The Real Reason people watch Eurovision
Anyone with even a passing familiarity with Eurovision has probably heard that it's a real mishmash of genres, and much of the appeal is seeing the entries that are just really extra.
This year you're not going to get more extra than Croatia. Their representative Let 3 is something like a combination of performance artists and a prog rock band, just outright legends locally. I highly, highly recommend checking out the
Overanalyzing Eurovision video on their entry, because it is really, really something. "Technically we weren't completely naked, because we had corks up our butts" is an actual defensive statement they've made in a courtroom.
This video is their performance at the Croatian national finals. Mildly NSFW.
The song is about "Mother kissing a little psychopath". Mother is pretty obviously Mother Russia, and it doesn't take a lot to guess who's the little psychopath. (All together now: "Eurovision is not political"
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The famously European country of Australia is also participating again (I'm not going to explain that one), with the prog-rock band Voyager. Those guys are a guaranteed fun time.
Another song this year that has to be mentioned is Austria's dance pop entry with a typical dance pop topic: a songwriter being possessed by the spirit of Edgar Allan Poe, yet still failing to make money because of how little music streaming pay to artists. They're a lot of fun.
Germany this year is sending the goth metal band Lord of the Lost, who have captured what you get when you combine metal with Eurovision: Blood and Glitter.
A major attraction with Eurovision for many are the ethnobangers; more or less EDM-flavored entries with varying ethnic elements. This year, two stand out in this category.
Spain's Blanca Paloma is a damned impressive singer, coming in with a modern take on a flamenco-lullaby. That might not sound like much when described, but it's really something when you actually see and hear it. She's considered a dark horse candidate to win the jury vote, but isn't expected to have the necessary mainstream appeal to do well in the televote.
And last we have Moldova. One of the smallest and poorest countries taking part in Eurovision, they have however built a reputation for always being a good time, and they're not failing us this year either. (This has English subtitles available.)
What you already missed
There always some good songs that get cut from the final in the semifinal stage.
For me, the standout in this category was Latvia. I truly loved their melancholic indie rock song about trying to protect the positivite attitude of a loved one despite feeling increasingly desperate about the state of the world.
It was always a bold entry, switching between 5/4 and 6/4 beats and being the kind of dark, introspective song that tend to do poorly in what is otherwise a pretty bombastic show. Despite that, its' a really great song that's now on several of my personal playlists and is probably one of my all-time favorite entries in the competion.