Eurovision 2023 – tonight’s running order
Here is your running order for tonight, which the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) have handily put on a social media graphic so that I don’t have to type it all out. The show starts at 8pm BST.
Ukraine go 19th, the UK goes last. Favourites Sweden and Finland go 10th and 13th. The show opens with Austria’s brilliant song about Edgar Allan Poe, and 25th is Croatia’s utterly and delightfully bonkers anti-war song Mama ŠČ! from Let 3. Plus we will get the usual skits and grand musical numbers.
The comments will be open, but experience tells me that I will be unlikely to draw enough of a breath to join in, but have fun and be kind to each other.
And remember our cardinal rule. If you have come on to the Guardian website to leave a comment saying that you don’t watch Eurovision, you hate it, it is a silly waste of a time, then fair enough, everyone is entitled to their opinion, you do you. But I can guarantee we are having a better time enjoying it than you are by choosing to actively spend your Saturday evening moaning about it 🙂
You can drop me an email to [email protected] if you spot mistakes or want to tell me how your party is going or why Austria should win and so on. I can’t promise to reply but I will try to read them all.
Key events
✨✨✨ A human centipede is formed! ✨✨✨
Eurovision’s first – and hopefully last – human centipede.
✨✨✨ An entirely different song arrives two-thirds of the way through! ✨✨✨
I mean, maybe not entirely different, but it is like someone slapped them round the face and shouted get to the chorus and make it catchy and have a silly dance and here we all are. I think this will do well with the public, but the jury might be a bit sobbier about it.
13: 🇫🇮 Finland: Käärijä – Cha Cha Cha
This is tipped to do well, and is a bit of an odd one. When I first heard it I was like, oh yes, if I had been in a club in 1987 and you sandwiched this between Nitzer Ebb and Front 242 I would have been “Yeah shouty Finnish electronic body music, let’s go!”, however, at some point they are going to suddenly remember they are on Eurovision and want to win it and … well … you’ll see.
Mystery solved on Twitter.
12: 🇪🇪 Estonia: Alika – Bridges
Every Eurovision final needs a ballad, and we were a little short on them to be honest. So it was good to see Alika progress to the final along with her piano that plays itself. Yes, that’s a bingo winner isn’t it?
✨✨✨ Ludicrous musical instruments appear! ✨✨✨
Thankfully someone remembered to bring a spangly vest-top this year. He’s got a very powerful voice on this hasn’t he? It is a good performance. The staging is a bit dull maybe? It is a stadium ballad and the crowd are accordingly getting their mobile phone lights out.
11: 🇮🇹 Italy: Marco Mengoni – Due Vite
Another new one on me. I can’t believe we are eleven songs in already. It is flying by.
This lot are all, genuinely, one big happy family.
10: 🇦🇱 Albania: Albina & Familja Kelmendi – Duje
A couple of songs tonight lean into the tried-and-tested Eurovision formula of being a modern dance tune that leans into traditional folk music and traditional dress costumes, and this is one of them. But I found it curiously low energy for what it is. Albania have never finished higher than fifth and this will surely not trouble the record book writers on that score.
This is great and it is going to win, isn’t it?
There is something very Kate Bush Lionheart era about her prowling around there. But by all accounts it looks an awful lot better on your tellybox at home than it does for the people who have actually paid to be at the show.
✨✨✨ A performance is designed to look great on TV but looks terrible in the hall! ✨✨✨
9: 🇸🇪 Sweden: Loreen – Tattoo
Loreen and her Wolverine fingers are bidding to be Sweden’s seventh Eurovision victory, and it would be her second victory, having won with Euphoria in 2012. Tattoo isn’t 100 miles away stylistically from that, and is very much a favourite going into tonight’s event. She would be only the second person to ever win the contest twice as a solo artist – Ireland’s Johnny Logan being the other. I would not bet against her doing it. Not least of which because she could have your eyes out with those and I am a bit scared.
