April 14, 2026 • 42 mins
The Eurovision Song Contest is one of the most popular talent shows on the planet, with multiple countries showcasing their culture through pop music spectacles in an effort to win the day. Some of the songs are utter bangers, some become one-hit wonders, and others are downright... bizarre. Looking at you, Irish puppet turkey. In the first part of this special two-part series, Ben, Noel and Max explore the surprising origin story of Eurovision, along with some of its more controversial aspects.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. Let's hear it for the man,
the myth our super producer Max Uh think about things, Williams.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
What what? What? What? What? Max? The more you know Williams. Wait, No, Ben,
you were referencing a Doddy FREYERTI oh, yes, our Dotti
from the Nordic climbs of Iceland. Way No, Iceland's the
Green One, Greenland's the Cold One.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Ah Yes, classic bait and switch. I am Ben bowling
for the purposes of this show, that is, mister Noel Brown.
We are talking about something as very exciting for us
and may well end up being a two part series. Guys, Guys, Eurovision.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Is this like a special pair of glasses that makes
everyone look like they're eating bars of chocolate and smoking cigarettes?
Speaker 1 (01:25):
I mean, I think I think we're still in the
brainstorming phase. That's pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I like that, bitch.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
We also know it as the Eurovision Song Contest.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah, folks stateside who maybe aren't familiar and maybe the
closest analog over here might be something in the neighborhood
of American Idol, a talent show extravaganza featuring performances by
various artists, in this case singing original songs, and then
they are judged. But I believe in euro Vision, man,
(02:01):
it is a much more of a democratic process rather
than Simon Cowell or Randy what's his face just telling
you he's not feeling a dog.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Oh. Democratic, What an interesting word to use for this.
Also known as the Colkus Revision de la Chanceon, it's
a huge deal across the pond. Almost every year since
nineteen fifty six, various countries, not all of which are
(02:33):
in Europe, submit an original song that is supposed to
represent their culture, and it has performed and broadcast live
via the Eurovision and euro Radio networks. Noel, this thing
is nuts. It is way before the autre spectacles of
American performance shows like The Voice or America's Got Talent
(02:57):
or that other one you mentioned, what was that.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Again, American Idol, which I've always found funny. The idea
of a pop idol, it just seems very inherently sacrilegious,
especially being that we are such a you know, a
religious country these days. We're not supposed to worship idols right.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Right now, Far before these American performance shows, Eurovision brought
this stunning, electric, occasionally downright bizarre music to the masses,
and we're going to argue that it has gone far
beyond your typical songwriting or talent show.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Now.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
It is an acknowledged example of what we call soft diplomacy.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Soft diplomacy. Indeed, it is a way of reaching across
geographical and ideological barriers in order to you know, mend
fences and to make peace, not war, at least in theory.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
In theory, in theory, right yeah, just like communism. It's
great and let's get into it. While Eurovision officially launched
way back in nineteen fifty six, we can argue the
real story begins a few years earlier in son Remo,
Italy or son Remo Italy if you want to be that.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Guy about it.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
That is the home of the son Remo Musical Festival
or music festival.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I do love a good music band ben the San
Ramo Music Festival. The first edition of this fest in
San Ramo, Italy was held between the twenty ninth and
thirty first of January in nineteen fifty one, and ever
since then it has happened more or less every single year,
making it the longest running annual television music competitions and
(04:46):
one of the longest running TV programs overall in the world.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Isn't that crazy?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
It's pretty cool, man, I think it's pretty Italians did
it first.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
The Italians. Italians do it better, it in a more
stylish way. The Italian contest highlights composers rather than singers themselves,
and it captivated regional audiences. It also inspired a ton
of people in the media landscape, especially a guy named
(05:16):
Marcel Besencolt. He's a Swiss journalist. He's a medium mogle,
he's top brass. He's the director of the European Broadcasting
Union between nineteen fifty four and nineteen seventy, so he's
kind of liked their Lorne Michaels.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Well, it's interesting, Ben, because the idea of the early
versions of what we're talking about today featuring composers makes
a whole lot of sense. In the fifties, especially in Europe,
but even in the United States. I mean, composers were
kind of the first rock stars, kind of the first
pop stars, and classical music, even contemporary classical music was
(05:53):
you know, occupying a similar space to what we think
of today, as you know the top forty hits. Right,
oh yeah, just so, And if.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
I can jump in here real quick, I've just gone
down a rabbit hole recently watching old Simpson's clips and
it's really enjoyablecause you remember how great the show is.
And there's one from like I guess it was like
they saw spinal Tap play and there's a riot afterwards,
and the Natives reporter Ken Brockman's like, so, like, you know,
here's my two cents on this is rock concert. Why
(06:21):
we have riots? No, people were rioting from mostart back
in the day. So my solution, let's ban all music.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Right classic Ken, He walked down the street for that one.
But I mean no, he's referencing, of course, the riots
that took place like during the Rights of Spring by Stravinsky,
which was famously such an alarmingly ooh tree, an outlandish
piece of modern classical music that went against all of
the kind of traditional standards that people were used to
for classical music, like atonality and having a lot more
(06:51):
dissonance and you know, just kind of aggressive, you know,
music that also had some pretty aggressive dancing that went
along with it. It did lead to riots when it
was premiered.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Right, it also calls to mind the phenomenon of Listomania.
Shout out to Phoenix another Europe France and in nineteen
fifty four, the year hour Pal Marcel becomes the director
of the European Broadcasting Union. He arrives at this new
position with a preloaded pitch. He says, why not take
(07:24):
what they're doing at San Remo and go bigger with it? Now,
to Marcel, this has a huge profit motivation because if
they can make a show like What's happening in Italy
and they can broadcast it throughout Europe, then they're going
to save a lot of money because now they have
(07:46):
the same program right, so that they don't have to
pay extra one per one. They just have to send
this thing out to wherever they can. And he also
he got a little bit on a soapbox about this,
and he was saying, hey, guys, we're gonna make a
lot of money, We're gonna save a lot of money.
(08:07):
But this is more than a neat television program. This
is a way for us to unite the nations of
post war Europe again. Nineteen fifty four. Right, so World
War two has already happened. But we need to keep
in mind that even a decade pasted the end of
World War Two, Europe was still pretty much wrecked. Like
(08:30):
it was not ideal, No, no, it was definitely a yeah.
When they say post war, they get it was in
the shambles. The infrastructure was, you know, very very significantly.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Damaged, as was morale. So people needed something, you know,
something peppy enough beat to focus on, and something that
could potentially unite the different countries in Europe that maybe
had some beef with one another. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
We have to recall that unlike the United States, which
managed to preserve the vast majority of its infrastructure and economy,
the Great War of World War Two left a lot
of Europe just absolutely wrecked and demolished. People are still
trying to rebuild by the mid nineteen fifties. And there
(09:16):
are countries that have been enemies during the war. There
are countries that had also historically been dixed to each
other for centuries before. It's not as if an official
peace treaty he suddenly made all these folks BFFs.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
No, No, absolutely not. And a lot of these simmering resentments,
of course, remained, and what better to get some folks
to simmer down from some of those resentments than to
unite them through song. At least that's what Marcel was thinking.
He was looking at this situation as a kind of
win win. There's a lot of power in unifying people
through the shared love of music. And of course he
(09:54):
was not blind to the potential profits that there were
to make bling.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Bling every time time I come around your city. Right,
So the first official Eurovision conte Oh spoiler, Marcel's plan works.
So the first official Eurovision contest takes place on May
twenty fourth in Switzerland in nineteen fifty six. And this
is historic for multiple reasons, the chief of which is
(10:21):
that it was one of the earliest attempts in all
of history to broadcast a live, televised event to a
huge international market. Now, this is not the Eurovision that
you're going to see in twenty twenty seven or anything
like that. There were only a few countries that took
part in the contest. Nol And there's some of our favorites.
(10:44):
There's Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg. What are you guys
doing the scamps, the Netherlands and swits Ridge, I know,
right also, but we got to think about this. Nineteen
fifty six Germany like the main bad guys of World
War two.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Bad they were the baddies.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah, and now they're going, well, let's see if Vickan
sing a song, they can.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Yeah. The journal has a lovely, lovely tradition of song.
So the first.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
Edition again is so different from the spectacle we know today.
You could not have a musical group. So if Max
mill yours truly and all our fellow ridiculous historians to
get together and we have a banger song representing the Netherlands,
they're not going to let us in. It can only
(11:38):
be for the first year a single singer. The song
cannot be longer than three and a half minutes. And
as sort of a fig leaf for an olive branch,
you get a twenty four piece orchestra accompanying you. You
also get two chances. You get two chances.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Yeah. This is also back in the day where like
you know, you had symphony orchestras associated with different broadcast
companies and you know, like the RCA Radio Orchestra, and
so much of this stuff was performed live, and again,
we are still very much in the heyday of classical
music being king, you know, and I mean a lot
of times like these pop songs or early sort of
(12:22):
proto versions of pop songs were kind of looked down upon.
So we're starting to kind of see a combination of
those things, and we're starting to see the earliest emergence
of the singer songwriters solo pop kind of persona.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
Sure. Yeah, again, the demi gods, the idols. Right in
a secular world where you know, spirits and gods are
not necessarily real, what do you worship celebrities? They took
that position in society. You also in your nineteen fifty
six inaugural Eurovision and uh, you get to submit as
(13:02):
a country two songs, but they don't have to be
performed by the same artists. So I could have Max
Vogan Flu name I made up for you, Max, especially.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
Maxic that actually birth names so low.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
But you know what, good eye you buddy, So.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
We could have You're welcome buckeroo, we could have we
could have Vogan Flu do uh two songs by himself
with the orchestra, or we could have Max do one
song and then we could pull another you know, up
and comer uh to a second song. And the contestants
originally get evaluated by a bunch of reps from these
(13:47):
different countries, and they give you points for each performance.
Each country sends two jury members over to watch the
show in Switzerland and they cast their votes in secret. Noel,
but it's super biased.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
For sure. And I'd love to just correct a statement
that I made earlier. Less than the American Idol heads
out there are yelling at their podcast device, there is,
of course a voting, a viewer voting component to American Idol.
I made it sound like it was all about Randy
and Simon and you know whatever, Paula, you know, make
him the call. Ultimately, they are the ones that call
(14:26):
the herd, let's just say, you know, and they're the
ones that are kicking folks to the curb who don't
have what it takes to make the finals. Once we
have that you know, crew assembled of the finalists, then
I believe every episode involves in the ability to vote
from home.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Yeah, to jump in here, since we're talking about American Idol,
can y'all. You know, they just revived American Idol, can y'all,
name the judges. Hell, no, no, Carrie Underwood, Luke Bryan
and Lionel Ritchie.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
They're both country people two thirds of the country, folks.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Is that a real name?
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Luke Bryan is a is a famous country singer? On purpose? Huh?
On purpose?
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Oh cool?
Speaker 2 (15:10):
Lionel Richie, though I've not this is no, no, that's
I don't have the greatest confidence in this paneling judges. Guys.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Yeah, he's been He's been doing a lot of stuff
as young Lionel.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
It just it just feels like a bit of a
half hearted reboot, is what I'm getting at.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
I mean, Ryan Seacrest is still there. And I don't
know how I've told you all this, but I I
graduated from the same high school that Ryan Seacrest went to.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
That's like he's our co he's our coworker by they.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Technically technically yeah, that's like, that's like my high school's
like one claim to fame they have. At least when
I was there, they had football jersey up in the
lot in the weight room, people like when you played football,
and like, yeah, I honestly think he was the kicker.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
He is a handsome man with the gift of gab
and it's uh, it's cool.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
To find success in entertainment, it's difficult. So in nineteen
fifty six, these seven participating countries and their broadcast arms.
They're saying, we're going to cast our votes. We're going
(16:19):
to cast our votes in secret. So at this point
the audience is not chiming in even though this is
a televised event. And get this, our lovable scamps over
in Luxembourg are not able to make it to the show.
I think they were too rich or something with their scheduling.
(16:39):
So their friends, the Swiss representatives, voted on Luxembourg's behalf.
This was very much a biased affair because these jury
members were allowed to vote for their own entries. And
as a result of this, there is a conspiracy see
(17:00):
that begins in the very first year of Eurovision. People
still wonder how the votes went, how they should have gone.
Was the voting rigged the winner was?
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Yeah, a question that's kinda continue and to the president.
We're gonna get to that in part two of this series.
But Ben, what was the issue up front? They're already
having scandal. It's literally year one of Eurovision and there's
already a problem with this whole idea of soft diplomacy
through song.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. So hypothetically, think of it this way.
We have a country named, in a burst of humility, Benvania, right,
and the country of Benvania sends its top brass, its
best and brightest.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
It's envoy.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah, yeah, the two envoys, Noel von Brown and Max
what was that name? What was your birth name? Again
it's lost to history. Okay, Well, it sends these two
guys to vote on Eurovision, but there's nothing stopping them
from saying, we're gonna vote Benvania and we're going to
(18:13):
screw up the whole election. Either way, Switzerland wins the
first one.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Ah, the Swiss.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Yeah, the host country as well.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Ghost country. Aren't they traditionally kind of known as being
diplomatically neutral, Yes, they are the neutral country. Issues come
up already challenging that neutrality. It seems that there's what's
the opposite of neutrality, bias? Yeah, a little bit of that. Yeah,
well put.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
The first winner of Eurovision is now known as the
ground Dome of Eurovision, lis Acia. She performed two songs
for Switzerland. One was called the Old Carousel. It is
a German language and Noel, could you do me a
favor and help us out with the pronunciation?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Ah Ben, you honor me with the opportunity to pronounce
something in my native tongue. As you know, I was
once a small German boy. The old carousel or does
alta carousel? Okay, cahoussell, Let's see if we can find
a clip.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
Yeah yeah yeah. Also, while you're looking for the clip, King,
give us that German one more time. But if you
can more emphatic.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Oh man, thank you so much for the second opportunity
to overpronounce something in my native tongue. As you know,
I was once a German boy. That's alta cows clip.
Let's roll the clip. We got it, We got it,
guys by Liz already see how this is like much
(20:02):
more like a classical piece.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Definitely sounds yeah, it definitely sounds like. There's twenty four
people in the orchestra.
Speaker 4 (20:09):
N s ferchib.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So this is again, as you said, No, this is
dos alte Carousel, the old Carousel. This is one of
the two songs that the Grand Dame of Eurovision submits,
but it is not the one that wins the day.
Her winning entry is a song in the French language,
(20:50):
because you know German and French or common languages in Switzerland.
This is a ballad called refrain, So let's play a
little bit of that.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
That one, isn't that a little redundant? Is about like refrain.
It just refers to like the chorus. I think that's
so funny. Let's see if we can find.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
Here we go, same guys in the orchestra, y'all.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I can see why this one won the day though,
because it's a lot more upbeat. That last one was
kind of a bummer, a little bit of a you know,
like a wistful, you know, reflection on the past. This
one kind of bops. Yeah, it's a little sweeter, hotjazz,
whatever the ear version of mouthfeel is. You know, it's
(21:52):
a little nicer. And then from there Eurovision is off
to the races, or in this case, the microphone. More
and more countries are becoming involved with the show from
nineteen fifty six and the format kept changing. Right now,
over forty countries compete, and so the show involves a
(22:12):
lot of knockout rounds or semi finals we could call them,
before the finals night occurs. The final night, as we
can tell you because we have been watching a lot
of Eurovision. The final night is pretty long. It's twenty
six acts at no more than three minutes each. Getting
(22:34):
a shot on stage can be complicated, but luckily the
rules to qualify for your performance are pretty simple. They've
got five rules, and they break the fifth one all
the time. They sure do, Ben, they sure do. Here
we go. Rule number one is it must be a
(22:57):
new song tune, the musical composition and the lyrical content
the libretto right.
Speaker 1 (23:07):
Right, So sorry, Estonia, Norway, there's no death metal version
of Mary had a little lamb that you can pull off. Yeah, no,
that'd be fun though.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
And can I just add to that, we're not gonna
play clips throughout this entire series. I think it was
important that we were able to kind of show you
how it progresses a little bit with some of these
vintage clips. But of course this would get closer and
closer to the modern day. We're gonna be hit with
copyright strikes, so we're gonna do our best to demonstrate
some of the evolution without you know, playing too too
many clips.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Maybe with some bad impressions. Everybody tune in. Also funny, Yeah,
The second rule sacer sanct is that your performance must
be no longer than three minutes.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
And I will die on this hill. No good pop
song worth its salt should be and movies should be
no more than one point five hours. WHOA, really, I'm
just kidding, but like you know, I do love you know, brevity, man, brevity, brevity,
so the soul of wit.
Speaker 3 (24:06):
I was talking to my dad about two thousand and
one of Space House and I'm like, Dad, you know
it's like fifteen movies, it's like forty eight hours longest.
Like it's not my voice four hours longest.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Well, that it is. Yes.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
I remember when Gettysburg, the not the Battle, the film
based on the battle, was out in theaters and they
had an intermission and I thought we could leave, but
my creepy family made me stay.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Oh man, I do remember the good old days where
movies like that of that length had to be served
up to you on two rubber banded VHS tapes that
would like flop together. That's right.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
Oh did I ever tell you guys? My first time
seeing The Godfather's series was through VHS tape and it
was it was exactly what you're describing, Nol. This was
blockbuster for anybody who was also old at last video. Yeah,
and they had the two VHS tapes and of rubber
(25:03):
banded together, but they put the tapes in the wrong order.
So I'm watching this, I'm thinking, whoa, this is so nonlinear.
This is groundbreaking, crazy artistry in the forefront. What's going
to happen has already happened. And then later one of
my friends said, hey, man, you know they have a
(25:26):
little sticker on the tapes. One one says number one
and the other says number two.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
It's sad that we're not going to make that kind
of mistake so much anymore, you know. In the well, actually,
that's not true. I have accidentally started watching the last
episode of a series on streaming before and not understand
that that's what was happening, And then also had a
similar thought, whoa, this is wild. They're just dropping me
in and Minie Rres I'm supposed to like, No, I
don't know this is I'm here for it, but I
(25:53):
have I have spoiled a handful of series for myself
that way. Where are we at with rules?
Speaker 1 (25:59):
Oh yeah, the main thing is, just like podcasting, you
cannot do lip syncing, so vast apologies to Kid Rock.
All the song shots fired, Brosby sung live, Oh No,
you're right, performed live. I wouldn't call what he does singing.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
No, my god, Ben, who hurt you? Was it? Kid Rock?
Where is Kid?
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Where is Kid? He's definitely not at Eurovision because no
lip syncing is allowed and no are tripling. Our fourth
rule is our fourth rule is I think probably? I
think it's an apology to the backstage production.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
I get it. And this is also the kind of
thing that could evolves as a show, and a production
like this evolves because as we know, of course, big
you know, singing groups, boy bands, girl groups, things like
that became very in vogue. But initially they had the
rule of no more than six people on stage, which
seemed to beat to your point, Ben, a way of
mitigating chaos and nightmarish you know, changeovers between sets.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
And this brings us to the number five rule, the
most important one, which is also the slipperiest and also
the rule that is most broken most years. No politics.
All right, So if we're Chechia, or if we're hungry,
(27:29):
or the United Kingdom or Israel, which we'll get to
in part two, then your stuff is supposed to be
a political It's just supposed to be a cool bop
that is not more than three minutes long.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
I mean, let's be real, man, this is an unrealistic
and unreasonable expectation for a competition that was started with
the acknowledgment that these countries, many of which did not
like each other, were meant to compete together. You know
what I mean. I get the sentiments. Heart is in
(28:01):
the right place, but it's also a little bit pie
in the sky. So while Eurovision was always intended to
be a political there have been many scandals and trends
towards political voting, where countries vote for their neighbors and
shun nations that they'd had issues within the past. This
(28:22):
has been combated to a certain degree by introducing more
national juries who have their professional judgment added in with
the public vote. But let's be real, man, Whenever there's
voting involvement, it's called voting. If politics baby.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Right, exactly, Yeah, it's called voting. I love that, actually, Max,
Can you do me a favor and play that back
as a clip of Noel saying that nol, I'm going
to make you hear yourself.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
It's called voting.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
It's called voting brilliant exactly.
Speaker 2 (28:53):
Yeah, I coined the term, by the way.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
And so with that, folks, we have to tell you
a little bit about how Eurovision works now and with
great affection, with profound love, we want you to know
this is kind of ridiculous. So every country that participates
in Eurovision has their own sort of bush league or
(29:25):
farm league selection process. That's how they choose one original song,
one act. It can take a couple of different forms,
like there may be regionally or nationally known artist who
gets approached by that country's government and that government says, hey,
you're the you know, you're the hottest ticket in Romania.
(29:48):
You should sing your song that you did earlier. That'll
represent us in Eurovision. Or it might be the next
step for an artist who wins their country's own song compy,
because a lot of them have them at this point.
So for example, if you are Italian and you win
the San Remo Music Festival, you get what we call
(30:09):
the first right of refusal to participate in Eurovision.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Yeah, and I mean, obviously it's a great honor to
be asked, but and most people would, of course, you know,
jump at the chance to represent their country in Eurovision,
but it also doesn't necessarily mean like it's not the
same as American Idol in this respect, American Idol is
about kind of being an unknown and then being elevated
(30:37):
to pop star status, whereas Eurovision the varying degrees of fame,
of pre existing fame. They are kind of pre existing
acts or groups that are then seen as a representative
of that particular nation, and they may well be incredibly popular,
but typically that popularity would not extend far beyond the
(30:58):
borders of that particuleicular country.
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Right, you got to have your stripes at least for
your country.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
We're going to get into some of our personal favorites
as well. Yeah, some that we've actually seen.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Live, similar to the Olympics, which is kind of what
this is. You might not be the best poll vaulter
in the world yet, but you kind of have to
be the best poll vaulter in Poland to get into.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Where all good pole vaulters come from. It's right there
in the name.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
Yeah, yep, yep, they do call it Poland. So the
composition of the act has also evolved. It's much broader
than it was originally. So as we said the first
contest they only have solo artists. The next year, nineteen
fifty seven, they allow duos. They get a little you know,
Simon and Garfunkel with it, and they continually open the
(31:51):
door to more and more types of acts. So today
you might see a solo singer, you might see a band,
You might see a nominal dancing turkey puppet, which weirdly enough,
was from Ireland. I wish we could play a clip,
but it's not going to translate to audio.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
No, Now that's weird, though I don't really think of
Ireland as being the land of dancing turkeys.
Speaker 1 (32:16):
You got to check out the show Man and so
the only real rules that hold are a song must
be brand new, it must be under three minutes, it
has to be sung live on stage. After that, it's
all about spectacle, creativity, showmanship.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
May we say or may I say? And you may
feel free to agree or disagree with me, Ben and Max,
But I think the live stand component is so cool
and so unique, even to this day, where we have
had a lot made out of another incredibly popular music
show out of Europe called Top of the Pops, oh
(32:53):
where famously it's great but famously all the band's lip
sync because of the logistics of the production and if
you're interested in checking out some folks kind of pushing
back against that. There is an incredible performance of Nirvana
on Top of the Pops where like he just I
think Kurt is just like pretending to play guitar, like,
(33:14):
oh my god, he's got like he's like a straight
hand while strumming the guitar and just kind of like
basically is just saying blah blah blah and marble mouth
mumbling kind of to the to the playback of smells
like teen Spirits. So the live singing aspect is super
important and relatively rare for live music television shows in Europe.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
Now you can have a backing band. At this point,
the twenty four piece orchestra is gone.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yeah you can. You can have that.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
You could have backing you could have a backing track
back in track pop Star, but you will have to
actually be singing. And I also want to give a
shout out to the Jules Holland show. Do you guys
remember him?
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Incredible, incredible, some fabulous performances. It's called Late Night with
Later with Jules Holland. Late it's not on. Yeah, it's
called Later with Jules Holland, and you can see incredible
performances of bands from the nineties, I think up through
the two thousand. The Sun is really really fabulous and
(34:17):
they are incredibly well produced and entirely live. Jules Holland
himself was actually a weird sort of niche pop artist
in the UK. He's a piano player. And there is
a pretty interesting film, a music film called erg a
Music War, which highlights a couple of interesting scenes in
(34:39):
the eighties, one from Los Angeles and one from London
where you've got bands like the Dead Milkman, Oingo Bueno
featuring Danny Elfman, who of course went on to become
a super famous film composer, and Jules Holland is featured
in that as well. So yeah, there's an incredible tradition
of music performance shows and the music and art documentary
(35:00):
trees that are produced. A lot of these things you
can find on YouTube, but just had to make the
Top of the Pops comparison. How some of these music shows,
because of production logistics, did not allow for actual live performance.
So it's a pretty big deal that from its earliest
days where production technology wasn't nearly where it got to.
Eurovision was all about that live element.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
And Eurovision when it reaches its apex every year, it
takes place over three big nights. The thing is a
lot of work goes into selecting those songs in advance,
so well before those three nights, countries will randomly draw
lots to determine which semi final they are in, and
(35:46):
then which half of that semi final they are in.
From there, it all goes to our producers, our showrunners.
They arrange the acts in the way that they feel
has the best pay you know what I mean. So
they don't want to really slow solo singer ballads one
(36:07):
after the other. Right, they want to paste it out.
They want to put in their dancing Turkey puppet to
liven things up. So you might be Ireland and you
might get you might randomly get assigned semi final two
and first half of that semi final. That means you
are performing earlier in the show that night, but you
(36:29):
don't know exactly where you're placed until the showrunners tell you,
until they mandate it. And so in each of these
semi finals, they're also mixing up the countries, right only
the top acts advance to the big night, the grand finale.
There are some exceptions to this, we'll get to them
(36:49):
in a moment, But that makes sense, right, just from
a production standpoint, like if the if the four of us,
Max Noll yours truly and you, fellow ridiculous historian, if
we're the four people who are running the show. We
wanted to have a good vibe, right, like we want
to curate it. We want to DJ a little for sure.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
Yeah, we don't want to do any have any train
wreck moments, right, that's what they call it when a
DJ screws up the tree? Is that really what they
call it? Have you seen? Maybe that's a colloquialism that
it was only in my circles, but it makes sense.
You can picture it right when you do a bad
beat match, or you do everything screeching to all God forbid,
(37:31):
you have dead air, you know?
Speaker 1 (37:32):
Oh right? Yeah, And that's what that's what these show
runners are terrified of as well. So, okay, we got
two nights, we got all these semi finals occurring after
everybody votes, and we'll get to the voting in part two.
The big day arrives and this is the main event.
(37:52):
This is where the best of the best caveat Asterisk
compete for ultimate bragging rights. You get a really cool trophy,
you get a place in music history. And as we
could tell you folks, the performances are galvanizing. The energy
is electric. It's a very kinetic sort of situation. Be
(38:14):
amazing to go there live. They have pyrotechnics, you know
what I mean, Like they have puppetry, they have like
they have people in the air.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
It's pretty, of course. No, it's a spectacle, man, it's
a regular there. We are a regular Empire of the
Sun and then insert any other theatrical type performance. But
it's cool. It has become known as much for its
music and tunefulness and you know, singing prowass on display
as it has for its spectacle.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
Absolutely one hundred percent. And with this we're going to
pause on a bit of a cliffhanger. So we've given
you the ridiculous, well intentioned history and origin story of Eurovision.
But we have questions to explore in chapter two of
this series. How does the voting actually work? What did
(39:06):
we mean when we said soft diplomacy. What's up with
all these controversies that the guys are referring to and
what are the weirdest songs from Eurovision? We can't wait
for you to join us in our second episode on
the ridiculous history of Eurovision. Big big thanks to our
super producer, mister Max Williams. Max, do you have a
(39:30):
favorite Eurovision song?
Speaker 4 (39:33):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (39:33):
I can't remember the name of it. I got two
they're from the same Eurovision, but it's the one with
the Norwegian guys singing about bananas.
Speaker 2 (39:40):
That's probably my favorite one classic. I love a Norwegian
singing about a banana that is not native to their region.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
Yeah, very strange, A pivotal piece of Norwegian culture, as
you can imagine. Big thanks to Alex Williams, our own
in house composer.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Now that you have to be able to grow a
banana to sing about a banana, I'm not Yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
We're not gatekeeping bananas, no nol.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
You've got you and I. We can't grow bananas here.
I mean it's fine.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
You and I both have a lot of weird favorite
Eurovision hits. We're going to get to in chapter two.
But he got one off the top that just really
sings to you.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
I reserve the right to hold there. We response until
part two when we talk about my guy. But man,
this is super fun. I think it makes a whole
lot of sense to pair the voting part with the
controversy part, because they are quite related, as we've already
alluded to with some of the biased voting. And boy
are we going to get into how this has been
incredibly politicized and weaponized.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Yeah too, Yeah, And speaking of weaponized and politicized, not
a thank you but a chilly civil formal acknowledgment of
Jonathan Strickland aka the Quister.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
I think I see, how do you?
Speaker 1 (40:56):
I think it was in Eurovision one time I could
see bald, Yeah, I can see, I can see the performance.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Big thing was blinding.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
He did a cover blinded by the light and the
judges kicked him out because it has to be an
original composition. Strix one to grow on big thanks to
Chris raassiotis Eve's Jeffcoat.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
Who else? They're here in spirit and also huge things
as you said to you know whatever, a chili at Chili,
how do you do to Jonathan Strickland the quizz or
a j Bahamas Jacobs the Puzzler, Because we got to
thank them in the same breath, because that's just how
it goes. Alex Williams, our own Eurovision star who composed
this bangin bop that you hear in your very ears
(41:38):
that could well have held its own in a Eurovision
Asque competition.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
Absolutely Now we just need the lyrics and big thanks
to the rude dudes of Ridiculous Crime. If you dig us,
you will love them, so tune in get THEE to
thy podcast platform of choice. I have been our research
associate for this series and Noel, thanks to you, man,
I can't wait for part two of this.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
It's gonna get so weird. Same, See you next time, folks.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
much for tuning in. Let's hear it for the man,
the myth our super producer Max Uh think about things, Williams.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
What what? What? What? What? Max? The more you know Williams. Wait, No, Ben,
you were referencing a Doddy FREYERTI oh, yes, our Dotti
from the Nordic climbs of Iceland. Way No, Iceland's the
Green One, Greenland's the Cold One.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Ah Yes, classic bait and switch. I am Ben bowling
for the purposes of this show, that is, mister Noel Brown.
We are talking about something as very exciting for us
and may well end up being a two part series. Guys, Guys, Eurovision.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Is this like a special pair of glasses that makes
everyone look like they're eating bars of chocolate and smoking cigarettes?
Speaker 1 (01:25):
I mean, I think I think we're still in the
brainstorming phase. That's pretty cool.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I like that, bitch.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
We also know it as the Eurovision Song Contest.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Yeah, folks stateside who maybe aren't familiar and maybe the
closest analog over here might be something in the neighborhood
of American Idol, a talent show extravaganza featuring performances by
various artists, in this case singing original songs, and then
they are judged. But I believe in euro Vision, man,
(02:01):
it is a much more of a democratic process rather
than Simon Cowell or Randy what's his face just telling
you he's not feeling a dog.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Oh. Democratic, What an interesting word to use for this.
Also known as the Colkus Revision de la Chanceon, it's
a huge deal across the pond. Almost every year since
nineteen fifty six, various countries, not all of which are
(02:33):
in Europe, submit an original song that is supposed to
represent their culture, and it has performed and broadcast live
via the Eurovision and euro Radio networks. Noel, this thing
is nuts. It is way before the autre spectacles of
American performance shows like The Voice or America's Got Talent
(02:57):
or that other one you mentioned, what was that.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Again, American Idol, which I've always found funny. The idea
of a pop idol, it just seems very inherently sacrilegious,
especially being that we are such a you know, a
religious country these days. We're not supposed to worship idols right.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Right now, Far before these American performance shows, Eurovision brought
this stunning, electric, occasionally downright bizarre music to the masses,
and we're going to argue that it has gone far
beyond your typical songwriting or talent show.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Now.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
It is an acknowledged example of what we call soft diplomacy.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Soft diplomacy. Indeed, it is a way of reaching across
geographical and ideological barriers in order to you know, mend
fences and to make peace, not war, at least in theory.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
In theory, in theory, right yeah, just like communism. It's
great and let's get into it. While Eurovision officially launched
way back in nineteen fifty six, we can argue the
real story begins a few years earlier in son Remo,
Italy or son Remo Italy if you want to be that.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Guy about it.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
That is the home of the son Remo Musical Festival
or music festival.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I do love a good music band ben the San
Ramo Music Festival. The first edition of this fest in
San Ramo, Italy was held between the twenty ninth and
thirty first of January in nineteen fifty one, and ever
since then it has happened more or less every single year,
making it the longest running annual television music competitions and
(04:46):
one of the longest running TV programs overall in the world.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Isn't that crazy?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
It's pretty cool, man, I think it's pretty Italians did
it first.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
The Italians. Italians do it better, it in a more
stylish way. The Italian contest highlights composers rather than singers themselves,
and it captivated regional audiences. It also inspired a ton
of people in the media landscape, especially a guy named
(05:16):
Marcel Besencolt. He's a Swiss journalist. He's a medium mogle,
he's top brass. He's the director of the European Broadcasting
Union between nineteen fifty four and nineteen seventy, so he's
kind of liked their Lorne Michaels.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Well, it's interesting, Ben, because the idea of the early
versions of what we're talking about today featuring composers makes
a whole lot of sense. In the fifties, especially in Europe,
but even in the United States. I mean, composers were
kind of the first rock stars, kind of the first
pop stars, and classical music, even contemporary classical music was
(05:53):
you know, occupying a similar space to what we think
of today, as you know the top forty hits. Right,
oh yeah, just so, And if.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
I can jump in here real quick, I've just gone
down a rabbit hole recently watching old Simpson's clips and
it's really enjoyablecause you remember how great the show is.
And there's one from like I guess it was like
they saw spinal Tap play and there's a riot afterwards,
and the Natives reporter Ken Brockman's like, so, like, you know,
here's my two cents on this is rock concert. Why
(06:21):
we have riots? No, people were rioting from mostart back
in the day. So my solution, let's ban all music.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Right classic Ken, He walked down the street for that one.
But I mean no, he's referencing, of course, the riots
that took place like during the Rights of Spring by Stravinsky,
which was famously such an alarmingly ooh tree, an outlandish
piece of modern classical music that went against all of
the kind of traditional standards that people were used to
for classical music, like atonality and having a lot more
(06:51):
dissonance and you know, just kind of aggressive, you know,
music that also had some pretty aggressive dancing that went
along with it. It did lead to riots when it
was premiered.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Right, it also calls to mind the phenomenon of Listomania.
Shout out to Phoenix another Europe France and in nineteen
fifty four, the year hour Pal Marcel becomes the director
of the European Broadcasting Union. He arrives at this new
position with a preloaded pitch. He says, why not take
(07:24):
what they're doing at San Remo and go bigger with it? Now,
to Marcel, this has a huge profit motivation because if
they can make a show like What's happening in Italy
and they can broadcast it throughout Europe, then they're going
to save a lot of money because now they have
(07:46):
the same program right, so that they don't have to
pay extra one per one. They just have to send
this thing out to wherever they can. And he also
he got a little bit on a soapbox about this,
and he was saying, hey, guys, we're gonna make a
lot of money, We're gonna save a lot of money.
(08:07):
But this is more than a neat television program. This
is a way for us to unite the nations of
post war Europe again. Nineteen fifty four. Right, so World
War two has already happened. But we need to keep
in mind that even a decade pasted the end of
World War Two, Europe was still pretty much wrecked. Like
(08:30):
it was not ideal, No, no, it was definitely a yeah.
When they say post war, they get it was in
the shambles. The infrastructure was, you know, very very significantly.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Damaged, as was morale. So people needed something, you know,
something peppy enough beat to focus on, and something that
could potentially unite the different countries in Europe that maybe
had some beef with one another. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
We have to recall that unlike the United States, which
managed to preserve the vast majority of its infrastructure and economy,
the Great War of World War Two left a lot
of Europe just absolutely wrecked and demolished. People are still
trying to rebuild by the mid nineteen fifties. And there
(09:16):
are countries that have been enemies during the war. There
are countries that had also historically been dixed to each
other for centuries before. It's not as if an official
peace treaty he suddenly made all these folks BFFs.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
No, No, absolutely not. And a lot of these simmering resentments,
of course, remained, and what better to get some folks
to simmer down from some of those resentments than to
unite them through song. At least that's what Marcel was thinking.
He was looking at this situation as a kind of
win win. There's a lot of power in unifying people
through the shared love of music. And of course he
(09:54):
was not blind to the potential profits that there were
to make bling.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Bling every time time I come around your city. Right,
So the first official Eurovision conte Oh spoiler, Marcel's plan works.
So the first official Eurovision contest takes place on May
twenty fourth in Switzerland in nineteen fifty six. And this
is historic for multiple reasons, the chief of which is
(10:21):
that it was one of the earliest attempts in all
of history to broadcast a live, televised event to a
huge international market. Now, this is not the Eurovision that
you're going to see in twenty twenty seven or anything
like that. There were only a few countries that took
part in the contest. Nol And there's some of our favorites.
(10:44):
There's Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg. What are you guys
doing the scamps, the Netherlands and swits Ridge, I know,
right also, but we got to think about this. Nineteen
fifty six Germany like the main bad guys of World
War two.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Bad they were the baddies.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah, and now they're going, well, let's see if Vickan
sing a song, they can.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Yeah. The journal has a lovely, lovely tradition of song.
So the first.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
Edition again is so different from the spectacle we know today.
You could not have a musical group. So if Max
mill yours truly and all our fellow ridiculous historians to
get together and we have a banger song representing the Netherlands,
they're not going to let us in. It can only
(11:38):
be for the first year a single singer. The song
cannot be longer than three and a half minutes. And
as sort of a fig leaf for an olive branch,
you get a twenty four piece orchestra accompanying you. You
also get two chances. You get two chances.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Yeah. This is also back in the day where like
you know, you had symphony orchestras associated with different broadcast
companies and you know, like the RCA Radio Orchestra, and
so much of this stuff was performed live, and again,
we are still very much in the heyday of classical
music being king, you know, and I mean a lot
of times like these pop songs or early sort of
(12:22):
proto versions of pop songs were kind of looked down upon.
So we're starting to kind of see a combination of
those things, and we're starting to see the earliest emergence
of the singer songwriters solo pop kind of persona.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
Sure. Yeah, again, the demi gods, the idols. Right in
a secular world where you know, spirits and gods are
not necessarily real, what do you worship celebrities? They took
that position in society. You also in your nineteen fifty
six inaugural Eurovision and uh, you get to submit as
(13:02):
a country two songs, but they don't have to be
performed by the same artists. So I could have Max
Vogan Flu name I made up for you, Max, especially.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
Maxic that actually birth names so low.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
But you know what, good eye you buddy, So.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
We could have You're welcome buckeroo, we could have we
could have Vogan Flu do uh two songs by himself
with the orchestra, or we could have Max do one
song and then we could pull another you know, up
and comer uh to a second song. And the contestants
originally get evaluated by a bunch of reps from these
(13:47):
different countries, and they give you points for each performance.
Each country sends two jury members over to watch the
show in Switzerland and they cast their votes in secret. Noel,
but it's super biased.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
For sure. And I'd love to just correct a statement
that I made earlier. Less than the American Idol heads
out there are yelling at their podcast device, there is,
of course a voting, a viewer voting component to American Idol.
I made it sound like it was all about Randy
and Simon and you know whatever, Paula, you know, make
him the call. Ultimately, they are the ones that call
(14:26):
the herd, let's just say, you know, and they're the
ones that are kicking folks to the curb who don't
have what it takes to make the finals. Once we
have that you know, crew assembled of the finalists, then
I believe every episode involves in the ability to vote
from home.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
Yeah, to jump in here, since we're talking about American Idol,
can y'all. You know, they just revived American Idol, can y'all,
name the judges. Hell, no, no, Carrie Underwood, Luke Bryan
and Lionel Ritchie.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
They're both country people two thirds of the country, folks.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Is that a real name?
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Luke Bryan is a is a famous country singer? On purpose? Huh?
On purpose?
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Oh cool?
Speaker 2 (15:10):
Lionel Richie, though I've not this is no, no, that's
I don't have the greatest confidence in this paneling judges. Guys.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Yeah, he's been He's been doing a lot of stuff
as young Lionel.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
It just it just feels like a bit of a
half hearted reboot, is what I'm getting at.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
I mean, Ryan Seacrest is still there. And I don't
know how I've told you all this, but I I
graduated from the same high school that Ryan Seacrest went to.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
That's like he's our co he's our coworker by they.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Technically technically yeah, that's like, that's like my high school's
like one claim to fame they have. At least when
I was there, they had football jersey up in the
lot in the weight room, people like when you played football,
and like, yeah, I honestly think he was the kicker.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
He is a handsome man with the gift of gab
and it's uh, it's cool.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
To find success in entertainment, it's difficult. So in nineteen
fifty six, these seven participating countries and their broadcast arms.
They're saying, we're going to cast our votes. We're going
(16:19):
to cast our votes in secret. So at this point
the audience is not chiming in even though this is
a televised event. And get this, our lovable scamps over
in Luxembourg are not able to make it to the show.
I think they were too rich or something with their scheduling.
(16:39):
So their friends, the Swiss representatives, voted on Luxembourg's behalf.
This was very much a biased affair because these jury
members were allowed to vote for their own entries. And
as a result of this, there is a conspiracy see
(17:00):
that begins in the very first year of Eurovision. People
still wonder how the votes went, how they should have gone.
Was the voting rigged the winner was?
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Yeah, a question that's kinda continue and to the president.
We're gonna get to that in part two of this series.
But Ben, what was the issue up front? They're already
having scandal. It's literally year one of Eurovision and there's
already a problem with this whole idea of soft diplomacy
through song.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. So hypothetically, think of it this way.
We have a country named, in a burst of humility, Benvania, right,
and the country of Benvania sends its top brass, its
best and brightest.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
It's envoy.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah, yeah, the two envoys, Noel von Brown and Max
what was that name? What was your birth name? Again
it's lost to history. Okay, Well, it sends these two
guys to vote on Eurovision, but there's nothing stopping them
from saying, we're gonna vote Benvania and we're going to
(18:13):
screw up the whole election. Either way, Switzerland wins the
first one.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Ah, the Swiss.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Yeah, the host country as well.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Ghost country. Aren't they traditionally kind of known as being
diplomatically neutral, Yes, they are the neutral country. Issues come
up already challenging that neutrality. It seems that there's what's
the opposite of neutrality, bias? Yeah, a little bit of that. Yeah,
well put.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
The first winner of Eurovision is now known as the
ground Dome of Eurovision, lis Acia. She performed two songs
for Switzerland. One was called the Old Carousel. It is
a German language and Noel, could you do me a
favor and help us out with the pronunciation?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Ah Ben, you honor me with the opportunity to pronounce
something in my native tongue. As you know, I was
once a small German boy. The old carousel or does
alta carousel? Okay, cahoussell, Let's see if we can find
a clip.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
Yeah yeah yeah. Also, while you're looking for the clip, King,
give us that German one more time. But if you
can more emphatic.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Oh man, thank you so much for the second opportunity
to overpronounce something in my native tongue. As you know,
I was once a German boy. That's alta cows clip.
Let's roll the clip. We got it, We got it,
guys by Liz already see how this is like much
(20:02):
more like a classical piece.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Definitely sounds yeah, it definitely sounds like. There's twenty four
people in the orchestra.
Speaker 4 (20:09):
N s ferchib.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So this is again, as you said, No, this is
dos alte Carousel, the old Carousel. This is one of
the two songs that the Grand Dame of Eurovision submits,
but it is not the one that wins the day.
Her winning entry is a song in the French language,
(20:50):
because you know German and French or common languages in Switzerland.
This is a ballad called refrain, So let's play a
little bit of that.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
That one, isn't that a little redundant? Is about like refrain.
It just refers to like the chorus. I think that's
so funny. Let's see if we can find.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
Here we go, same guys in the orchestra, y'all.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I can see why this one won the day though,
because it's a lot more upbeat. That last one was
kind of a bummer, a little bit of a you know,
like a wistful, you know, reflection on the past. This
one kind of bops. Yeah, it's a little sweeter, hotjazz,
whatever the ear version of mouthfeel is. You know, it's
(21:52):
a little nicer. And then from there Eurovision is off
to the races, or in this case, the microphone. More
and more countries are becoming involved with the show from
nineteen fifty six and the format kept changing. Right now,
over forty countries compete, and so the show involves a
(22:12):
lot of knockout rounds or semi finals we could call them,
before the finals night occurs. The final night, as we
can tell you because we have been watching a lot
of Eurovision. The final night is pretty long. It's twenty
six acts at no more than three minutes each. Getting
(22:34):
a shot on stage can be complicated, but luckily the
rules to qualify for your performance are pretty simple. They've
got five rules, and they break the fifth one all
the time. They sure do, Ben, they sure do. Here
we go. Rule number one is it must be a
(22:57):
new song tune, the musical composition and the lyrical content
the libretto right.
Speaker 1 (23:07):
Right, So sorry, Estonia, Norway, there's no death metal version
of Mary had a little lamb that you can pull off. Yeah, no,
that'd be fun though.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
And can I just add to that, we're not gonna
play clips throughout this entire series. I think it was
important that we were able to kind of show you
how it progresses a little bit with some of these
vintage clips. But of course this would get closer and
closer to the modern day. We're gonna be hit with
copyright strikes, so we're gonna do our best to demonstrate
some of the evolution without you know, playing too too
many clips.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Maybe with some bad impressions. Everybody tune in. Also funny, Yeah,
The second rule sacer sanct is that your performance must
be no longer than three minutes.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
And I will die on this hill. No good pop
song worth its salt should be and movies should be
no more than one point five hours. WHOA, really, I'm
just kidding, but like you know, I do love you know, brevity, man, brevity, brevity,
so the soul of wit.
Speaker 3 (24:06):
I was talking to my dad about two thousand and
one of Space House and I'm like, Dad, you know
it's like fifteen movies, it's like forty eight hours longest.
Like it's not my voice four hours longest.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Well, that it is. Yes.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
I remember when Gettysburg, the not the Battle, the film
based on the battle, was out in theaters and they
had an intermission and I thought we could leave, but
my creepy family made me stay.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
Oh man, I do remember the good old days where
movies like that of that length had to be served
up to you on two rubber banded VHS tapes that
would like flop together. That's right.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
Oh did I ever tell you guys? My first time
seeing The Godfather's series was through VHS tape and it
was it was exactly what you're describing, Nol. This was
blockbuster for anybody who was also old at last video. Yeah,
and they had the two VHS tapes and of rubber
(25:03):
banded together, but they put the tapes in the wrong order.
So I'm watching this, I'm thinking, whoa, this is so nonlinear.
This is groundbreaking, crazy artistry in the forefront. What's going
to happen has already happened. And then later one of
my friends said, hey, man, you know they have a
(25:26):
little sticker on the tapes. One one says number one
and the other says number two.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
It's sad that we're not going to make that kind
of mistake so much anymore, you know. In the well, actually,
that's not true. I have accidentally started watching the last
episode of a series on streaming before and not understand
that that's what was happening, And then also had a
similar thought, whoa, this is wild. They're just dropping me
in and Minie Rres I'm supposed to like, No, I
don't know this is I'm here for it, but I
(25:53):
have I have spoiled a handful of series for myself
that way. Where are we at with rules?
Speaker 1 (25:59):
Oh yeah, the main thing is, just like podcasting, you
cannot do lip syncing, so vast apologies to Kid Rock.
All the song shots fired, Brosby sung live, Oh No,
you're right, performed live. I wouldn't call what he does singing.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
No, my god, Ben, who hurt you? Was it? Kid Rock?
Where is Kid?
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Where is Kid? He's definitely not at Eurovision because no
lip syncing is allowed and no are tripling. Our fourth
rule is our fourth rule is I think probably? I
think it's an apology to the backstage production.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
I get it. And this is also the kind of
thing that could evolves as a show, and a production
like this evolves because as we know, of course, big
you know, singing groups, boy bands, girl groups, things like
that became very in vogue. But initially they had the
rule of no more than six people on stage, which
seemed to beat to your point, Ben, a way of
mitigating chaos and nightmarish you know, changeovers between sets.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
And this brings us to the number five rule, the
most important one, which is also the slipperiest and also
the rule that is most broken most years. No politics.
All right, So if we're Chechia, or if we're hungry,
(27:29):
or the United Kingdom or Israel, which we'll get to
in part two, then your stuff is supposed to be
a political It's just supposed to be a cool bop
that is not more than three minutes long.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
I mean, let's be real, man, this is an unrealistic
and unreasonable expectation for a competition that was started with
the acknowledgment that these countries, many of which did not
like each other, were meant to compete together. You know
what I mean. I get the sentiments. Heart is in
(28:01):
the right place, but it's also a little bit pie
in the sky. So while Eurovision was always intended to
be a political there have been many scandals and trends
towards political voting, where countries vote for their neighbors and
shun nations that they'd had issues within the past. This
(28:22):
has been combated to a certain degree by introducing more
national juries who have their professional judgment added in with
the public vote. But let's be real, man, Whenever there's
voting involvement, it's called voting. If politics baby.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Right, exactly, Yeah, it's called voting. I love that, actually, Max,
Can you do me a favor and play that back
as a clip of Noel saying that nol, I'm going
to make you hear yourself.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
It's called voting.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
It's called voting brilliant exactly.
Speaker 2 (28:53):
Yeah, I coined the term, by the way.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
And so with that, folks, we have to tell you
a little bit about how Eurovision works now and with
great affection, with profound love, we want you to know
this is kind of ridiculous. So every country that participates
in Eurovision has their own sort of bush league or
(29:25):
farm league selection process. That's how they choose one original song,
one act. It can take a couple of different forms,
like there may be regionally or nationally known artist who
gets approached by that country's government and that government says, hey,
you're the you know, you're the hottest ticket in Romania.
(29:48):
You should sing your song that you did earlier. That'll
represent us in Eurovision. Or it might be the next
step for an artist who wins their country's own song compy,
because a lot of them have them at this point.
So for example, if you are Italian and you win
the San Remo Music Festival, you get what we call
(30:09):
the first right of refusal to participate in Eurovision.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Yeah, and I mean, obviously it's a great honor to
be asked, but and most people would, of course, you know,
jump at the chance to represent their country in Eurovision,
but it also doesn't necessarily mean like it's not the
same as American Idol in this respect, American Idol is
about kind of being an unknown and then being elevated
(30:37):
to pop star status, whereas Eurovision the varying degrees of fame,
of pre existing fame. They are kind of pre existing
acts or groups that are then seen as a representative
of that particular nation, and they may well be incredibly popular,
but typically that popularity would not extend far beyond the
(30:58):
borders of that particuleicular country.
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Right, you got to have your stripes at least for
your country.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
We're going to get into some of our personal favorites
as well. Yeah, some that we've actually seen.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Live, similar to the Olympics, which is kind of what
this is. You might not be the best poll vaulter
in the world yet, but you kind of have to
be the best poll vaulter in Poland to get into.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Where all good pole vaulters come from. It's right there
in the name.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
Yeah, yep, yep, they do call it Poland. So the
composition of the act has also evolved. It's much broader
than it was originally. So as we said the first
contest they only have solo artists. The next year, nineteen
fifty seven, they allow duos. They get a little you know,
Simon and Garfunkel with it, and they continually open the
(31:51):
door to more and more types of acts. So today
you might see a solo singer, you might see a band,
You might see a nominal dancing turkey puppet, which weirdly enough,
was from Ireland. I wish we could play a clip,
but it's not going to translate to audio.
Speaker 2 (32:11):
No, Now that's weird, though I don't really think of
Ireland as being the land of dancing turkeys.
Speaker 1 (32:16):
You got to check out the show Man and so
the only real rules that hold are a song must
be brand new, it must be under three minutes, it
has to be sung live on stage. After that, it's
all about spectacle, creativity, showmanship.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
May we say or may I say? And you may
feel free to agree or disagree with me, Ben and Max,
But I think the live stand component is so cool
and so unique, even to this day, where we have
had a lot made out of another incredibly popular music
show out of Europe called Top of the Pops, oh
(32:53):
where famously it's great but famously all the band's lip
sync because of the logistics of the production and if
you're interested in checking out some folks kind of pushing
back against that. There is an incredible performance of Nirvana
on Top of the Pops where like he just I
think Kurt is just like pretending to play guitar, like,
(33:14):
oh my god, he's got like he's like a straight
hand while strumming the guitar and just kind of like
basically is just saying blah blah blah and marble mouth
mumbling kind of to the to the playback of smells
like teen Spirits. So the live singing aspect is super
important and relatively rare for live music television shows in Europe.
Speaker 1 (33:36):
Now you can have a backing band. At this point,
the twenty four piece orchestra is gone.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yeah you can. You can have that.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
You could have backing you could have a backing track
back in track pop Star, but you will have to
actually be singing. And I also want to give a
shout out to the Jules Holland show. Do you guys
remember him?
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Incredible, incredible, some fabulous performances. It's called Late Night with
Later with Jules Holland. Late it's not on. Yeah, it's
called Later with Jules Holland, and you can see incredible
performances of bands from the nineties, I think up through
the two thousand. The Sun is really really fabulous and
(34:17):
they are incredibly well produced and entirely live. Jules Holland
himself was actually a weird sort of niche pop artist
in the UK. He's a piano player. And there is
a pretty interesting film, a music film called erg a
Music War, which highlights a couple of interesting scenes in
(34:39):
the eighties, one from Los Angeles and one from London
where you've got bands like the Dead Milkman, Oingo Bueno
featuring Danny Elfman, who of course went on to become
a super famous film composer, and Jules Holland is featured
in that as well. So yeah, there's an incredible tradition
of music performance shows and the music and art documentary
(35:00):
trees that are produced. A lot of these things you
can find on YouTube, but just had to make the
Top of the Pops comparison. How some of these music shows,
because of production logistics, did not allow for actual live performance.
So it's a pretty big deal that from its earliest
days where production technology wasn't nearly where it got to.
Eurovision was all about that live element.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
And Eurovision when it reaches its apex every year, it
takes place over three big nights. The thing is a
lot of work goes into selecting those songs in advance,
so well before those three nights, countries will randomly draw
lots to determine which semi final they are in, and
(35:46):
then which half of that semi final they are in.
From there, it all goes to our producers, our showrunners.
They arrange the acts in the way that they feel
has the best pay you know what I mean. So
they don't want to really slow solo singer ballads one
(36:07):
after the other. Right, they want to paste it out.
They want to put in their dancing Turkey puppet to
liven things up. So you might be Ireland and you
might get you might randomly get assigned semi final two
and first half of that semi final. That means you
are performing earlier in the show that night, but you
(36:29):
don't know exactly where you're placed until the showrunners tell you,
until they mandate it. And so in each of these
semi finals, they're also mixing up the countries, right only
the top acts advance to the big night, the grand finale.
There are some exceptions to this, we'll get to them
(36:49):
in a moment, But that makes sense, right, just from
a production standpoint, like if the if the four of us,
Max Noll yours truly and you, fellow ridiculous historian, if
we're the four people who are running the show. We
wanted to have a good vibe, right, like we want
to curate it. We want to DJ a little for sure.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
Yeah, we don't want to do any have any train
wreck moments, right, that's what they call it when a
DJ screws up the tree? Is that really what they
call it? Have you seen? Maybe that's a colloquialism that
it was only in my circles, but it makes sense.
You can picture it right when you do a bad
beat match, or you do everything screeching to all God forbid,
(37:31):
you have dead air, you know?
Speaker 1 (37:32):
Oh right? Yeah, And that's what that's what these show
runners are terrified of as well. So, okay, we got
two nights, we got all these semi finals occurring after
everybody votes, and we'll get to the voting in part two.
The big day arrives and this is the main event.
(37:52):
This is where the best of the best caveat Asterisk
compete for ultimate bragging rights. You get a really cool trophy,
you get a place in music history. And as we
could tell you folks, the performances are galvanizing. The energy
is electric. It's a very kinetic sort of situation. Be
(38:14):
amazing to go there live. They have pyrotechnics, you know
what I mean, Like they have puppetry, they have like
they have people in the air.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
It's pretty, of course. No, it's a spectacle, man, it's
a regular there. We are a regular Empire of the
Sun and then insert any other theatrical type performance. But
it's cool. It has become known as much for its
music and tunefulness and you know, singing prowass on display
as it has for its spectacle.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
Absolutely one hundred percent. And with this we're going to
pause on a bit of a cliffhanger. So we've given
you the ridiculous, well intentioned history and origin story of Eurovision.
But we have questions to explore in chapter two of
this series. How does the voting actually work? What did
(39:06):
we mean when we said soft diplomacy. What's up with
all these controversies that the guys are referring to and
what are the weirdest songs from Eurovision? We can't wait
for you to join us in our second episode on
the ridiculous history of Eurovision. Big big thanks to our
super producer, mister Max Williams. Max, do you have a
(39:30):
favorite Eurovision song?
Speaker 4 (39:33):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (39:33):
I can't remember the name of it. I got two
they're from the same Eurovision, but it's the one with
the Norwegian guys singing about bananas.
Speaker 2 (39:40):
That's probably my favorite one classic. I love a Norwegian
singing about a banana that is not native to their region.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
Yeah, very strange, A pivotal piece of Norwegian culture, as
you can imagine. Big thanks to Alex Williams, our own
in house composer.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Now that you have to be able to grow a
banana to sing about a banana, I'm not Yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
We're not gatekeeping bananas, no nol.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
You've got you and I. We can't grow bananas here.
I mean it's fine.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
You and I both have a lot of weird favorite
Eurovision hits. We're going to get to in chapter two.
But he got one off the top that just really
sings to you.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
I reserve the right to hold there. We response until
part two when we talk about my guy. But man,
this is super fun. I think it makes a whole
lot of sense to pair the voting part with the
controversy part, because they are quite related, as we've already
alluded to with some of the biased voting. And boy
are we going to get into how this has been
incredibly politicized and weaponized.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Yeah too, Yeah, And speaking of weaponized and politicized, not
a thank you but a chilly civil formal acknowledgment of
Jonathan Strickland aka the Quister.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
I think I see, how do you?
Speaker 1 (40:56):
I think it was in Eurovision one time I could
see bald, Yeah, I can see, I can see the performance.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
Big thing was blinding.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
He did a cover blinded by the light and the
judges kicked him out because it has to be an
original composition. Strix one to grow on big thanks to
Chris raassiotis Eve's Jeffcoat.
Speaker 2 (41:17):
Who else? They're here in spirit and also huge things
as you said to you know whatever, a chili at Chili,
how do you do to Jonathan Strickland the quizz or
a j Bahamas Jacobs the Puzzler, Because we got to
thank them in the same breath, because that's just how
it goes. Alex Williams, our own Eurovision star who composed
this bangin bop that you hear in your very ears
(41:38):
that could well have held its own in a Eurovision
Asque competition.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
Absolutely Now we just need the lyrics and big thanks
to the rude dudes of Ridiculous Crime. If you dig us,
you will love them, so tune in get THEE to
thy podcast platform of choice. I have been our research
associate for this series and Noel, thanks to you, man,
I can't wait for part two of this.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
It's gonna get so weird. Same, See you next time, folks.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
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Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
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Noel Brown
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