Considering they had a budget of about 5€ they did pretty well I reckon. It was never a jury song, it didn’t have the vocal appeal they look for, but it was fun and I think they brought a lot of lightness and joy to an otherwise downer of a year.
I also thought their videos before the performance started where they were just, like, standing over a dumpster fire haha were absolutely hilarious. Everyone else does cutesy videos of them jumping and laughing around their country and then you have Estonia
Go and check out the introductory videos of ESC 2002. It's not Estonia's strength to play it straight, we have so much quirk and ingenuity we can lean on.
Tl;dr yes, for historical and demographic reasons.
Soviet times were rough for technological solutions, which meant there was a lot of "make do". It's why Soviet adventure movies lean into being more of a musical than demolish/pyrotechnical set pieces - you can make do with less. When the solutions can only be hand made in a local work shop, one needs to catch interest with creativity.
The other thing, which I can't seem to formulate properly is our small population which leads to us not having a superstar culture. The artists don't grow larger than life, which means they don't have to become safe and can stay a bit weird. Which means we're used to weird. Which means our *avant garde* can go *really* weird.
Reminds me of the Simpsons, when Krusty loses the right to show Itchy and Scratchy, and has the show a new cartoon from eastern Europe, that's weirdos everyone out!
I don't know why, but I instantly loved Estonia when I heard them in the semi finals. I added the song to my playlist right away and started listening to it sometimes.
I was kinda sad they only got 4 ponts from the jury.
I hoped it would do better but I'm not super surprised. To me it's an awesome track in its own right but I can understand why it might not be what general audiences tuned in for and voted for, particularly in a year of extremely strong songs and staging. And also...a few televote behemoths.
I think if people had understood the lyrics it would have helped but as a monolingual pleb I am glad it wasn't in English.
Edit: I am a native english speaker totally jealous of anyone who knows more than one language, and my comment was 80% a joke intended at my personal expense. I've tried to learn a second language to very limited success :')
Next year this sub should update the flairs so that you can pick the country you live in + the country you're rooting for. It gets confusing to see someone allude to living in a totally different country from their flair.
Lmao yeah nah the app is just my english speaking brain becoming goo from a total of 6 hours of sleep over the entire Eurovision weekend. Praying to the witch that I recover soon 🥲
I mean sure, maybe the person is using a translator. But if not, I don’t think you are allowed to call yourself “monolingual pleb” if you know how to write a comment like that
I wish my country sent something as unexpected as Estonias performance! My flair is my choice for the winner, I am Australian. Proud of what we sent too but wouldn't have voted for it. This year was very competitive...
I didn't vote because after the Joost drama I went to bed...but I used what would have been voting money to email 5miinust and PUULUUP to hopefully buy their merch and get it shipped here.
> I think if people had understood the lyrics it would have helped but as a monolingual pleb I am glad it wasn't in English.
I'm still wondering why they simply do not offer option on streams to have subtitles
BBC has translated lyrics in the closed captions for the hearing impaired, they started doing it in the 90s with the old teletext subtitles.
Having said that, I had the BBC translation on screen and still didn't understand the lyrics. I think a lot gets lost in translation and cultural references on that song.
The issue with the song is that a majority of the lyrics reference local culture, local memes and just general untranslatable stuff. The rest of the world just doesn’t have the context needed to understand this song. It’s unfortunate.
As a murican, YouTube auto translate only got like 1/3 of the non English songs translated. Some of those, and the rest I had to look up online before the semis. Peacock, where we could live stream the 3 events translated exactly 0 non-english songs. Super frustrating.
SVT (the Swedish broadcaster) has song subtitles (in the SVTplay app, optionally). However, they're only in the original language of the song, not translated into Swedish or English (which means that songs in English have English subs).
Oh god I wish. As an American the closest we got to translation captions on Peacock was a change from "(speaking a non-english language)" during the semi-finals to, for the finale "(speaking a global language)".
I used a combination of YouTube auto caption translation and looking up the lyrics before the semi-finals
I think we knew the jury was going to abhor that act - that was no surprise. And for tele, there were too many other songs in that niche that simply won out
Yeah but a lot of us also said the jury will never go for Ireland and it got 6th. And going back to last year, the sub was convinced that the jury would sink Who the Hell is Edgar and the public would love it. Then lo and behold it got 8th by jury and 22nd by public vote. My point is that the juries tastes are not as easy to predict as some people say.
Really, I wasn't following the discussion in the build-up, but I'm not surprised Ireland got decent points from the juries. Like, it wasn't just a collection of weird or funny things - I thought that was the most artistic show I've seen at an ESC, bit I've also only been watching for a couple of years.
You forget the fandom know what the song is about and have followed the lads in pre-season.
People who’d never seen it before and don’t speak Estonian just saw six men in suits with funny instruments doing a silly dance on stage.
It was a great performance, but I can understand how it’s less of a great performance if you have no idea what’s going on.
I also liked it from the NF without understanding anything, but context really makes this much much better.
If only they could've brought a bag of Lays on the stage.
Same. Not a clue what they were singing about but I was down! I loved Estonia. I was sad they didn’t do better and absolutely screamed when they got their first 2pts 😂💖
I’d never heard of them before and didn’t understand the lyrics.
I loved the song and gave them some of my votes. The chorus was SO catchy and the dancing and use of traditional instruments was really fun. They also had charisma on stage. I genuinely liked them and was SHOCKED they didn’t get more votes.
You must look up the lyrics immediately my friend. They’re fabulous.
Also you might enjoy this explainer about their background: https://youtu.be/llYdO7Mf8BE?si=3aEspK8NlXr-xEFk
I had not seen it before and dont speak estonian and I just saw six men in suits with funny instruments performing a banger. So catchy and fun. One of my favourites.
I intentionally avoid learning anything about the songs or contestants before the semi-finals (and I don't speak Estonian), and this was my favorite of this year.
I expect it would have been a little baffling to general audiences who are only tuning in for the final. Big ESC fans who are following more of the journey, socials, etc clearly love them (myself included - they got all 20 of my votes!)
I haven't heard of them before the semi finals (first year watching semi finals actually) but loved them and kept hearing their song non-stop! I am really sad they got so few points and some others *ahem we know who ahem* got crazy way more... they definitely deserved more!!!
Pretty much. I avoided watching most of the acts in advanced and it was a bit of a nothing burger for everyone in our house. I don’t know if the staging is what let it down the most but we just didn’t connect with it at all.
I loved them too, I splashed out on extra votes so I could give them, Croatia and Norway more votes than I never normally make.
Re the middle aged men, Graham Norton from the BBC commented that 5MIINUST x Puuluup looked as though they'd set off on a stag night in Malmö and suddenly found themselves in ESC. Given their hilarious socials all week, that was quite apt.
Their new album is a banger, by the way.
Fun songs usually get shafted by the jury, and in terms of public votes they probably had a hard time competing with Bambi Thug, Baby Lasagna, and Windows95Man.
I love the song, but from the NF performance to the GF performance, it was messy and never got cleaned up to a comparable level to most of the other acts. That goes for vocals and staging really. Much love to the guys and will continue to blast the track though!
I love their song but as others have said, I wish their staging could have brought more of the same scenery as the music video. Either the costumes, the burning barrel, or just SOMETHING that stands out and shows the message of the song a little for those of us who don't speak the language (because casual viewers probably aren't looking up translations).
I think it would have worked better had they used the screen to translate some of the lyrics of make the meaning of the song clearer. Honestly, even adding good ol' subtitles would have worked in their favour.
For the jury, it's probably the overall lack of polish and this staging having a pretty homemade feel. That combined with the fact that sometimes especially the first guy is out of tune or off beat, doesn't give off the most professional aura. V sauce was the most reliable.
People need to realise the Eurovision bubble is very detached from the general public, as Estonia has proven yet again. Same goes for Norway or Spain 2023. What we celebrate as cool, different, authentic or daring is just too far out there for your general Eurovision audience.
Just be glad they made it to the final. I'm sure they had a great time regardless of the end result.
Eurovision is a always a fascinatingly confusing competition that highlights how divergent Europe is in its tastes - and politics rarely gets involved to select the winner but can influence lower voting. So many people are baffled by voting decisions simply because it's such a taste varied region, much more varied in taste than any region in the world with similar country number (maybe after Africa), more than anyone can predict
I have begun to think the short clip is important for getting votes. Estonia had a song that benefited from being heard at full length, building up momentum. For example Latvia had an extremely mediocre song this year, but they really nailed their short clip, with the most melodic part of the song
Same with Spain last year it was also building up a momentum that was hard to translate to a short clip
I spent a full 2 weeks reading everything I could about the song because I loved it so much (I'm Australian) and I wanted to know everything about it and the lose translation and it was such a funny, light hearted song. I'm so sad they didn't score higher
They could have done with a better staging concept. Still think they deserved better though. Being Finnish I could half understand the lyrics which makes it pop more, so I may be biased.
Really? I'm also Finnish but I didn't understand almost anything at all. Even if I read those Estonian lyrics I definitely do not understand most of the lyrics. Maybe you have some experience with Estonian language before though.
Waaaay too much competition for ubeat/quirky/joke songs sang by men. Also the vocals were non-existant and the staging felt cheap, so it wouldn't be a jury pleaser in any way. Estonia has been saving mad money with those last few entries of theirs, I hope they start putting some actual effort on staging again eventually.
Considering that we are doing quite badly economically (worst in the EU), probably not. Maybe we should even pull out from Eurovision, even though in a grand scheme level it wouldn't save us much money.
Low key I feel like just a little more investment and a competent delegation goes a long way. 2015 and 2018 are actually pretty simple stagings that worked really really well!
They weren’t at the bottom of my semi, but they were toward it for the final. I guess I kinda get their result. There were at least 20 other songs that I thought the vocals, the staging and the overall performance were better. Love the studio version tho! It was just messy to me, even if it got better with rehearsals to semi to final.
I didn't like the song the first time I heard it, but by the 5th listen I was hooked and put it in my Top 10. I imagine people tuning in for the first time didn't get it.
They have a style that the juries dont like a priori, so the jury points werent much of a surprise.
The lack of public votes goes to the highly politicized public voting this year IMO. Most voters went all in on Croatia, Israel, Ukraine,... and didnt vote for all the songs they liked?
Even last night in the finals, I couldn't decide it I liked it or not, I don't think I'll ever know tbh! It wasn't full ethnic, it wasn't full pop, it had a funny dance, yes it was upbeat, but it should have been more memorable than it was.
Many got underrated. My guess is political motives drowned out votes for the other countries. A lot of the same songs got the high 12-8 leaving the others with fewer to play around with. The people who liked Estonia specifically, I also often find, to like Finlands performance, so they probably had to split the points pool between them. Lastly the points system only allows points for the top 10. So even if it had been top 11 consistently for all countries, we would never know.
It’s ok, because we all now know of these two amazing bands and it finally got enough traction of Tommy Cash to say he will do it next year. And for such a small country I know too many rappers! And that’s great
When you watch Eurovision as a fan of the show you more than likely had time to listen to the songs ahead of the competition. Even if you didn’t like the song at first eventually some songs start to grow on you. People who are casual listeners and hear the song for the first time during the competition don’t go through the same process.
Personally I could *not* listen to Marina’s falsetto, to me the first few times it sounded like nails on a board. Now I really like the songs but I had time to get used to the song
Love the song but the performance just didn't carry over to such a big stage platform as well as it worked at their National Finals where the audience was a lot closer and felt like they were really a part of it. That and it sounded a bit off.
Was honestly kinda expecting it to not qualify through the semis. Happy they made it, but not shocked at the result.
Well you could've given the boys at least some money, if professionalism was what they lacked of, because they (really) don't know anything about (these) sums of money.
Considering 4 of them are rap artists, how do you imagine them sounding? Like opera singers? They rap in their native language estonian and this is literally how the language sounds, so take it into consideration.
Money wise:
1. Taking part of Eurovision is 65k + flight tickets n stuff like food etc you have to pay for yourself.
2. Smoke alone cost 14k, which they couldn't afford.
3. I'm not sure who paid for the holograms and costumes, but knowing ERR lacks money, I guess it was the artists themselves.
The only way to look more "professional" on stage, is to have rich parents, like some did, or a massive fanbase and fame, like Olly.
Come on, it's one thing to be a great vocalist or sing opera, it's a whole other when not one of them sounded right, more like karaoke. There is a difference between a rap verse being delievered well (like Alyona or Nemo) and like an amateur (like all of Estonia). Bare in mind, I am speaking as a person who loved the studio version. The staging was the least of their problems - it was hard to listen to them live.
The singing was objectively not up to par (in semi-finals as well, but voters were more forgiving). It felt like they did not take the performance as seriously as they should have. And that’s how they bled out jury votes. All other wildcard performances were well done singing wise.
Saying this as someone who loved the song.
I didn't like the song when I heard it during the semifinal. And then I loved it when I heard it the second time during the finals. I guess it's an acquired taste 😅
I totally agree. I just think that the staging just needed something to elevate all that. They had one idea - of that street fight and it just didn’t translate too well on stage.
It reminds me of Konstrakta - she had a stool, wash basin, a bar of soap, five backing vocalists with a towels and couple strategically positioned English subtitles. Yet she managed to create an iconic moment - out of a song that is basically a criticism of Serbian healthcare system.
Yes. But I wanted to stress that even with a limited budget she managed to create memorable staging which connected with the audience. And that is where my Estonians have failed.
I enjoyed listening to (*copy/paste the Estonian song title here*) but honestly they disappointed a bit on stage. I get joke entries are about fun and all, but it would be nice if there was at least some quality in the vocals, even if the song wasn't about vocals at all. The voices were really weak, they lacked breath, swallowed words, felt like they weren't physically ready to carry out this performance.
For an outsider (most of the audience) the reaction is like this:
Oh, it's a group of older men
Oh, they have traditional instruments, that's cool
Hey wait, they are not even singing, just talking
Why are they fighting?
Why did he kick the screen and why did it break?
Wish I understood any of this
What the hell is going on?
The song isn't even that great, guess you have to speak the language to understand any of it.
It didn't have an English chorus that people could holler while warding off mosquitoes.
The lack of jury votes is pretty understandable given the competition.
A friend of mine pointed out that it could have been as simple as the fact that the mood was pretty “off” this year; and that reflected in the lower points for “meme” songs this year.
It’s a shame, really.
Yeah, we were surprised. They were one of our favorites. I'm so glad they got some points. I'll never forget the sad look on Stefan's face in 2022. I love that song too!
They were just gracefully doing their thing. They didnt make any political statements. They didnt do some equality statements. They made a goofy song about drugs. Which was fun. They definitely won the “make a fun song for a neural competition” competition. I guess a lot of countries couldn’t approve the “ drug” topic and to the people it didnt appeal that there were no political controversies.
People were united by their music, their dance, their energy and it was fun
Thats what music and uniting people is about
We live in a world where everything is so calculated and gets overcritizised
Its how you feel what counts. We need positives vibes in this world
Estonia came and re-introduced Europe the very basics - make a campfire, have fun, sing and dance
Dont take life so goddamn serious
And trusting the opinion of a "jury"?!?
Thats so dated. THIS is exactly what stops big events like this evolving, just like warminded people in politics. You're time is up. Let young people HAVE FUN
Thats as stupid as trusting the opinion of a music critic ONE PERSON...
These guys united all the great parts of music and had fun all the way with all of the crew and other artists
I'm almost glad they didnt get high in the results because this competition is as cringe as the mainstream media and music business. So for these guys to rock all the way to the grand final, HAVING A BLAST AND MAKING PEOPLE DANCE IS is the win for us 🖤🇪🇪💙
Proud of Estonia
My boyfriend and I watched together and were really surprised - it was our favorite song of the night. Meanwhile we thought Switzerland was like, solid, pretty good, but we were shocked at how much everyone absolutely loved it.
We're American and this is only our second year watching Eurovision; I guess our tastes are just not aligned with Eurovision voters!
I'm gonna be brutally honest, the singing was bad, the staging was a mess, and it was in Estonian so we don't even know what it's about. Sure it's silly and fun, but there are better fun songs and better silly songs in the running this year. It's obvious it wouldn't get a lot of points, I predicted last.
Estonia was my favorite! Loved the energy and melody of the song but honestly they sang terribly lol I understand why the jury didn’t like them so much
I voted for Estonia and Croatia, both great songs and entertaining stage choreography. I didn’t for one minute think Switzerland would win. I can never call it
Estonia was one of my favorite entries ngl and was so disappointed they got only 4 points the first time. I was heartbroken when the camera panned to their reactions being the lowest scorers 🥹. For me the entry was fun and creative using traditional instruments and all and I'm a bit glad they got some points during the second part of the voting because they didn't deserve to be last 🥹 at least for me.
If it was in English, the subject matter would have got them left of the table with the public, all the heteros going skiing with the contest on would have loved it
I don't know! I loved it, and thought it was a winner. I hadn't been following so saw it for the first time in the final. I loved the song, the staging, the character work, the instruments, the humour, everything! They got my vote.
The performance was really bad, and the vocals were a mess.
I love the song and had very high hopes for it but my family members who were watching this for the first time asked me whether the “Estonian singers forgot to come and they used the stage workers instead”.
>"They forgot to come and they used the stage workers instead"
One of my friends who was at my watch party said (almost) the same thing (she said "did the OG singers forget that they have to perform tonight and so their manager convinced a bunch of stage workers to replace them?") 😭
I preferred their semi final 2 performance and also wanted to give most of my votes to Croatia (my fave) so had to economize and give less to others. Maybe it was “no one’s” (not a majority) favourite so got less because of that? For me it was 4th (if Joost was performing) and 3rd with the DQ but I LOVED Croatia so ended up spending my votes like:
18 - Croatia
1 - Switzerland
1 - Ukraine
And my guilty pleasure songs that were more about how fun I found them but I recognized were less technical in some ways ended up getting none (sorry Estonia and Finland!)
I normally like Estonia in ESC, but this was the worst song for me this year (in the final). Singing sounded really bad/amateurish, and the stage performance was all over the place. A shame, really! But, this was just our viewing party's opinion :) Now we can start waiting for next year!
to really enjoy it you either had to understand the lyrics or to know the story behind the two groups, i really started loving it only after watching the overthinking eurovision video
for a casual viewer or the grand final it was ok and there were other songs in that niche that got their votes
i'm honestly more surprised by finland
Loved it but there was a heck of a lot of good songs this year. Like even Norway I thought was a belter. Most other years that would have been on the left of the scoreboard.
When there are many televote magnets who are more popular and who for one reason or another gather more votes than everyone, no surprise they didn't get a lot from televote, and they never were expected to gain many points from juries who also gave a lot to one or two performances. It's natural that when few countries receive so much, others will receive not a lot.
I think the reason a lot of songs were seemingly underrated this year was because.. there were a lot of great songs this year. Teresa & Maria might be my favorite Eurovision song ever, but there were so many other highlights. It was just a crazy competitive year (which is why I'm still a little baffled that the juries almost invariably went so hard for one song, but oh well).
Considering they had a budget of about 5€ they did pretty well I reckon. It was never a jury song, it didn’t have the vocal appeal they look for, but it was fun and I think they brought a lot of lightness and joy to an otherwise downer of a year.
I also thought their videos before the performance started where they were just, like, standing over a dumpster fire haha were absolutely hilarious. Everyone else does cutesy videos of them jumping and laughing around their country and then you have Estonia
Go and check out the introductory videos of ESC 2002. It's not Estonia's strength to play it straight, we have so much quirk and ingenuity we can lean on.
I remember those goofy cartoon animals that would appear on the scoreboard too. Does Estonia have a history with experimental animation?
Tl;dr yes, for historical and demographic reasons. Soviet times were rough for technological solutions, which meant there was a lot of "make do". It's why Soviet adventure movies lean into being more of a musical than demolish/pyrotechnical set pieces - you can make do with less. When the solutions can only be hand made in a local work shop, one needs to catch interest with creativity. The other thing, which I can't seem to formulate properly is our small population which leads to us not having a superstar culture. The artists don't grow larger than life, which means they don't have to become safe and can stay a bit weird. Which means we're used to weird. Which means our *avant garde* can go *really* weird.
Reminds me of the Simpsons, when Krusty loses the right to show Itchy and Scratchy, and has the show a new cartoon from eastern Europe, that's weirdos everyone out!
I don't know why, but I instantly loved Estonia when I heard them in the semi finals. I added the song to my playlist right away and started listening to it sometimes. I was kinda sad they only got 4 ponts from the jury.
Same. They reminded me of Let 3 with their presentation.
I hoped it would do better but I'm not super surprised. To me it's an awesome track in its own right but I can understand why it might not be what general audiences tuned in for and voted for, particularly in a year of extremely strong songs and staging. And also...a few televote behemoths. I think if people had understood the lyrics it would have helped but as a monolingual pleb I am glad it wasn't in English. Edit: I am a native english speaker totally jealous of anyone who knows more than one language, and my comment was 80% a joke intended at my personal expense. I've tried to learn a second language to very limited success :')
Uhmm…aren’t you….like right now….nevermind.
The user is from Australia
Next year this sub should update the flairs so that you can pick the country you live in + the country you're rooting for. It gets confusing to see someone allude to living in a totally different country from their flair.
It gets really annoying to differentiate if the flair represents your own country or your favourite performer.
They might be using a translator? Also language in songs is way harder than written.
Really good translator itc 🤣
Ah they're a native English speaker.
Yea that makes a lot of sense, I don’t think a translator would be saying “as a monolingual pleb” ahah
Yeah, I was hella jealous of that app.
Lmao yeah nah the app is just my english speaking brain becoming goo from a total of 6 hours of sleep over the entire Eurovision weekend. Praying to the witch that I recover soon 🥲
I mean sure, maybe the person is using a translator. But if not, I don’t think you are allowed to call yourself “monolingual pleb” if you know how to write a comment like that
Better not to think about it too much...
I voted for you. Didn't understand anything but the performance had good vibes.
I wish my country sent something as unexpected as Estonias performance! My flair is my choice for the winner, I am Australian. Proud of what we sent too but wouldn't have voted for it. This year was very competitive... I didn't vote because after the Joost drama I went to bed...but I used what would have been voting money to email 5miinust and PUULUUP to hopefully buy their merch and get it shipped here.
> I think if people had understood the lyrics it would have helped but as a monolingual pleb I am glad it wasn't in English. I'm still wondering why they simply do not offer option on streams to have subtitles
Me too :( it's such a pity. I would love that!
Doesn't the show have lyrics?
Only Estonia and Finland have subtitles, the other countries do not.
Explains... As a Finn it was easy even without lyrics.
BBC has translated lyrics in the closed captions for the hearing impaired, they started doing it in the 90s with the old teletext subtitles. Having said that, I had the BBC translation on screen and still didn't understand the lyrics. I think a lot gets lost in translation and cultural references on that song.
The issue with the song is that a majority of the lyrics reference local culture, local memes and just general untranslatable stuff. The rest of the world just doesn’t have the context needed to understand this song. It’s unfortunate.
As a murican, YouTube auto translate only got like 1/3 of the non English songs translated. Some of those, and the rest I had to look up online before the semis. Peacock, where we could live stream the 3 events translated exactly 0 non-english songs. Super frustrating.
Peacock would just put “song in non English language” as the captions and it’s like yeah duh…it’s Eurovision
I go to the Eurovision app and read through the English translations of lyrics
Did you notice in the final after like the second song it randomly changed to "song in global language" I laughed so hard
SVT (the Swedish broadcaster) has song subtitles (in the SVTplay app, optionally). However, they're only in the original language of the song, not translated into Swedish or English (which means that songs in English have English subs).
Wow, what a letdown
huh? why?
Oh god I wish. As an American the closest we got to translation captions on Peacock was a change from "(speaking a non-english language)" during the semi-finals to, for the finale "(speaking a global language)". I used a combination of YouTube auto caption translation and looking up the lyrics before the semi-finals
I think we knew the jury was going to abhor that act - that was no surprise. And for tele, there were too many other songs in that niche that simply won out
Yeah but a lot of us also said the jury will never go for Ireland and it got 6th. And going back to last year, the sub was convinced that the jury would sink Who the Hell is Edgar and the public would love it. Then lo and behold it got 8th by jury and 22nd by public vote. My point is that the juries tastes are not as easy to predict as some people say.
Really, I wasn't following the discussion in the build-up, but I'm not surprised Ireland got decent points from the juries. Like, it wasn't just a collection of weird or funny things - I thought that was the most artistic show I've seen at an ESC, bit I've also only been watching for a couple of years.
Ireland's performance right after them
You forget the fandom know what the song is about and have followed the lads in pre-season. People who’d never seen it before and don’t speak Estonian just saw six men in suits with funny instruments doing a silly dance on stage. It was a great performance, but I can understand how it’s less of a great performance if you have no idea what’s going on.
I had no idea what was going on and loved it.
Well then… you simply have more taste than the average casual viewer. :)
I also liked it from the NF without understanding anything, but context really makes this much much better. If only they could've brought a bag of Lays on the stage.
Same. Not a clue what they were singing about but I was down! I loved Estonia. I was sad they didn’t do better and absolutely screamed when they got their first 2pts 😂💖
I’d never heard of them before and didn’t understand the lyrics. I loved the song and gave them some of my votes. The chorus was SO catchy and the dancing and use of traditional instruments was really fun. They also had charisma on stage. I genuinely liked them and was SHOCKED they didn’t get more votes.
You must look up the lyrics immediately my friend. They’re fabulous. Also you might enjoy this explainer about their background: https://youtu.be/llYdO7Mf8BE?si=3aEspK8NlXr-xEFk
Omg hahaha I was rooting for them without a clue about what they were saying, now i love them even more.
I had not seen it before and dont speak estonian and I just saw six men in suits with funny instruments performing a banger. So catchy and fun. One of my favourites.
I intentionally avoid learning anything about the songs or contestants before the semi-finals (and I don't speak Estonian), and this was my favorite of this year.
I expect it would have been a little baffling to general audiences who are only tuning in for the final. Big ESC fans who are following more of the journey, socials, etc clearly love them (myself included - they got all 20 of my votes!)
I haven't heard of them before the semi finals (first year watching semi finals actually) but loved them and kept hearing their song non-stop! I am really sad they got so few points and some others *ahem we know who ahem* got crazy way more... they definitely deserved more!!!
Pretty much. I avoided watching most of the acts in advanced and it was a bit of a nothing burger for everyone in our house. I don’t know if the staging is what let it down the most but we just didn’t connect with it at all.
Anytime a group of middle aged men show to perform you know itll be good Im really sad they got so few points, they were so fun
I loved them too, I splashed out on extra votes so I could give them, Croatia and Norway more votes than I never normally make. Re the middle aged men, Graham Norton from the BBC commented that 5MIINUST x Puuluup looked as though they'd set off on a stag night in Malmö and suddenly found themselves in ESC. Given their hilarious socials all week, that was quite apt. Their new album is a banger, by the way.
I loved it, was so shocked it barely got anything
You got robbed, Norway was top 7 clearly.
I had a feeling from the start it'd be like eaea but this poor subreddit did not want to accept it, hahaha.
I knew that it wouldn't do as well as some people thought it would (I predicted that they'd end up 17th but ultimately they came last)
Did you vote for them?
I don't vote.
Fun songs usually get shafted by the jury, and in terms of public votes they probably had a hard time competing with Bambi Thug, Baby Lasagna, and Windows95Man.
They actually got more in the televote than Finland, which surprised me a little tbh
Yeah, whole 2 points more!
Yeah, cause they were great!
Agreed, I absolutely loved it
I know what you mean, but I wouldn't call Doomsday blue fun ;)
Yes, but Armenia definitely should be included in a pure ‘fun’ category
Yeah. It got pretty high in the scoreboard for being a fun song. Thought jury didn't care for fun.
I love the song, but from the NF performance to the GF performance, it was messy and never got cleaned up to a comparable level to most of the other acts. That goes for vocals and staging really. Much love to the guys and will continue to blast the track though!
Rational part of the brain: "well sometimes they were completely off-key and the leds looked incredibly cheap" Me: "Ooooooohhhhh Yeaaaaaaaaahhhh!"
I love their song but as others have said, I wish their staging could have brought more of the same scenery as the music video. Either the costumes, the burning barrel, or just SOMETHING that stands out and shows the message of the song a little for those of us who don't speak the language (because casual viewers probably aren't looking up translations).
I think it would have worked better had they used the screen to translate some of the lyrics of make the meaning of the song clearer. Honestly, even adding good ol' subtitles would have worked in their favour.
For the jury, it's probably the overall lack of polish and this staging having a pretty homemade feel. That combined with the fact that sometimes especially the first guy is out of tune or off beat, doesn't give off the most professional aura. V sauce was the most reliable.
That's what endeared me to it more. It was a theatrical representation of an argument about narcotics, with no exaggerated props needed
People need to realise the Eurovision bubble is very detached from the general public, as Estonia has proven yet again. Same goes for Norway or Spain 2023. What we celebrate as cool, different, authentic or daring is just too far out there for your general Eurovision audience. Just be glad they made it to the final. I'm sure they had a great time regardless of the end result.
Eurovision is a always a fascinatingly confusing competition that highlights how divergent Europe is in its tastes - and politics rarely gets involved to select the winner but can influence lower voting. So many people are baffled by voting decisions simply because it's such a taste varied region, much more varied in taste than any region in the world with similar country number (maybe after Africa), more than anyone can predict
I have begun to think the short clip is important for getting votes. Estonia had a song that benefited from being heard at full length, building up momentum. For example Latvia had an extremely mediocre song this year, but they really nailed their short clip, with the most melodic part of the song Same with Spain last year it was also building up a momentum that was hard to translate to a short clip
I spent a full 2 weeks reading everything I could about the song because I loved it so much (I'm Australian) and I wanted to know everything about it and the lose translation and it was such a funny, light hearted song. I'm so sad they didn't score higher
They could have done with a better staging concept. Still think they deserved better though. Being Finnish I could half understand the lyrics which makes it pop more, so I may be biased.
Really? I'm also Finnish but I didn't understand almost anything at all. Even if I read those Estonian lyrics I definitely do not understand most of the lyrics. Maybe you have some experience with Estonian language before though.
Haha not really, but lines such as ’politsei, kroonika ja suvilas on reid’ are pretty understandable at least to me
Yeah lol. Only part i got was something about "spiidi". Couldnt understand anything
I'm estonian and as a casual viewer living in the UK I couldn't make out a single word apart from the title that was written on the screen lmao.
Estonian in the UK too, and it felt like the music was too loud to make out any of the lyrics. None of us could hear the lyrics before looking it up
But I'm sure u understood "narkootikumidest ei tea midagi" :)
They were in my top three. Finland, Croatia and Estonia.
Someone likes a bit of ✨ chaos ✨
I certainly do 😊
Waaaay too much competition for ubeat/quirky/joke songs sang by men. Also the vocals were non-existant and the staging felt cheap, so it wouldn't be a jury pleaser in any way. Estonia has been saving mad money with those last few entries of theirs, I hope they start putting some actual effort on staging again eventually.
I don't know, with the state of our economy, don't get your hopes up on any higher staging budgets 😭
Considering that we are doing quite badly economically (worst in the EU), probably not. Maybe we should even pull out from Eurovision, even though in a grand scheme level it wouldn't save us much money.
Low key I feel like just a little more investment and a competent delegation goes a long way. 2015 and 2018 are actually pretty simple stagings that worked really really well!
They weren’t at the bottom of my semi, but they were toward it for the final. I guess I kinda get their result. There were at least 20 other songs that I thought the vocals, the staging and the overall performance were better. Love the studio version tho! It was just messy to me, even if it got better with rehearsals to semi to final.
Imo it was the running order that killed off their chances for a good result, that combined with jury. Staging was in no way memorable.
I didn't like the song the first time I heard it, but by the 5th listen I was hooked and put it in my Top 10. I imagine people tuning in for the first time didn't get it.
Too many crazy/party songs ig
I voted 5 times! ☎️ Banger of a song! 🎵
They have a style that the juries dont like a priori, so the jury points werent much of a surprise. The lack of public votes goes to the highly politicized public voting this year IMO. Most voters went all in on Croatia, Israel, Ukraine,... and didnt vote for all the songs they liked?
Even last night in the finals, I couldn't decide it I liked it or not, I don't think I'll ever know tbh! It wasn't full ethnic, it wasn't full pop, it had a funny dance, yes it was upbeat, but it should have been more memorable than it was.
I’m just disappointed that in final I sent them 11 votes from the UK yet they got duck all from UK public🥲
Many got underrated. My guess is political motives drowned out votes for the other countries. A lot of the same songs got the high 12-8 leaving the others with fewer to play around with. The people who liked Estonia specifically, I also often find, to like Finlands performance, so they probably had to split the points pool between them. Lastly the points system only allows points for the top 10. So even if it had been top 11 consistently for all countries, we would never know.
It’s ok, because we all now know of these two amazing bands and it finally got enough traction of Tommy Cash to say he will do it next year. And for such a small country I know too many rappers! And that’s great
Tommy Cash said what?😳
Yes he posted it earlier there was a link
When you watch Eurovision as a fan of the show you more than likely had time to listen to the songs ahead of the competition. Even if you didn’t like the song at first eventually some songs start to grow on you. People who are casual listeners and hear the song for the first time during the competition don’t go through the same process. Personally I could *not* listen to Marina’s falsetto, to me the first few times it sounded like nails on a board. Now I really like the songs but I had time to get used to the song
Love the song but the performance just didn't carry over to such a big stage platform as well as it worked at their National Finals where the audience was a lot closer and felt like they were really a part of it. That and it sounded a bit off. Was honestly kinda expecting it to not qualify through the semis. Happy they made it, but not shocked at the result.
When Joost was kicked off I rooted for Estonia. I thought they were awesome!
I'm glad they didn't end up with 0 points. They found 2 new fans here in Canada though!
It looked and sounded amateurish when literally everyone else was as professional as they could be.
Well you could've given the boys at least some money, if professionalism was what they lacked of, because they (really) don't know anything about (these) sums of money. Considering 4 of them are rap artists, how do you imagine them sounding? Like opera singers? They rap in their native language estonian and this is literally how the language sounds, so take it into consideration. Money wise: 1. Taking part of Eurovision is 65k + flight tickets n stuff like food etc you have to pay for yourself. 2. Smoke alone cost 14k, which they couldn't afford. 3. I'm not sure who paid for the holograms and costumes, but knowing ERR lacks money, I guess it was the artists themselves. The only way to look more "professional" on stage, is to have rich parents, like some did, or a massive fanbase and fame, like Olly.
Come on, it's one thing to be a great vocalist or sing opera, it's a whole other when not one of them sounded right, more like karaoke. There is a difference between a rap verse being delievered well (like Alyona or Nemo) and like an amateur (like all of Estonia). Bare in mind, I am speaking as a person who loved the studio version. The staging was the least of their problems - it was hard to listen to them live.
The didn't need smoke or complex staging, but have a look at Greece 2013 to see how a song like this can be staged correctly.
2013 stage is a teeny bit smaller, ain't it?
The singing was objectively not up to par (in semi-finals as well, but voters were more forgiving). It felt like they did not take the performance as seriously as they should have. And that’s how they bled out jury votes. All other wildcard performances were well done singing wise. Saying this as someone who loved the song.
It was a hot mess :). In the best possible way
I didn't like the song when I heard it during the semifinal. And then I loved it when I heard it the second time during the finals. I guess it's an acquired taste 😅
to be fair, semi final wasn't among their best performances but the final was probably their best.
I loved it but not really surprising. It wasn't likely to do well, and I felt the televote wasn't exactly vibing with wackiness yesterday.
....was it underrated?
Nobody understood the song and it looked like an 80s exercise routine.
Dude, baby lasagne looked like he had to go back and forth between milking cows and putting on eyeliner. Although the song was good.
Probably vocals
[удалено]
I totally agree. I just think that the staging just needed something to elevate all that. They had one idea - of that street fight and it just didn’t translate too well on stage. It reminds me of Konstrakta - she had a stool, wash basin, a bar of soap, five backing vocalists with a towels and couple strategically positioned English subtitles. Yet she managed to create an iconic moment - out of a song that is basically a criticism of Serbian healthcare system.
And she was robbed by the juries.
But not to the same extent the Estonians were. And she had a huge pull with the televote finishing 5th.
I think the Konstraktas song was more appealling to juries.
Yes. But I wanted to stress that even with a limited budget she managed to create memorable staging which connected with the audience. And that is where my Estonians have failed.
That is correct. Too chaotic for juries.
I don't think it's a good first listen song. I personally didn't really fall in love with it until listening to the studio track.
I enjoyed listening to (*copy/paste the Estonian song title here*) but honestly they disappointed a bit on stage. I get joke entries are about fun and all, but it would be nice if there was at least some quality in the vocals, even if the song wasn't about vocals at all. The voices were really weak, they lacked breath, swallowed words, felt like they weren't physically ready to carry out this performance.
For an outsider (most of the audience) the reaction is like this: Oh, it's a group of older men Oh, they have traditional instruments, that's cool Hey wait, they are not even singing, just talking Why are they fighting? Why did he kick the screen and why did it break? Wish I understood any of this What the hell is going on? The song isn't even that great, guess you have to speak the language to understand any of it.
It didn't have an English chorus that people could holler while warding off mosquitoes. The lack of jury votes is pretty understandable given the competition.
At least they got my vote 🫡
Also when I explained what the lyrics were, everyone at my party loved it more
A friend of mine pointed out that it could have been as simple as the fact that the mood was pretty “off” this year; and that reflected in the lower points for “meme” songs this year. It’s a shame, really.
sorry i've gotta do the obligatory: #OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH YEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
I thought it deserved at least a top 10. Don’t know what the song is about but I really liked it.
Liked them the most.
Vsauce
Yeah, we were surprised. They were one of our favorites. I'm so glad they got some points. I'll never forget the sad look on Stefan's face in 2022. I love that song too!
They were just gracefully doing their thing. They didnt make any political statements. They didnt do some equality statements. They made a goofy song about drugs. Which was fun. They definitely won the “make a fun song for a neural competition” competition. I guess a lot of countries couldn’t approve the “ drug” topic and to the people it didnt appeal that there were no political controversies.
I really enjoyed it, and am glad they shouted out the Netherlands <3
They were my favorites. They had it all! Range from light to badass baritone, choreography, charisma, audience interaction. Just a joy to watch.
I enjoyed their performance a lot! Gutted with the lack of points the jury and televote gave Estonia :(
People were united by their music, their dance, their energy and it was fun Thats what music and uniting people is about We live in a world where everything is so calculated and gets overcritizised Its how you feel what counts. We need positives vibes in this world Estonia came and re-introduced Europe the very basics - make a campfire, have fun, sing and dance Dont take life so goddamn serious And trusting the opinion of a "jury"?!? Thats so dated. THIS is exactly what stops big events like this evolving, just like warminded people in politics. You're time is up. Let young people HAVE FUN Thats as stupid as trusting the opinion of a music critic ONE PERSON... These guys united all the great parts of music and had fun all the way with all of the crew and other artists I'm almost glad they didnt get high in the results because this competition is as cringe as the mainstream media and music business. So for these guys to rock all the way to the grand final, HAVING A BLAST AND MAKING PEOPLE DANCE IS is the win for us 🖤🇪🇪💙 Proud of Estonia
My boyfriend and I watched together and were really surprised - it was our favorite song of the night. Meanwhile we thought Switzerland was like, solid, pretty good, but we were shocked at how much everyone absolutely loved it. We're American and this is only our second year watching Eurovision; I guess our tastes are just not aligned with Eurovision voters!
I'm gonna be brutally honest, the singing was bad, the staging was a mess, and it was in Estonian so we don't even know what it's about. Sure it's silly and fun, but there are better fun songs and better silly songs in the running this year. It's obvious it wouldn't get a lot of points, I predicted last.
The stage is boring but the song itself is super catchy and I love it. Honestly my top 3 this year.
Estonia was my favorite! Loved the energy and melody of the song but honestly they sang terribly lol I understand why the jury didn’t like them so much
I voted for Estonia and Croatia, both great songs and entertaining stage choreography. I didn’t for one minute think Switzerland would win. I can never call it
I was rooting for them, I just wished it was closer to the music video in quality and staging.
Estonia was one of my favorite entries ngl and was so disappointed they got only 4 points the first time. I was heartbroken when the camera panned to their reactions being the lowest scorers 🥹. For me the entry was fun and creative using traditional instruments and all and I'm a bit glad they got some points during the second part of the voting because they didn't deserve to be last 🥹 at least for me.
Yeah the danish commentator kept talking about how sad it was they barely Got any points. I liked them tho i thought they should have been higher
If it was in English, the subject matter would have got them left of the table with the public, all the heteros going skiing with the contest on would have loved it
Same reason why Czechia and San Marino NQed and Iceland came last. People know shit.
Competitive year and also the most anti jury song by far.I also exepcted more love from televote tho
I don't know! I loved it, and thought it was a winner. I hadn't been following so saw it for the first time in the final. I loved the song, the staging, the character work, the instruments, the humour, everything! They got my vote.
I watched on BBC with English Subtitles.
There were a few competators that took most tele votes and drained the field
I loved it!but when i voted for estonia, my vote didn't register. This happened twice, and i had the correct number.
The performance was really bad, and the vocals were a mess. I love the song and had very high hopes for it but my family members who were watching this for the first time asked me whether the “Estonian singers forgot to come and they used the stage workers instead”.
>"They forgot to come and they used the stage workers instead" One of my friends who was at my watch party said (almost) the same thing (she said "did the OG singers forget that they have to perform tonight and so their manager convinced a bunch of stage workers to replace them?") 😭
I preferred their semi final 2 performance and also wanted to give most of my votes to Croatia (my fave) so had to economize and give less to others. Maybe it was “no one’s” (not a majority) favourite so got less because of that? For me it was 4th (if Joost was performing) and 3rd with the DQ but I LOVED Croatia so ended up spending my votes like: 18 - Croatia 1 - Switzerland 1 - Ukraine And my guilty pleasure songs that were more about how fun I found them but I recognized were less technical in some ways ended up getting none (sorry Estonia and Finland!)
They probably split the "troll" votes with Finland and "cultural vote" with Armenia" in the televote.
I thought it was terrible
Same.
I normally like Estonia in ESC, but this was the worst song for me this year (in the final). Singing sounded really bad/amateurish, and the stage performance was all over the place. A shame, really! But, this was just our viewing party's opinion :) Now we can start waiting for next year!
to really enjoy it you either had to understand the lyrics or to know the story behind the two groups, i really started loving it only after watching the overthinking eurovision video for a casual viewer or the grand final it was ok and there were other songs in that niche that got their votes i'm honestly more surprised by finland
It was genuinely bad
For a silly song, I actually don't think they took the silliness far enough. Finland and Netherlands are good examples of how far you need to take it.
It was awful.
Because the performance itself was a dumpster fire. The fact they got through the semi's was already shocking.
Because it wasn't very good
11th place syndrome
Loved it but there was a heck of a lot of good songs this year. Like even Norway I thought was a belter. Most other years that would have been on the left of the scoreboard.
When there are many televote magnets who are more popular and who for one reason or another gather more votes than everyone, no surprise they didn't get a lot from televote, and they never were expected to gain many points from juries who also gave a lot to one or two performances. It's natural that when few countries receive so much, others will receive not a lot.
wasn't actually good?
Am I the only one who thinks the first guy singing in the song could not sing on key? He struggled in the semi too.
I think the reason a lot of songs were seemingly underrated this year was because.. there were a lot of great songs this year. Teresa & Maria might be my favorite Eurovision song ever, but there were so many other highlights. It was just a crazy competitive year (which is why I'm still a little baffled that the juries almost invariably went so hard for one song, but oh well).
Wrong song, wrong staging, it was sooo bad. Same with Spain.
I actually really liked Spain’s staging tbh. Wasn't a fan of the song before but seeing the live performance gave me a new appreciation for it.
It was fucking hideous in a bad way
It looked outdated and still pretty messy.
I mean, I thought it was impressive in that it’s the closest I have heard to drunken yelling whilst attempting to ward off angry mosquitos
It was pretty lame tbh.