A beginner’s guide to getting hooked on Eurovision

Image: EBU / Andres Putting

Glitter. Glam. Camp. Ridiculous. Moving. Funny. Awesome. Cringe. Iconic. Sexy. Here's Troy from Aussievision’s guide to getting hooked on the Eurovision Song Contest.

The Eurovision Song Contest has everything that makes for compelling entertainment.

The depth and fervour of the Eurovision fandom is as complex, obsessive and opinionated as that of UEFA, AFL, NRL, and even Olympic breakdance. The Contest even has its own odds and betting market!

For someone new to the swirling and fast-paced world that the Eurovision has cultivated, it can be difficult to find a foothold.

Here’s my foolproof guide to getting hooked on the Eurovision Song Contest.

The basics

Eurovision’s full name is the Eurovision Song Contest (sometimes shortened to ESC), which started way back in 1956.

Each year, countries that are members of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), who organise and manage the contest, can elect to enter an artist and song into the contest.

Entry songs can only be 3 minutes in length and must be original – no previous releases or covers.

The country that won the previous year’s competition gets to host (if they can). The total number of entries fluctuates with how many countries choose to enter in a given year.  

The Big Five

You'll hear this term a bit. Staging an international competition that is watched by hundreds of millions of people globally is not a simple (or cheap) exercise.

And because entering the competition is voluntary, making total numbers and financial contributions uncertain, the Big Five provide the stability (and big money) that keeps the competition rolling each year.

The countries making up the Big Five are the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Germany, and Italy. In return for their commitment (and coin), their entries automatically make the Grand Final each year.

But… Australia isn’t in Europe?

So, you’ve seen a map, you’ve figured out that Australia is a bit of a trek from old Europa and you’re wondering how we ended up in the Eurovision Song Contest.

We Aussies have a long and proud history of broadcasting Eurovision down under. We are an Associate Member of the EBU (not a full one) and we’ve shown the competition each year since 1983 via SBS.

Originally broadcast to help European migrants feel more at home here in Australia, Eurovision has amassed an enormous following across many demographics. That’s how we’ve got to show our stuff on the Eurovision main stage since our first invitational performance in 2014.

Australia was invited to perform in 2015, and we've stuck around ever since.

Aussievision recently partnered with SBS for a deep dive podcast on the history of Eurovision down under and answered the perennial “but why is Australia in Eurovision anyway” trope in great (but entertaining) detail.

Check out the podcast here or read more about why we're in it here.

How did that whacked-out entry make it?

The weird, and honestly sometimes absurd, entries that make it to Eurovision are part of what makes it iconic.

Eurovision can take music and the industry deeply seriously, but is also happy to parody both the machine and itself. Eurovision is proud to showcase the odd along with the outstanding.

Some countries have complex selection systems, hosting their own enormous competitions to select their entrants each year. Some selection competitions rival the main Contest itself in terms of fandom and star-making power, such as the Sanremo Music Festival in Italy, which pre-dates Eurovision.

Other countries opt for direct selection, where an internal and closed-door group invites artists to submit songs, and they pick an entrant without a public vote.

Australia has had a mix of both. We started with direct selection, then moved to the Australia Decides competition where the public had a say, and have since reverted to direct selection in recent times.

Gobble up those tunes

Streaming and YouTube have had a huge impact on how engaged you can be with the lead-up to Eurovision.

Many diehard fans religiously track song entries into the various national selection competitions. There are countless playlists available on music streaming services, and you can even watch many of the competitions live or in replay on YouTube.

With each country using its own selection method, the entry roster playlist of songs for each year’s contest gets gradually populated.

Again, streaming and YouTube playlists are a great way to start engaging with the songs early. A simple search will spit out dozens of options.

Competition time

Eurovision rocks around in May each year. The competition is held over two semi-finals and a Grand Final.

The Grand Final usually has places for 26 songs – 20 entries (10 qualifiers from each semi-final) and the guaranteed Big Five plus the hosts who automatically make the final.

If a Big Five nation hosts, the Grand Final will have 25 songs.

Many fans are well-familiar with the entry songs by this stage… but it’s common for casual fans (and even some hardcore fans) to raw dog it.

Wait… what?

Like the trend on long-haul flights where passengers chose to forego inflight entertainment (or even read a book or play CandyCrush) in the air, raw dogging Eurovision-style is where you don’t listen to any of the songs until they’re performed at the semi-final.

Going in cold like this used to be the only way we could consume the songs in Australia, but thanks to the World Wide Web we now have the choice to either obsess upfront or raw dog it like those who came before us.

Voting

Voting in Eurovision can be confusing.

There’s a semi-final allocation draw that happens around January. Countries get put into semi final 1 or 2.

Countries in one group vote for one another. If Australia is performing in semi-final 2, we don’t get to vote for entries in semi-final 1.

You can vote for your favourite entry… except for your own country.

Crucially, in the semis only public votes are used to determine placing and progression to the Grand Final.

Countries are awarded points from 1-8, 10 and 12 from each nation.

In the Grand Final, it’s a combination of the public vote (or ‘televote’… because the language of 1995 is alive and well in Eurovision-land) and jury vote.

Each country nominates a jury of experts to judge and awards points – they’re usually musicians, producers or sometimes music critics and journalists.

The ultimate Eurovision dream is to get that sweet, sweet "Douze Points!" (twelve points) from as many countries as possible.

Oh yeah…historically Eurovision was broadcast in French, English and the host nation’s language. While this varies a bit from year to year, the traditional French has stuck for the voting mostly because of how fun it is to shout “DOUZE POINTS” in a terrible French accent.

At this point you’ll see the hosts awkwardly chatting with spokespeople from each country (“allo, UK calling”) announcing how their jury awarded points, while you hold your breath, biting your nails. Followed by another round revealing the televote from each country.

There’s never really downtime

And that's where the come down begins. All the build-up to the ultimate show, and it's done and dusted.

But Eurovision's industrious fan community continue to produce content throughout the year between Grand Finals.

There are blogs like Aussievision, Facebook groups, meet-ups, polls, surveys, clubs, live shows, radio countdowns that trawl over previous entries, entrants that missed out and even previous winners’ entries.

This territory is where you start to uncover the depth of the Eurovision experience and how much there is to enjoy. There are lots of discussions you can join, friendly arguments to be had, but most importantly, there’s seemingly endless, high-quality music to digest.

You can use Aussievision as a launching pad and you’ll have all you need to “DOUZE POINTS” with the most knowledgeable of Eurovision fans.

For continued updates on all the Eurovision Song Contest news follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Bluesky Threads and TikTok. All links at: https://linktr.ee/aussievisionnet