Athenians, get ready, Silvia Night is coming!!!

Just the other day, I relived some Eurovision memories by listening to some old ESC albums. Surprisingly, some of them have aged with grace.

One example is this album, containg the songs from the 2006 Eurovision song contest, organized in Athens and won (very surprisingly) by a heavy metal band from Finland, the legendary Lordi and their song "Hard Rock Hallelujah". Still, the lyrics sound like a parody on death metal, rather than the real thing...

Otherwise, I must say that the variety of styles is bewildering: heavy metal, cheesy ballads about peace on earth, light weight hip hop, parody folk music, serious folk music, Polynesian-inspired tunes, twist á la Chubby Checker, eurodisco, and even real chart pop (Kate Ryan's song, which was voted out already during the semi-finales!).

Was anyone surprised? :D

Otherwise, I still remember all the scandals in Athens. The Swedish singer Carola (an evangelical Christian and former Word of Faith supporter) climbed the Acropolis, shouting "Athenians, get ready, Jesus is coming!!!" The Icelandic singer Silvia Night took her spoof role as a cartoon character with bad attitude a bit too seriously. She was actually booed by the audience before, during and after her performance - something unprecendented in ESC history. The Greek singer Anna Vissi, a superdiva, hated Carola (another diva) but loved the Finnish rockers Lordi. And two really good pop songs, the Belgian and Estonian entries, didn't even reach the finale.

The Eurovision Song Contest isn't for everyone. You probably need a certain kind of frivolous humour to really appreciate it, especially if you watch the actual live event. Still, 2006 was a relatively good year. Even non-ESC fans could probably use this album as muzak. Personally, I was reading a book by Theodore Draper on Cuba (!) while listening to this easy going CD, which deserves all its five stars.