέθαιναΤη” It’s a tricky chunk of words to read, but those lisping sounds are more Greek than any entry Greece has ever sent before. It mean as much as “how can I make it clear that I would die for you?” and if that’s not dramatic, then I don’t know what is.

The Mishap Award: If you didn’t know any better, you’d think Yianna accidentally ignored a “wet paint” sign before coming on stage, but the blue colour she applied to her hand is a conscious decision. It’s meant to be the same blue as the Greek flag, symbolising air and water at the same time. But if you want to imagine she’s had an accident with that Estonian Dulux-machine, that’s perfectly valid.

FINLAND | Saara Aalto - “Monsters”

Summary: Frenetic choreo and killer vocals are Saara’s weapons. This is about as perfect as a Eurovision song can get.

Mind the lyric: “At my worst I found my army strong/All the demons are gone.” It’s not a stretch to read this as a song about coming out and facing the fears you have. Even at your very worst, there will always be other “monsters like you” (thank you, Norway 2015) to support you.

The Eternal Second Award: Saara Aalto has tried to represent her home country before, but each time she finished second. Last year, she journeyed to the United Kingdom, tot participate in the X-Factor. Despite her popularity, she finished… second again. In this year’s Finnish national selection, Saara came second again. Of course, that was only because the public had three songs to choose from, and they were all hers. Whether she’ll get a podium spot at the actual contest is less certain.

The Typecasting Award: Finland’s first victory came in 2006, with Lordi, a hard rock band wearing monster costumes. Maybe Saara’s monsters will do just as well.

ARMENIA | Sevak Khanagyan - “Qami”

Summary: A wind machine slowly gets turned on, which is not enough to blow a miniature model of Stonehenge off the stage.

Mind the lyric: “Qami.” Yes, the title of the song means “wind”, and the cold wind that Sevak sing about, appears to have blown away all of his warm memories. Just memorising “qami” is enough to get you 80% of the way to singing along with this song.

The Best Beard Award: The Albanian Eugent Bushpepa was a contender for this one as well, but in the end there can be only one winner. The song just isn’t as interesting; it’s a slow build to an explosive climax, with some very impressive long notes along the way.

SWITZERLAND | ZiBBZ - “Stones”

Summary: A photogenic brother-and-sister duo with a non-confrontational song… sort of the ultimate Swiss protest.

Mind the lyric: “Wild joker on a gold throne/Blood diamond summer home” Sure, why the hell not. If we’re not allowed to talk about America at the Eurovision Song Contest, then what are we even doing?

The Paltry Pacifist Award: Of all places, of course Switzerland should be the one to send this song. Neutrality is exemplified here, with statements such as “I ain’t throwing stones” and “I can’t do anything about it”. Or: what sounds like a protest song on the surface, is actually about deliberately doing fuck-all.

Award for the Worst Band Name: Stee en Coco Gfeller are brother and sister, or “siblings”. That word does not exist in many languages, so it’s easy to see why it captures the imagination. If you’re a heinous enough person, you might find yourself one day accidentally shortening that to “sibs”. In this day and age, it’s easy to turn an s into a z, and before you know it, you’re calling yourself “zibs”. And sure, that’s terrible enough as is, but you could decide to start a band, and you could think that perhaps “zibbz” is a good name for that band. And if your ultimate goal is to drive Europe to madness, then yes, you could use capitalisation in the worst possible way and write it as “ZiBBZ”. You could. But you shouldn’t. No one should. Eye Cue doesn’t seem as bad, now that I look at it again.

IRELAND | Ryan O’Shaughnessy - “Together”

Summary: Bittersweet lullaby for a shattering relationship.

Mind the lyric: “There’s a smile on your face/That I haven’t seen/Since we started going out.” Clearly, things are going off the rails for the couple in this story, although I don’t know why it took Ryan so long to notice somethign was wrong. We’ve theorised that that smile disappeared as soon as Ryan first pulled out his guitar and said “anyway, I write songs”.

Award for Most Charming Choreography: While Ryan gently strums his guitar, two dancers prance around the stage to represent the romantic start of his relationship. It looks almost like a memory to him, as the stage is dark and he realises that initial promise (“we said we’d be together till we’d die”) has no hope of being kept. It’s a bit odd to call it romantic, given that the song is about the complete opposite, but it’s a solid enough juxtaposition.

CYPRUS | Eleni Foureira - “Fuego”

Summary: Call the firemen, because someone is burning down the house tonight.

Mind the lyric: “You’ve got me pelican fly-fly-flyin’.” Of all the birds in the animal kingdom, the choice fell on a pelican. Whether that actually means anything? The question burns in our minds, but we just don’t know. We have however been informed that the chorus’ shouts of “a-yeah-a-yeah-a-yeah, fuego” mean “yeah, yeah. Fire”. So that’s nice.

Award for the Most Smouldering Surprise: Eleni Foureira made the members of the press feel warm during her rehearsals, but last night she burned down the roof. She performed for the juries, which means half of tonight’s results have already been decided. Cyprus exceeded all expectations, some saying she was the surefire winner of this semi-final. The bookmakers saw her rise drastically. Where she was in 20th position a few weeks ago, she shot up to second instantly, and by the time the morning came around, she had overtaken Israel completely. Is a first victory for this small island a serious possibility?

So there we have it: 19 hopefuls with only 10 places in the final.You know who they are now and you know what to expect from them. Tune in tonight and see who makes it through the first semi-final!

In addition to that, you’ll be treated to a snippet from some of the direct qualifiers. Host country Portugal brings us an intimate song about saying goodbye and about remembrance. The United Kingdom delivers a wonderful singer whose song is not nearly as good as she is. Finally, there’s Spain: a bombastic duet, which, curiously enough, is the only one in its kind.

Enjoy!





(This article was first published on Newsmonkey.be in the original Dutch.)

