As the chorus line goes, “I don’t feel hate, I just feel sorry”, and it sums up my feelings towards the wooden spoon position of my countdown – “Germany, I’m sorry”. There has to be one country that finishes as my last place, and that falls to Germany this year. I certainly don’t feel hate towards the song, and certainly not the artist, but I do feel sorry I have to put something last – given all the efforts all delegations and artists put in. Ultimately though, it’s the song I skip most quickly when listening through on Spotify so I think have to place this as my #39.
Jendrik Sigwart is the artist representing Germany; he’s a very perky, openly LGBT+ singer and musical performer who plays the ukulele and seemingly had a single minded determination to represent Germany at Eurovision with one of his songs. He went so far as roping in friends, family etc. in creating his music video and the song itself is inspired by his own experiences of dealing with hate and negative reactions to him – as he has described himself “a bit different”. He’s also very much of the modern social media generation, posting stories on Instagram and TikTok that have shown his journey to become the representative, all in his unique/quirky style.
The song itself is reminiscent of a mix of “Cake to Bake” (Latvia 2014) and the egregious “Wadde hadde dudde da” (Germany 2000) along with the chaos of “Guido hat euch lieb!” (Germany 1998). I’m sure a lot of people enjoy the chirpy positivity of this, but it’s just not for me. I’ve never been a fan of George Formby and his ukulele (or banjolele) so perhaps it’s no surprise this just doesn’t click with me. A shame in my view given Germany got into my top 10 in 2020 with “Violent Thing“.
Jendrik has a strong musical background, having learned how to play the ukulele and the piano when young, then going on to study at a musical institute, and on to musical theatre primarily after graduation. He certainly seems to put that in practice in his live performances from what I’ve seen and I think that, plus fact some will get behind this because it’s different, quirky, and catchy will see it get a good chunk of televote. In short, I don’t think Germany will be finishing last this year.
Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest
First entered: 1956
Appearances (excluding this year): 63
Best result: Winner 1982, 2010
Last year’s result: 25th
#Harsh. There is definitely worst songs than this “happy mess” by Germany’s answer to Tin Tin. What’s not to love about a song with random instrumentals, a dancing middle finger, a speech and a tap dancing break. Although a bit all over the place this song does make me smile every time I hear it and does stand out from a lot of the other songs (although maybe for all the wrong reasons).
I have a feeling that some of your “worst songs” may end up too high for your liking on my own list! But that’s the joy of Eurovision – we all like different things 😉