United Kingdom UNITED KINGDOM 2024 - Olly Alexander - Dizzy

[ESC United Mod Team]

 

[Rocket man]

Too many straight people still like the “unthreatening gay” person that you could say is camp and almost asexual. Any gay person that claims their sexuality on stage is still “too much” for some people. We’ll get there eventually where gay people don’t have to put in a more palatable box and can have true equality on stage.

 

[eerik]

Was it supposed to be "gay"? They looked more like a bunch of heroin addicts to me.

 

[MooseShoes]

I knew it was a mistake to let Jonkonfui do the staging.

 

[Chalphon]

Well didn't see that coming. Good song, cool staging but the vocals were weak. But zero points? That threw me off a bit.

 

[Chalphon]

I've had a weird journey with this song, my feelings for it and my expectations. I've done a full circle. About 18th is exactly where I envisioned Dizzy coming when the song was first revealed, and I pretty much thought all the points would come from the jury. That happened but also the public 0 feels harsh. I felt it coming. Said it to some friends "here comes a 0" and then boom. Composition wise it's in the upper half I'd say of decent songs this year. The staging though was something else. It's so bold, creative and quite possibly my favourite concept of the year (well, certainly up there with Bambie and Nemo in terms of really creating a visual moment that sticks).

I feel like this result is a combination of weak vocals and an entry that was always a better instrumental than it was a song to sing. I feel bad for Olly as he's had a rough Eurovision experience and this isn't a very nice end to it.

I think you summed it up quite well, in hindsight I also feel like the melody might have been a wee bit too repetative.

 

[ESCConor]

Olly didnt deserve zero from the televote, I thought it was harsh to be honest, but 46 points from the juries and 18th overall isnt terrible, but it will feel overshadowed by the zero televote score.

Ive seen some people saying we should withdraw next year which I think its a big overreaction, the BBC will never do that, whats interesting is that there is a lot less blaming politics, a lot are saying the song/staging just wasnt good enough.

We need to go back to basics like France did this year, get back to doing what we were doing best under Sam Ryder, get someone who is vocally very strong, give the artist full creative control over the staging and promote the song like we did under Sam, go on tv and radio in Europe and dont just do the pre-parties.

We need to get the fundamentals right next year with the staging, promotion, the song itself and the staging, it has to be a complete package like it was under Sam Ryder.

 

[Chalphon]

This happens every year. Thereakity is the song just wasn't good enough. this result always going to be the outcome the moment the song was released.

Something that we forget is with Jade Ewen, Blue and Sam the moment their sings were released they immediately were hi in the odds. Every other song has failed in the odds and then went on to fail in Eurovision even the ones with amazing staging. At the end of the day it's about the song.

The odds tell us the type of result we are going to get every year and many of us choose to ignore it.

You also need strong vocals to back up the song. For instance, UK 2023 was a great song with a lot of streams of the studio version but vocally it completely fell through live.

 

[Uto]

I'm not sure if the "Gayness" Of the staging is what sunk that element of it, I feel that it taking place in a dingy and grimy shower room set in a confined box that limited his connection to the audience at home and in the arena did more to it. Had that generally empowered sexuality happened on a wider stage with better and more dance-like choreography it would have been stronger. It feels like Olly and the team bet the farm on good staging to make up for Olly's limitations as a singer and it didn't pay off.

In isolation the staging is fine. But at a contest like this, it didn't work.

This is a point often missed, but I think it very important and it was the first thing I raised to friends after getting over the gayness of it all (I am not gay, I really had to adjust, I'm sorry). I mean we've seen before how there were songs that either denied the audience existed, or the stage, or whatever, but never did we see an entry that denied the location itself so thoroughly. I mean it really felt like watching a video clip instead of a live performance at the venue and indeed the connection was lost because of it and it suddenly felt very gimmicky to me. Maybe if they had chosen to start with a zoom into the box this would have been better.

Still though, end of the day, 0 points because the song was too weak mainly. Juries will have liked the artistic bent, but as a catchy pop song it's just not there and you need to be top 3 with people to stand a chance at getting votes.

 

[Shadowfuxcs]

The UK could have been top 10 (with jury support), with the same staging, same song, same mediocre vocals, as long as they skipped the cringe sexualised facial expressions. I don't mind that they did it, but they were trying too hard.

 

[SpiritofKeiino]

I liked the staging, the song was ok. I wasn't expecting it to get many televotes, but 0 was a surprise to me. And looking at the country breakdowns, he wasn't even close to getting points (best was 14th)

 

[Nicfedy]

Though I didn’t mind the staging and the weak vocals too much, I found the camera jumping every second in an attempt to make the viewer feel dizzy was not really a great idea, especially after a few drinks.

 

[njdevils94]

Oof no even borderline tele-vote scores from any countries.

Ireland #14
Ukraine #14
Lithuania #16
Spain #16
Australia #17
Finland #17
Malta #17
Portugal #17
Estonia #18
Iceland #18
Azerbaijan #19
Czechia #19
Poland #19
Cyprus #20
Latvia #20
Sweden #20
Denmark #21
Luxembourg #21
Norway #21
San Marino #21
Georgia #22
Slovenia #22
Switzerland #22
Armenia #23
Austria #23
Belgium #23
France #23
Germany #23
Greece #23
Italy #23
Moldova #23
Netherlands #23
Croatia #24
Israel #24
Serbia #24
Albania #25

 

[Fluke]

First off, 18th place is actually better than all but 3 results since 2012.

I'm really surprised they didn't even do any higher than 14th in any televoting. I think the problem was that they aimed everything at the gays, hoping they'll vote for it in droves, while alienating everyone who didn't see LGBT representation as their only issue. And of course, all those votes went to Switzerland and Ireland instead.

Wonder how well it would have done with a inoffensive staging more like the video, the jury points may have been about the same. It was never likely to do well, so they actually did right by throwing a controversial staging at it out of nowhere, but the result goes to show that you simply can't save a mediocre song either way.

 

[Leydan]

Olly didnt deserve zero from the televote, I thought it was harsh to be honest, but 46 points from the juries and 18th overall isnt terrible, but it will feel overshadowed by the zero televote score.

Ive seen some people saying we should withdraw next year which I think its a big overreaction, the BBC will never do that, whats interesting is that there is a lot less blaming politics, a lot are saying the song/staging just wasnt good enough.

We need to go back to basics like France did this year, get back to doing what we were doing best under Sam Ryder, get someone who is vocally very strong, give the artist full creative control over the staging and promote the song like we did under Sam, go on tv and radio in Europe and dont just do the pre-parties.

We need to get the fundamentals right next year with the staging, promotion, the song itself and the staging, it has to be a complete package like it was under Sam Ryder.

I think if we take part in JESC again this year will be a telling sign of whether the BBC are still in full or whether they're past caring again.

I thought our staging was great, although i'll concede it did lack a personal touch with the audience I guess overall I thought it was innovative and a huge upgrade compared to BBC effort in years gone by - it was easily one of my favourites as i've stated here before. I think ultimately we need someone who actually has solid vocals. It was the one thing we fell short on, I don't think Olly was awful as some like to pretend, but he was a lot weaker compared to others and just like Mae we had a season of concerns about whether he'd deliver. I am actually intrigued to know what the other songs are up in the running, as it was the BBC who picked the song.

 

[Chrisiam]

To be fair the UK has been doing far better in JESC than in the main contest since we came back to that. In my opinion participation in that won't be the telling sign of how much effort is put into 2025, the quality of act put forward into JESC this year will be. If we get an act around the same quality (with a respectable result) as the past couple of years in JESC then the BBC still cares and is still trying to crack the code. If we get, well, to be polite, something more on par with the X Factor style contestants the main contest has had from the UK in the 2010's then it is a sign that the spirit isn't there and we may get something in that realm in 2025 for the main contest.

 

[ESCConor]

I think if we take part in JESC again this year will be a telling sign of whether the BBC are still in full or whether they're past caring again.

I thought our staging was great, although i'll concede it did lack a personal touch with the audience I guess overall I thought it was innovative and a huge upgrade compared to BBC effort in years gone by - it was easily one of my favourites as i've stated here before. I think ultimately we need someone who actually has solid vocals. It was the one thing we fell short on, I don't think Olly was awful as some like to pretend, but he was a lot weaker compared to others and just like Mae we had a season of concerns about whether he'd deliver. I am actually intrigued to know what the other songs are up in the running, as it was the BBC who picked the song.

I think we will be back for JESC imo this year, we tend to do far better in that compared to the adult contest, I think its a great way to potentially promote young talent, just look at Freya Syke and how well shes doing now.

If anything, I think it will only make us more determined.

 

[marty]

I think the staging was ok. I found Ollys vocals very weak that night. I thought maybe he was sick because you could hardly hear him.

 

[soulm8]

I said it already. He is just an awful live singer. I was attending this Halloween party in London and he was supposed to sing, many years back when it was Years and years, I was completely shocked with his live performance, it was an utter disaster, couldn’t hear what he was singing. Once I heard he gonna sing for UK, I was hoping the back vocals will save him, well not the case…..

 

[SpiritofKeiino]

Mae's vocals weren't good either. An absolute non-negotiable requirement for next year should be vocal ability.

 

[Chrisiam]

To be fair Mae was on a vocal rest. Shame that rest ended three weeks after the contest ended...