Eurovision semi-final: Euphoria for Ireland as Bambie Thug qualifies for Saturday’s final

“We are in the Grand Final at last!” declares an emotional Marty Whelan on RTÉ as Ireland qualifies for the first time since 2018. “That is just fantastic.”

Well, he’s not wrong. As he signs off, he’s also talking about cracking open the Baileys early. Again, another sensible decision. Other cream liqueurs are available.

With Sweden’s fiendish Eurovision producers leaving it until the ninth qualification spot to call out Ireland – and Slovenia beating the bookies’ odds to unexpectedly qualify near the start of the announcement – that was a little tense, I must admit, if only because I didn’t want to have offered an embarrassingly over-optimistic impression of Bambie Thug’s chances earlier on this evening.

Saturday now beckons for Bambie and the Irish delegation, who erupted in ecstatic delight and relief in the green room as Ireland’s qualification was confirmed. Assuming I am not hexed by any passing witches in the meantime, I’ll be back to live-blog the final, when we can at least dream of the occasional douze points. Goodnight.

And the qualifiers are...

• Serbia!
• Portugal!
• Slovenia!
• Ukraine!
• Lithuania!
• Finland!
• Cyprus!
• Croatia!
• Ireland!
• Luxembourg!

The votes have been counted and Malin and Petra are already planning their post-show cocktails. The obligatory check-in with Eurovision Song Contest executive supervisor Martin Österdahl, who is Swedish, takes place – he confirms there is a valid result and the presenters are “good to go”.

So, the results are nigh. Will it be Euphoria in Malmö for Ireland? Or will Europe be too freaked out by Bambie’s stage witchcraft to let them showcase their hexing powers in Saturday’s final?

Who has survived to sing again and who will be forlornly googling the top sights of Malmö to distract themselves until their flight home?

Petra Mede stalks the green room, trying some “baby lasagne” and making her way to Ireland’s sofa for choreographed interaction with half-Swedish Bambie Thug, Petra’s “spirit animal”, who waves a trans flag.

“So if Bambie Thug wins on Saturday, it will be 8-8, Sweden, Ireland,” Petra posits.

No, Sweden, no.

Here’s the final image from Bambie’s performance earlier. But did the voters of Europe receive the message?

The second interval act arrives. Hold me now, it’s Swedish star Benjamin Ingrosso with a medley of songs I don’t know.

He appears to have borrowed the white suit King Johnny Logan wore when he won in 1987, customising it to make the shoulders modishly sharper. Ingrosso has not himself won Eurovision – he finished a mere seventh when he represented Sweden in 2018.

“Sing for me, Europe,” he says. “Sing for me.”

If it’s alright, Benjamin, I won’t.

The big countdown to the close of voting approaches. “STOP VOTING NOW,” Europe. You’ve been told.

The 16 countries competing in Thursday’s second semi-final for 10 final places are given a brief tease, alongside the other three pre-qualifiers, including my favourite, Italy’s Angelina Mango and her summer-evoking song La Noia.

Malin Åkerman explains that married couple Nicole & Hugo, Belgium’s representatives in 1973, were the first Eurovision participants to sing and dance at the same time, though they were rewarded for their pioneering spirit by being placed last.

“Let’s just say they were before their time,” says Malin. She pays tribute to the recently late Nicole by way of segueing into a montage of the couple’s “legacy of dance”, as evidenced by a spangled line-up of hopefuls over the decades since. Coincidentally, a glimpse of Bucks Fizz is a compulsory element of any Eurovision production.

We’re not done. There are two interval acts, various fillers, more than one song recap and the voting to get through before I can have my dinner and re-establish circulation to my feet.

“Europe and the rest of the world, are you ready?” asks Malin Åkerman. “START VOTING NOW.”

Owing to some, ahem, irregularities a couple of years back, there are no juries weighing in on tonight’s semi-final – it is televote only.

You can’t vote for Ireland if you’re in Ireland. But you can vote for Ireland if you’re in one of the other countries participating tonight or you’re based in the UK, Germany or Sweden – the three pre-qualifiers we saw perform earlier – or you’re not in any participating Eurovision country, in which case your choices will be amalgamated into a single “rest of the world” online vote.

Petra Mede says that although Sweden has won Eurovision seven times, it has also lost 55 times, then she acknowledges that before “queen” Loreen, aforementioned two-time winner for Sweden, there was a king.

“I can’t put into words how much he meant to me as a young girl watching Eurovision at home,” she says.

I mean, sure.

Then she introduces “his royal highness” Johnny Logan, who is in fine voice as he gives an impressively stirring rendition of Loreen’s Euphoria, with its electronic dance music vibes replaced by rousing strings. “Reaching for divinity,” indeed – Johnny is a Eurovision immortal.

And finally... it’s our last song in competition tonight and a welcome back to Luxembourg, which has quietly ended the longest huff in Eurovision history, returning to the contest for the first time since finishing in 20th place in Millstreet in 1993.

It’s a creditably poppy return, too, courtesy of singer Tali and her song Fighter, which has French verses and an English chorus.

Sample lyric (translated): “I admit, I admit I don’t know / I want everything and nothing at the same time / I’m gonna end up totally mad / And behold!”

Another hard relate here. Tali has two long plaits, a big-cat graphic and a mildly hooky tune at her disposal and she turns in a decent performance with the smile of someone who at the time of Luxembourg’s great humiliation of 1993 had not yet been born.

Voila! We’re so done.

Our penultimate entry tonight hails from Portugal with the song Grito, performed and co-written by Iolanda.

Sample lyric (translated): “I’m a flame that still burns / Still burns / Still burns”

Iolanda is a festival of white satin here with a corseted jacket and vogueish wide-legged trousers and she’s got a big power note in her skillset, which feels appropriate as Grito translates as “scream”.

Musically, this feels a touch nondescript, therefore I will save myself the trouble of describing it.

She sings that she plans to “forgive those who wanted to see me suffer”. I’m not entirely sure of the wisdom of this. They actually wanted to see you suffer? Maybe they don’t deserve your forgiveness, Iolanda.

Moving along to Australia now with synth-pop duo Electric Fields and their self-composed song One Milkali (One Blood).

Sample lyric: “While entertaining the Gods / One milkali la, milkali la / It’s raining love / One milkali la, milkali la”

Zaachariaha Fielding, modelling pearl-white headgear and a dress with a side-bustle, has one of the bigger voices on display tonight, while his bandmate Michael Ross busies himself using his keyboard as a prop/shield before taking a brief turn with the vocals.

There’s an Aboriginal theme running throughout, with some of the lyrics in the Yankunytjatjara language – the song is inspired by the Yankunytjatjara lands of South Australia – and a didgeridoo.

If the power was all mine, this would qualify, but it’s not, so it might be borderline.

We’re back to song 12 of the official 15, and it’s the turn of Azerbaijan, represented by Fahree featuring Ilkin Dovlatov and the song Özünle Apar.

Sample lyrics (translated): “I lived a life standing on my own / Chaos inside and mysteries unsolved / Only with you I feel / How the burdens of my life just disappear”

Another ode to the honeymoon phase of a relationship here as Fahree sings about finding inner peace through love, represented in the arena by a graphic of a low-energy synchronised swimmer who sparkles mysteriously without doing much to ease Fahree’s struggle.

Fahree and featured wailer Ilkin Dovlatov are dressed in outfits that remind me both of Blake’s 7 and a schoolbag I had in the 1990s, while the stage bears a pair of giant disco hands opened in what I can only assume is a manifestation of Fahree’s noble distress.

Petra Mede returns to introduce a performance by Sweden, which is not one of the Big Five – the UK, Germany, Italy, France and Spain – but has pre-qualified by virtue of being the hosts.

Sweden has drafted in some Norwegians this year, with dance-pop duo Marcus & Martinus doing the honours on their behalf with the song Unforgettable, which isn’t.

Sample lyric: “You better know she’s dangerous / She is unforgettable”

Is this about Loreen? In any event, it’s safe to say that Sweden will not be claiming a record-breaking eighth victory this year.

Moldova’s Natalia Barbu is here with her song In the Middle.

Sample lyric: “I want you to be happy all of your life / My beautiful angel a work of art”

Moldovan artist Natalia Barbu didn’t write this song specifically for Eurovision and it sort of shows. She has got into the spirit of things, however, with some asymmetric white draping on the costume front. She also proves adept at miming playing the violin, which she does with a flourish (Barbu is a violinist for real) as the graphics form a pair of unwieldy angel wings around her.

Like the butterflies on the screens above, In the Middle may not have the longest of lifespans.

Nobody is happy all of their lives, are they? It’s a nice sentiment, but just an unrealistic ambition to have for someone.

Finland is up next with Windows95man, aka Teemu Keisteri, and No Rules!

Sample lyric: “Welcome, my name is Windows / Windows95man / And I only live by one rule / And the rule is no rules”

Like Croatia, Finland is playing the shouty eccentricity card again this year, but less successfully, though there is at least an, ahem, cracking start as Windows95man emerges from a giant egg in vintage Microsoft colours. Thankfully, there’s no sign of Clippy.

There are vocals from Keisteri’s co-writer Henri Piispanen in a coat made of grey post-its, then a series of camera-angle jokes as Windows95man is apparently not wearing much beyond a T-shirt and a hat, both of them featuring approximations of a long-ditched Microsoft logo.

Despite claiming there are no rules, there is indeed a rule about full-frontal nudity. As a result, Windows95man is sporting a modesty pouch – if modesty can ever be the right word to use in connection with Eurovision.

A pair of tiny denim shorts ceremonially descends for the big climax. I’m not making any of this up.

We are on song nine of 15 and it’s Slovenia, represented by Raiven and the song Veronika. I have seen this dubbed “electro-opera” but it’s not as good as that sounds.

Sample lyric: “I am a frameless mirror / Just a reflection of your fears”

I would describe mezzo-soprano Raiven’s look as “I’m available for a cameo in House of the Dragon”, while her high-note oscillating near the end serves as a useful reminder that the next series of Doctor Who starts this weekend.

Marty reckons Raiven had her outfit confiscated at customs, something that – as far as I know – has yet to happen to Marty. Either way, if I waste time here searching for a rehearsal photograph to show you what he means, I’ll miss Finland and one should never miss Finland.

Say hello to Isaak, representing pre-qualified Germany with his song Always on the Run.

Sample lyric: “I’m always on the run, run, run, run / Close, but never done, done, done, done”

Isaak has a convenient leather armchair nearby if he fancies a sit down and he also has a toasty bin fire to hand in case Europe has another energy crisis. He has a big voice, but it’s hard to engage as Germany are not our or anyone’s competition tonight.

Finally, he’s done, done, done, done.

Iceland’s entry this year is Hera Björk with Scared of Heights, which to be honest is not a patch on Scared of the Dark by Steps, but then, what is?

Sample lyric: “Maybe we should leave this / Cos what would be the use / Of crashing into you / We could end up in pieces / Don’t need another heart-shaped bruise”

This song is a sort of sequel or companion piece to the UK’s Dizzy, in that it traces the vertigo-like sensation of falling in love again after a previous heartbreak. Luckily, Hera Björk is not literally scared of heights as this performance obliges her to stand on top of a tall plinth amid graphic design that wouldn’t look out of place on an ITV gameshow.

Regardless of your level of fear in relation to heights, I would advise not wearing sleeves with such long fringing on an escalator anytime soon.

“I feel it coming,” she sings. I don’t, alas. Next!

Croatia’s Baby Lasagna is up next, with his song Rim Tim Tagi Dim ushering in a shift in genre. That genre is Euro-ridic-rock. Dismiss it at your peril.

Sample lyric: “Bye Mom, bye Dad / Meow, cat, please, meow back”

This is a genuinely hilarious grower from Baby Lasagna, with the added bonus of a “wo-oh” refrain that is very Bon Jovi. It’s all managed electric-pink chaos on stage, with people pretending to play instruments – no live instrumentation is permitted at Eurovision – and our frontman sporting a waistcoat that is substantially louder than the kind you might see at the Crucible.

Deploying a simple-but-fun elbow dance, steam-effect jets, balaclavas, headdresses and test-card colours, Croatia’s tale of youth emigration and cats that don’t care if you’re leaving home is Eurovision at its most glorious.

“Just brilliant,” says Marty Whelan, commentating on RTÉ.

Poland is represented this year by The Tower, which depending on your degree of resistance is either an irritation or an irritatingly catchy song performed and co-written by Luna.

Sample lyric: “I’m the one who built The Tower / I’m the one who holds the power”

Luna is one of several artists this year to sport a sharp-shouldered look, though I think she’s the only one whose staging centres around a possible chess motif.

There’s some cape removal at the start, then Luna mounts a red-tinged horse/unicorn (a virtual one) in this pleasantly accessible Polish number.

Back to the actual competition with Ukrainian artists alyona alyona and Jerry Heil and their song Teresa & Maria.

Sample lyric (translated): “Mother Teresa and Virgin Mary are with us / Barefoot, as if on a blade, they walked on the ground / With us are Mother Teresa and Virgin Mary / All the divas were born as human beings”

Jerry Heil, modelling a touch of armour-plating on her one-shouldered dress, opens Ukraine’s tribute to Mother Teresa and the Virgin Mary – yes, all kinds of everything are welcome in Eurovision – then alyona alyona, also a co-writer on this, comes in and lends her rapping skills to proceedings.

You don’t need to be of any particular faith to recognise that this is one of the better songs in this year’s competition.

After an interlude that you will only have been obliged to tolerate if you are watching this on the BBC – RTÉ mercifully opted for ads – it’s time for popstar-actor Olly Alexander to perform his song Dizzy, the pre-qualified UK entry.

Sample lyric: “Won’t you make me dizzy from your kisses? / Will you take my hand and spin me / Round and round until the moment never ends”

As the above lyric suggests, Dizzy is not about the travails of suffering from an inner ear disorder, which I have it on good authority is one of those invisible medical conditions that nevertheless manages to be utterly miserable.

The song is instead about someone who naively wants to be dizzy forever, the state signalling the “overwhelming feeling of love that someone gives you where they’ve swept you off your feet and they’re literally turning your world upside down”, he says.

This UK entry won’t turn anyone’s world upside down, but Olly Alexander was incredible in It’s a Sin and also Ireland would appreciate votes from the UK tonight, so I’ll say no more.

It’s Ireland now – yay – and time for Bambie Thug to spook all of Europe with their song Doomsday Blue, which they co-wrote with Olivia Cassy (“Cassyette”) Brooking, Sam Matlock and Tylr Rydr.

Sample lyric: “I guess you’d rather have a star than the moon / I guess I always overestimate you / Hoodoo all the things that you do / I’m down, down in my doomsday blue”

Bambie’s song is about placing a hex on an ex, and what a hex this is. The opening is both witchy and balletic – witchcraft and ballet being two of Bambie’s key interests/skills – and then, wait, who’s this bloke?

It’s choreographer Matt Williams, who has been dabbling in blue body paint. He performs alongside Bambie inside a ring of candles, and then we have one of the most Eurovision moves ever: a costume change. Specifically, a costume strip.

The good news is it looks like Bambie has found a way to Eurovision-ify their old Irish dancing pump laces. The bad news is that it doesn’t end well for the half-man, half-monster (aka Williams), who finishes Ireland’s three minutes on the Eurovision stage writhing in agony as Bambie sends a message to all voters: CROWN THE WITCH. (Please.)

Lithuania’s entry is a bit of a bop courtesy of Silvester Belt and his song Luktelk.

Sample lyric (translated): “One day has passed and then another / As if the time has stopped / I go somewhere, then some place else / And after it gets dark it will repeat again”

Well, that’s all highly relatable. According to Silvester, who co-wrote the song, it’s about being stuck in the limbo between living and merely existing. On paper, that sounds like a drag of a song, but Lithuania has added beats, helmeted backing dancers and some distinctive shoulder-bobbing to this bouncy effort.

Full marks for doing a turning hop there, Mr Belt, your balance is impeccable.

Serbia is next with Ramonda, performed and co-written by Teya Dora.

Sample lyric (translated): “The world is on fire, every flower too / Where have lilac ramondas disappeared to?”

This one begins on a gentler note, and with a change of pace, as the clouds part to reveal Teya Dora hanging out by a rock in post-apocalyptic rags to bemoan the absence of ramonda flowers – a Serbian symbol of hope and new beginnings – in the godforsaken world she finds herself in.

This is a classy entry in the slow-build Eurovision sub-genre, with the richly voiced Teya climbing back to her rock as a purple flower blooms above her. The land is not dead after all, and neither is Serbia’s chance of qualification.

First up in competition is Cyprus’s Silia Kapsis with the song Liar.

Sample lyric: “Waking up in the morning and I’m, I’m feeling like ooh la la / It’s about to go down ‘cos I found out the truth, la la”

When I woke up this morning I felt like ugh ugh ugh (hayfever), but Silia is made of sterner stuff than me and she’s here in her sparkly white crop top to repeatedly express her disdain for a big faker in her life. Don’t worry, that pelvis grab is part of the choreography – her flared and bravely white trousers are not falling down.

The advance publicity suggests this is a social commentary about the superficiality of the world we live in. Silia, backed by the requisite four male dancers, finishes by making an “L” shape with her hands, which traditionally in the international language of playground-speak means “loser” not “liar”.

Is Silia a loser? No, I’m guessing she’s done enough to qualify here, la la.

So it begins. The show commences, as is customary, with the EBU’s familiar theme – the prelude to Charpentier’s Te Deum – then there’s a montage of previous winners from Ye Olden Times until the spotlights go wild and we are into the thick of the arena.

The first performer of the night is Eleni Foureira, who finished as the runner-up to Israel in 2018, but is back for a reprise of her dance pop classic Fuego, a fan favourite. The only problem with starting with Fuego is that it is all going to be downhill from here.

Eric Saade, who represented Sweden in 2011, and Chanel, who did the honours for Spain in 2022, happen to be knocking about too and we are treated to an explosion of joy, exuberance and bottom-wiggling from the trio of past participants before tonight’s presenters, the actor Malin Åkerman and Eurovision stalwart Petra Mede, arrive in pink and orange suits respectively to guide us through the evening.

This is Åkerman’s first time hosting the contest (which showed in the first dress rehearsal), but the much-admired Mede – a comedian capable of lethal sarcasm – is completing her Eurovision hat-trick this year.

“I tried it alone, I tried it with a man, and now I’m trying it with a woman. But enough about my love life,” she says.

There’s also a nod to the 50th anniversary of Waterloo as Åkerman quotes another Abba song. Is it The Winner Takes it All? No, it’s Mamma Mia. As in, here we go again…

We are in Malmö tonight, of course, because Loreen, Sweden’s long-nailed queen of Eurovision, won for the second time last year, running away with it in Liverpool thanks to her song Tattoo.

Tattoo, I think we can all agree, was not as good as Loreen’s 2012-winning entry Euphoria, which is generally considered a banger, though at the risk of committing Eurovision sacrilege and being cancelled by Loreen’s vast fanbase, for me it also resides at the boring end of the banger scale.

In Liverpool, pretty much everyone in the arena save for Loreen wanted centipede-forming rapper Käärijä and his novelty-tinged song Cha Cha Cha to claim it for both Finland and lovers of umlauts, and he duly won the public vote. But the various international juries knew better and chose Loreen, so here we are. Not in Helsinki.

The “odds are looking good” for Bambie Thug, the Minister also correctly observed. This potentially marks a turnaround in Ireland’s rather dismal fortunes in Eurovision this, um, century.

If Bambie Thug qualifies, it will seal Ireland’s first progression to the Grand Final since 2018, when Ryan O’Shaughnessy’s performance of the song Together did the business in Lisbon.

Since the semi-finals were introduced, we have failed to qualify 11 times and got through just six times.

Only one of those times – O’Shaughnessy’s year – has been in the past decade. And on two of the occasions we qualified, we came last in the final. That’s not a wonderful 21st century record. Indeed, our best result since the year 2000 (when we finished sixth) came courtesy of Jedward, who placed eighth in 2011 with Lipstick.

Before the millennium, we prided ourselves on ruling Eurovision, amassing seven wins, including that bizarre stretch of three consecutive victories from 1992 to 1994, while our most recent Grand Prix triumph took place in 1996, when Eimear Quinn outsung everybody in Oslo with The Voice.

If Bambie outscares everybody, could we pull ahead of Sweden’s record-equalling tally of seven victories and claim a record eighth win? No, don’t even think it.

Meanwhile, at a press conference about various RTÉ shenanigans and how to make sure they don’t happen again, Minister for Media Catherine Martin was asked if it was appropriate for Ireland to be participating in Eurovision, our political correspondent Cormac McQuinn reports.

“I think involvement in the Eurovision Song Contest is a matter for RTÉ,” she told journalists, adding that she did not want to get involved or “try to influence any decision” as she believes in artistic freedom.

Bambie Thug, the Minister said, was “doing a great job” and she wished them the “very best of luck”.

Her thoughts on Croatia’s entry, the sublime Rim Tim Tagi Dim, were sadly unrecorded.

Many people protesting Israel’s inclusion point out that the EBU banned Russia from the contest in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine and argue that double standards are in play.

The EBU did indeed effectively ban Russia from Eurovision shortly after its invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Technically, however, what happened was that it suspended the Russian broadcasters from the organisation “due to their persistent breaches of membership obligations and the violation of public service values”. This notably followed pressure on it to do so from Ukrainian broadcaster UA: PBC and other members.

The EBU, an alliance of public service broadcasters led from its Geneva headquarters by its Irish director general, former RTÉ boss Noel Curran, has said comparisons between wars and conflicts are “complex and difficult” and “not ours to make”.

Its position is that the relationship between Israeli public broadcaster Kan and Binyamin Netanyahu’s government is “fundamentally different” to the relationship between its former Russian members and Vladimir Putin’s state.

With Netanyahu closing down Kan’s predecessor, the Israel Broadcasting Authority, in 2017 and his ministers more recently threatening to privatise Kan, it seems likely that the biggest risk to Israel’s participation in Eurovision comes from within Israel itself.

The Eurovision Song Contest is ostensibly a non-political event, though for a non-political event it does often manage to have a political edge to it. This year, controversy lingers and threatens to overshadow the contest as calls for a boycott have arisen from the participation of Israel, in light of its ongoing assault on Gaza.

In March, several Eurovision artists including Bambie Thug put out a joint statement rejecting the call, saying they believed in “the unifying power of music, enabling people to transcend differences and foster meaningful conversations and connections”.

Since then, more than 400 Irish artists – musicians, poets, writers, photographers, actors and many others – have written to Bambie Thug, once again urging them to drop out in solidarity with Palestinians, decrying “words from the stage” as meaningless and saying Israel’s Eurovision participation amounts to the “artwashing” of genocide. There have also been protests outside RTÉ in Donnybrook.

Meanwhile, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) – which organises Eurovision – has said it “recognises the strong emotions stirred” by this year’s song contest, while stressing that it is “firmly against any form of abuse or harassment directed at participants”.

Bambie, who has described all this as an “incredibly heavy” situation, says they stand with anyone boycotting Eurovision and has suggested they would do so themselves if they weren’t a participant.

Israel is not performing in tonight’s semi-final.

Bambie Thug, as you may have read in Deirdre Falvey’s fascinating interview with our representative in Sweden, is a stage name used by Bambie Ray Robinson, a London-based artist from Macroom in Cork.

Bambie defines their style of electro-gothic music as “ouija-pop” or “hyperpunk avant electro-pop” and their song Doomsday Blue, which they co-wrote, goes full witch tonight. I’ve watched one of the dress rehearsals and it is all just immense theatre – absolutely no one can accuse Ireland of playing it safe this year.

Bambie – who is non-binary and half-Swedish – originally trained in ballet, which is definitely in evidence in their performance. They moved to London for a dance scholarship, but broke their arm and switched to studying musical theatre. Selected as Ireland’s participant on the Late Late Show’s Eurosong special back in January, they have the perfect CV for Eurovision and should feel right at home as they terrify the arena later.

With Doomsday Blue, they are going all out and the bookmakers’ odds suggest they are also going through. Initially, their odds were only the eighth best out of just 10 qualifiers, but as of today they are deemed fourth most likely to progress tonight based on aggregated odds quoted by the website EurovisionWorld.

On a day when RTÉ was slapped with 116 recommendations arising from two Government reviews of its corporate governance and human resources procedures, this is a rare spot of positive news for the broadcaster, which could presumably do without adding “Eurovision flop” to its week.

Slightly alarmingly from an RTÉ finances point of view, however, is the fact that Bambie’s odds of claiming the Grand Prix on Saturday have also shortened, with Ireland ranked the fifth most likely to win behind Croatia, Switzerland, Italy and Ukraine.

But let’s not worry about that now, eh?

Hello Europe, this is Dublin calling with The Irish Times live blog for the first semi-final in the 68th Eurovision Song Contest, in which Bambie Thug will be vying on behalf of Ireland to make it through to Saturday’s Grand Final with their song Doomsday Blue.

Will Europe give us love we can’t ignore? Will we see the light leading us home (to the final)? Or will it be doomsday in Malmö?

I’ll be recapping the often fractious background to the 2024 contest, reminding everyone of the rules (the important ones), retracing our abject qualification record, assessing Bambie Thug’s chances (in summary: strong), revealing my bias for pre-qualified Italy and wondering what exactly it is they’re putting in the water in (bookies’ favourite) Croatia.

Then, as the singing, dancing, writhing, kiss-blowing and furious flag-waving gets under way at 8pm live from Malmö Arena, I’ll have a snap analysis of the 15 (out of 37) contenders who are performing in competition tonight alongside pre-qualifiers from the UK, Germany and Sweden.

This may be followed by a spot of marvelling at the “King of Eurovision”, aka interval act Johnny Logan.

For sure, it’s not compulsory, but if you’re in and you’re Euro-curious, assemble your midweek smorgasbords, take the dry cleaning tag off your finest white suit (again, optional) and prepare to be simultaneously enthralled and appalled by this first foray into the 2024 contest.

Note to viewers unburdened by Eurovision euphoria but keen to have an opinion on Bambie: Ireland is up fourth.

Ooh Aah... Just a Little Bit of reading:

• Bambie Thug interview: ‘I fully support anyone boycotting Eurovision’
• Eurovision Music Quiz: What is Bambie Thug’s full name?
• Can Ireland’s entry Bambie Thug win, who are the favourites and more