[LMBTO] Jedward (My Fav Eurovision Artists)

Now you must be starting to think that I only like 'Marmite' artists and songs...first was LT United and "We Are The Winners", then Krista Siegfrids - now Jedward?  John and Edward - really?


I know that their contribution to musical quality can be best summed up by this 1980s Kit Kat advert (I am sure a lot of you my age remember this with fondness):

The record svengali's last comment is the pertinent one but for me that is their endearing quality - a sort of haphazard chaotic fun and innocent joy that comes with all of their early performances.  Their singing isn't the best and needs some help, dance routines are never synchronised and there is always the feeling that one of the twins has 'read the script' but the other hasn't!  The enthusiasm is all there for everyone to see though and it has always made for terrific television - it makes me smile whenever I see this staging in particular:



Of their two Eurovision entries, "Lipstick" has always been my favourite - I love the way it all appears so unpolished but with great ideas that almost come off (one twin being the other's shadow at the start of the song, the wobbly shoulder pads, the high fives that just about connect).  Having Leanne Moore in an incredibly sexy hoodie minidress didn't hurt either:
Excuse me, my heterosexual mind is drifting!  Twelve months on and a year's more experience means better vocals, better props and better stagecraft but I found this too polished, too clinical and far less entertaining.  As we all know, "Waterline" ended up eleven places and 73 points worse off than Jedward's 2011 offering:



Isn't that ironic, don't you think?  And not in a Alanis Morissette kind of way!

They were always seen as the anti-music duo and Eurovision purists breathed a sigh of relief when neither song troubled the trophy makers.  Having said all that, Jedward have been Ireland's most successful ESC participants since 2006 and have given 'The Emerald Isle' their best result since 2000 (8th with "Lipstick").  The reason for this?  A lot of it can be explained once you have read this excellent article by ESC Insight's Ben Robertson from earlier this year (A Lesson for Eurovision...).  Having time for all their fans, even if it is a whistle-stop visit to an airport departure lounge, makes them very likeable as people and that is partly why I like them - you get what you see with Jedward, two guys having fun, knowing that they aren't the best singers but realising that they have a lot of people who like what they do on stage:
So what if they sometimes look like they have come off the set of 'Starlight Express'?  They brought glitz, fun and panache to the Eurovision stage and gained a huge number of European fans to go with their homebase admirers in Ireland and the UK.  It is extremely unlikely that if they tried the ESC for a third time that their results would be any better than 2011 and 2012 but...