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Russia Wins Eurovision

The Gazprom Song Contest

Russia's victory at this year's Eurovision Song Contest has critics in Britain and Germany asking if an Eastern European voting bloc has emerged that will make it hard for Western Europe to win again.

Before this year's Eurovision Song Contest could even begin, Terry Wogan, who has dissected the event for decades for the BBC with his razor-sharp commentary, predicted Russia would win. "The word went out it was Russia's turn," he said, ominously.

Russia did score a win on Saturday with heartthrob singer Dima Bilan's "Believe," produced by American hip-hop and R&B star Timbaland. The Russians spared no expense in staging their entry either, with Bilan singing barefoot on a cushion of ice as Olympic skating champion Yevgeny Plushenko swirled around him. Then, with less than 30 seconds left of the song, Bilan dramatically ripped open his shirt and flashed his abdominal muscles to secure his win. Former Soviet republics Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus and Armenia all faithfully awarded the maximum 12 points to Russia. So was this the Gazprom Song Contest as some critics derided it?

For several years now, critics have complained that the system of voting set up by the European Broadcasting Union, which produces the song contest, has enabled voting blocs to emerge in the Balkans and amongst Russia's neighbors that have virtually shut out Western Europe. More than half the winners since 2000 have been Eastern European countries, including Estonia, Latvia, Ukraine, Serbia and now Russia.

The evidence of that voting bloc could be seen on Saturday night in Belgrade, host to this year's competition. Only three years ago, Ukrainians were ready to freeze to death rather than cave in to Moscow's price hikes on gas, but on Saturday, they eagerly gave their "douze points" to Russia. When Eurovision beamed the results live from Kiev, a Russian sitting in a popular Berlin bar was heard to quip: "They finally get it." And Wogan, commenting for the BBC said: "Ukraine want to be absolutely sure that the electricity and oil flows through."

In Moscow, Saturday's win provided yet another opportunity to pop open the champagne after recently scoring the 2014 Winter Olympics for Sochi and hosting last week's Champions League football final. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin offered his congratulations to Bilan, saying: "This is not just a personal success for Dima Bilan, but also another triumph for the whole of Russia."

It was an expensive one, too. The Russians reportedly spent $10 million on the production, prompting the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung to sarcastically suggest there might be speculation over whether some of that money got pumped into call centers to vote for Bilan. The European Broadcasting Union has "categorically ruled out that possibility."

Then win left some Western European countries feeling they had been discriminated against by the voting system.

As islanders relatively isolated over on the Western coast of Europe, the British are particularly sensitive. "At the very beginning of the year, I said Russia would win for political reasons and they did," said Wogan. "I think the former countries of the USSR are feeling a little nervous. The voting used to be about the songs. Now it's about national prejudices."

Germany's 'Null Angels'

Resentment is also simmering in Germany, where the mass-circulation daily Bild has it as its leading story: "Zero points from 40 countries, the most embarrassing Grand Prix ever. We pay and the others get the votes." Of course, as Britain's Telegraph points out, "It may have momentarily escaped the attention of the outraged commentators in Berlin that Germany itself borders nine countries, which on the 'neighbors' rationale doesn't seem too shoddy a platform for victory."

The German entry, the successful TV casting fabrication No Angels, performed miserably on Saturday night, coming in third from last. The group did score 12 points from Bulgaria, but only because member Ludmilla "Lucy" Diakovska happens to be Bulgarian and is a judge on the country's version of Pop Idol. Germany finances the song contest to the tune of half a million euros, and the paper asks if it should consider pulling out.

The poor performance by No Angels could also place additional pressure on German public television. Close to a million fewer viewers tuned into the event on Saturday than the previous year, though at 6.38 million, but it still represented a 27.9 percent share of television viewers.

And there were few doubts in Germany this weekend over the reasons for the country's loss. It wasn't the "Eastern European mafia" blamed by some. In an editorial, SPIEGEL ONLINE writes that it would be regrettable if Eurovision ended in Germany because of "a mediocre radio tune by a formerly famous casting girl group. What was planned as No Angels' spectacular comeback instead looked like a bad wind tunnel test, with the band's bad hair blowing wildly and horrendous makeup. Record company Universal must have known it would be impossible to come up with any choreography for the song. It's almost as if they were setting the group up for a fall." The Hamburg daily Hamburger Abendblatt is calling them "Null Angels."

SPIEGEL ONLINE has another theory for Germany's loss, as well as that of the other "big four" financers of the song contest. "The truth is that none of the four countries wants to take the risk of winning then having to take over the costly production the next year," its editorialist writes. "Not England, not France, not Spain and not even Germany. Just a few hours after the final in Belgrade, No Angels had already flown to another grand prix in Monaco, where the Forumal 1 circus has landed. The Eurovision winners press conference wasn't scheduled until Sunday at 12 p.m. in Belgrade. That's not the kind of scheduling you do if you think you have a shot at winning."

Perhaps it wasn't a coincidence that No Angel's Eurovision entry was titled, "Disappear."

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