Good morning! Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate, and Happy Flag Day to Albanians reading this column! Today we are not directly talking about politics, but we are talking about the Eurovision Song Contest, a rare opportunity to present Montenegrin popular culture in Europe. I took a look at the winning song and a few others that competed and decided to make a socio-political comment on the topic.
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Montenegrin boomers at the Eurovision Song Contest
I know today’s title will sound like ageism, but that’s not the point. More in the way is a sarcastic or rather ironic comment on the fact that we are sending 50-year-olds to Basel for the Eurovision Song Contest who sing about the Internet in a rather clumsy way. Criticism of misinformation, social networks, with bisexual and tolerant messages, is an attempt to be relevant and to intrigue the Eurovision audience with simple tones and catchy phrases based on stereotypes about that same audience.
With Rambo, we already tried to send a political message to the Eurovision Song Contest with his song Euro-Neuro in a significantly less banal way. But even then, we didn’t find too much understanding. Neither did Croatian Let3 a few years ago.
We understand Europe too banally, and we chase trends in a banal and provincial way. With a few exceptions, our presentation at the Eurovision Song Contest went unnoticed. Both at the times when we sent folklore themes, and when we wanted to please the Eurovision fan base.
It was rare for us to be authentic, and it seems to me that we would send the best message that way.
This year’s Monte Song itself was a lot more like the Eurovision. The presentation of the candidates, and the competition itself, was more transparent, interactive and modern. And it gave a platform for some new authors and faces. Djurdja Perovic Poljak and the author Dolce Hera left a special impression on me with new forms that would perhaps go over well in Europe.
Still, it seems the jury thought the Clickbait song was a good thing. Without wanting to offend the guys, I think that the song is not good enough and that the message will be laughed at by the cynical Eurovision audience because of its naivety.
I was talking about authenticity. Montenegro is on the way to becoming an EU member, part of the European family. Montenegrins should think about bringing themselves into the European identity mosaic. That stone of our identity must be redefined. We should not and must not look at ourselves through Yugoslav stereotypes about Montenegrins and we should not make a caricature of ourselves in order to be liked by the European audience. It works in Pink-like Belgrade because such Pink-like Belgrade is used to caricaturing and making fun of everything outside of Belgrade, starting from Nis, through Cacak and Krusevac, to across the border.
We need another approach. Monte Song this year resembled the Eurovision in miniature. We had metal and indie music, we had monsters on stage. In the end, we sent four rather old Peter Pans there.
Who knows, maybe everything will turn out for the best. We should have fun.
However, I think it would have been nicer if we had sent someone who could really make a European career after the Eurovision Song Contest, and it seems to me that the two mentioned authors had more potential for such a thing.
That’s it for today. We wish you a pleasant rest of the day.
Kind regards,
Ljubomir Filipovic, CdM analyst and columnist
(The opinions and views of the authors of the columns are not necessarily those of CdM)