From Zero to Hero

So Finland, the country with the most zero point scoring entries in the Eurovision song contest has won, courtesy of the band Lordi and their hard-rockin' "Hard Rock hallelujah" - lets call it an homage to 1980s metal.

In a sea of sound-alike, stunning but shallow performers, they stood out with their originality, musicianship, and ok, bonkers monster costumes. The Eurovision used to be a tedious joke (except when Ireland won of course), and it's been tending towards irony as our cynical generation rises to ascendancy (check out the Latvian Lithuanian entry - "We are the winners (of Eurovision)") - so it could be said that were engineered, that an entrant that was good, and yet opposed everything the contest stands for had a good chance. I say that's us being cynical again - the band are scarily representative of Finnish musical tastes and output (HIM, Nightwish, Apocolyptica, et al), and the performance was fantastic, so fair play to them.

Unfortunately it seems like Finns aren't quite sure how to celebrate. Our brainwave - head down to a square in town with a big-screen - backfired when

a) there was nothing special on the big screen
b) the square was full of some crazy XBox promotional shite, and...
c) nobody was celebrating outside.

We wandered onwards to a club, but the atmosphere was par for a Saturday night: a slightly disappointing end to a great night. Of course this means there's the chance to actually attend the contest in person next year, assuming I'm still here...