Last night, we got the opportunity to watch the Evening Preview (previously the Jury Show) of Semi Final 1 lof the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest. In the following article, Andy Richards takes you through the whole event, including his thoughts of each perfromance and what you can expect in the show tonight. All opinions are his own. The ramblings are ‘as live’, so please excuse the randomless and slightly messy structure. This post is jammed full of spoilers – so if you don’t want anything ruining, you’ve been warned!

After the initial Te ‘Deum’, we properly start off with Eleni Fouriera and a performance of ‘Fuego’. It’s a great song to kick things off, full of plenty of energy – and as you’d expect – lots of fire!! There’s plenty of fire and pyro throughout the show, so get your shot glasses prepared!

Up next is Eric Saade with ‘Popular’. It’s a slighty different mix of the original song, with an almost dubstep sound to it in parts. His backing dancers look very much like what Kaleen will be wearing in her performance in SF2.

Third to the party is Chanel with ‘SloMo’. Plenty of energy once again, with a long dance break. By the end, all three acts join together on stage, and we’re now due to start the show with our two hosts: Hollywood actress Malin Åkerman and returning presenter Petra Mede!

Nice matching outfits with the orange and purple background! The jokes are actually pretty funny, and the new addition of the Big 5 countries (plus Sweden) performing live amongst the Semi-Final acts is explained.

This year, the postcards all show clips of two other successful acts from that country’s previous entries, then the 2024 artist appears selfie-style, with other on-screen clips of them doing various activities.

Song 01: Cyprus Liar – Silia Kapsis

A slick performance from Silia, dressed in a white top and trousers, and accompanied by four male dancers. Her vocals are impressive and the choreography is slick. There’s a micture of blues and whites in the lighting, looking very impressive in the dance break. Great start! For such a young artist, her stage presence in superb. Slick choreography from all involved!

Song 02: Serbia RAMONDA – TEYA DORA

Some nice graphics making it blook like the camera is flying though the clouds at the start. Teya Dora is sat on a rock, all in dark clothing. It’s quite similar to what you would see Loreen wearing! Plenty of low fog on the cross shaped stage. Very well performed. It was admittedly not one of my favourite songs going into the contest, but I think this will do much better than many may expect! It is still a borderline qualifier for me, though.

Song 03: Lithuania Luktelk – Silvester Belt

Another act using blue colours in their staging to start with, but soon we switch to red! Silvester is in a leather looking outfit and his four dancers are in white and black outfits with hoods. Lots of strobe lighting, so please be careful if you have epilepsy! That was an excellent perfomance, and it’s on par with the studio version. What a great Semi Final so far! The thumping beat will sound awesome in the arena!

Song 04: Ireland Doomsday Blue – Bambie Thug

Another viewer discretion warning here. If you have small children watcihng, they could be having nightmares for weeks after this one! Bambi is dressed in an almost Disney’s Malevelent outfit with horns, feathers, and metalic looking teeth. They ares accompnied by a male dancer in a circle of candles. Look out for the outfit change! It’s tough to assess the vocals as there’s plenty of shouting in the majority of Bambi’s song in general, but the more melodic lines are perfect. Respect to Ireland for going wild with their choice this year.

We’re back to the hosts now, while some of Europe take an ad-break. Some audience participation with Petra – not entirely sure she’s a geniune member of the fandom though!

Automatic Qualifier: United Kingdom Dizzy – Olly Alexander

In his postcard, Olly appears to be wearing a suit made out of my wallpaper! Very jazzy. He starts his performance upside down in a box with four shiftless dancers in boxing shorts and knee pads, with himself sporting a ripped white vest. The set reminds me of the first Saw movie! The camera rotates around making the performers slide around the room. Most the vocals are fine, but after the rap section, Olly sounds a little out of breath – which is hardly surprising. It’s nice to finally hear a full live version as the UK team appear to have been a little shy getting footage from the pre-parties to the fans in previous weeks.

Song 05: Ukraine Teresa & Maria – alyona alyona & Jerry Heil

Jerry Heil starts off dressed in a light dress with a veil covering and a piece of armour plating on her shoulder. There’s vibrant orange lighting and blue LED stage. She looks beautiful, and it’s a totally different look to the National Final performance, where everybody looked dressed to go to a funeral. She gradually climbs up a rock and the wind machine is set to 11. Soon, we cut to the rap with alyona alyona, and the pair join together. Again, this has rocketed up in my estimation. The vocal style of Jerry is very Florence and the Machine / London Grammar, and I’m sure will easily make top 5 in the grand final. Beautiful vocals.

Song 06: Poland The Tower – LUNA

Luna is dressed in a very Lady Gaga looking red cloak at the start of the performance, but it’s not long before it’s whipped off by one of the three human chess pieces, and she’s then in a white shorts and pointy shouldered top. The staging is perfect for the cross shaped stage, turning it into a massive chess board, complete with two massive pieced that get pushed around by three dancers in red, black and red. Cleverly done, Poland. The song is performed fantasticly, even with some of Luna’s English dictation not being quite perfect.

Song 07: Croatia Rim Tim Tagi Dim – Baby Lasagna

You can tell it’s one of the crowd favourites by the real sounds of the crowd over-powering the prerecorded audience sound effects which are added by the production team. Baby Lasagne’s stage presence is top-notch. He totally owns it, and reminds my of the lead singer of Green Day or Keith from The Prodigy. Plenty of greens, reds and purples in the lighting package, and plenty of pyro if you want to play a drinking game too. This is going to do very, very well. Top 3 for sure. Again, the singing isn’t 100% on-key, but it really does not matter as everyhing else makes up for it.

Song 08: Iceland Scared of Heights – Hera Björk

There was quite a long pause with camera shots of the audience after Iceland’s postcard, so it’s likely the scenery change took longer than expected. I’m sure this will be resolved by tonight, though! Hera is dressed in a gold sparkly outfit, and you can tell thaht she’s done this all before. Great stage presence once again. I was about to comment that she looked a bit lonely on stage – but she’s shortly joined by 5 backing vocalists. It’s a solid performance, and one for the Eurovision fans of old!

Another ad break for some of Europe now, and I’m sure they will welcome it. as this is certainly one of the weaker parts of the show. There’s a montage of old movies, with dubbed over Eurovision songs – but it really doesn’t work for me. It’s just not entertaning or funny in the slightest. A perfect time to visit the toliet if you’ve been having a few Kopperbergs! There’s a couple of great jokes about the fantastic stage this year!

Automatic Qualifier: Germany Always on the Run – Isaak

I’m not sure Isaak is aware about the high gas prices or Global Warming issues, but he’s probably pretty warm on stage. Fuego-central. If only we had a firefighter somewhere! He’s surrounded by metal structures and a barrel, all on fire. There’s oddly a leather chair there too. Flame jets spew bursts of the hot stuff around the perimeter of the stage. It’s a good, solid performance – so surely Germany won’t come last again? Surely? Fingers crossed, Isaak – sounded good to me!

Song 09: Slovenia Veronika – Raiven

Raiven’s staging is once again foggy and lit in blue and white lighting with clouds on the LED wall. She’s in a skintight all-in-one outfit and accompanied by four dancers that almost look naked – they obviously must have been taking fashion tips for Windows95man! I don’t think there’s anything particularily wrong with the performance, but this type of ‘screaming in tune’ style of singing isn’t really my bag at all. I know it has it’s fans, but I’m not sure how much of a wide appeal in will have in Europe and the Rest of the World

Song 10: Finland No Rules – Windows95man

Speaking of Windows95man – he’s here now, complete with cap and T-shirt with a pixellated logo to keep Microsoft’s lawyers happy. This performance is a lot more slick to the National Final performance, as the camera shots, smoke machine, Steadicam operators and clipboards much better cover his modesty. There’s still a little work to do as the ‘audience member’ revealed W95m’s skin coloured underpants, ruining the illusion. There’s more caution when swinging the handheld pyros around, compared to the NF performance – potentially saving the audience members having a trip to Malmö hospital! Again, not incrdedible vocals from either of the two guys – but it’s not required in this type of song. Love the ‘get over here!’ Mortal Kombat refererence after the song has finished.

Song 11: Moldova In the Middle – Natalia Barbu

Not sure if it was due to budget or an artistic reason, but Natalia is on her own on the Eurovision stage, unlike in her NF performance where she was accompanied by a number of other violinists. The obligatory ‘wings’ and ‘tree’ Eurovision tropes appear on-screen towards the end of the performance too. Nice vocals, and I do enjoy the clap section! Reminds me a little of a certain handwashing lady from a few years ago!

Automatic Qualifier: Sweden Unforgettable – Marcus & Martinus

Representing the host country are Marcus and Martinus, and again Sweden just 100% nail the staging. The boys are dressed in blue and black outfits and trapped in a Matrix/Tron style grid of lighting. It’s a great pop song, and they’ve been doing a good job at promoting it globally, even apparing on the UK’s long running children’s show, Blue Peter. If you’re watching on YouTube tonight, expect it to explode when the strobe lighting and random text appears on screen! The bitrate will struggle in a similar way it does when a confetti cannon cannon goes off. It’s both a perfect radio and Eurovision song, and it will do well with the family audience around the world. Surely, though if Sweden/Ukraine won again so soon – it could possibly result in countries losing interest/withdrawing.

Song 12: Azerbaijan Özünlə Apar – Fahree featuring Ilkin Dovlatov

For me, this is one of the weaker songs in the Semi – it just all seems a little bit drab. The two guys are dressed in matching silver and black outfits, with two enormous open statue-like hands centre stage. It just feels like nothing is really original or unique about this song or performance. Could this be a non-qualifying year for Azerbaijan? Notably, after the song finished in this rehearsal, the crowd didn’t seem massively impressed either, amusingly having a solitary fan leaping into the air in excitement on the close-up!

Song 13: Australia One Milkali’ (One Blood) – Electric Fields

The Aussies are back, and one of their most famous instruments is finally featured on the Eurovision stage!! Both members of Electric Fields perform this very well, and it’s a huge grower for me. There’s elements of the music video represented on the wall behind them, and there’s plenty of bright orange and red lighting. Love ‘Epic Didgereedoo Guy’, but if I’m honest it feels a little but shoehorned into the song – a little bit like the sax solo in Father Ted’s ‘My Lovely Horse’. Overall, a very good song and performance. I’m pleasntly surprised that my initial thoughts when the song was first released have been improved.

Song 14: Portugal Grito – iolanda

A very brave opening to the song with zero backing music for 10-15 seconds or so. It’s just iolanda and the microphone – so nothing al all to hide behind. She and the faceless dancers are all dressed in vibrant white outfits, with an enormous white cube hanging over their heads. Rather them than me! I hope the steel cable and truss connections have been double checked! Again, brilliant vocals. I never really saw this as a contender going into the contest, but live it is very impressive. Simple but effective. Could they do a Salvador this year?

Song 15: Luxembourg Fighter – TALI

This is the last of tonight’s performances, and it’s a great one! There’s something about this that works very well. It’s sleek and sexy, without being almost obscene like some of the staging this year. Tali looks great and the stage is full of low fog, and purple and blue lighting. I geniunely think this is one to watch out for, and worth putting a Euro or two bet on! The French language works well juxtaposed with the Eastern-sounding backing music. Very good vocals, pretty faultless.

So – that’s the songs done, sand we’re back to the hosts to open up the voting lines!

Recap time, and gags from Petra. Did you know that Sweden have LOST the contest 55 times?

Interval act time. It’s some guy called Johnny Logan with an orchestral version of ‘Euphoria’. Another weak part of the show if I’m being perfectly honest. It’s not performed particularily well or in time by Johnny, although I do like the music production. An instrumental would have been much more prefered – or another singer. I know Johnny is Eurovision royalty, but does he really need to pop up at some point nearly every year during the Eurovision season?

We’re now joined with Petra in the Green Room who chats with Tali, then there’s some video highlights of Sunday’s Turquoise Carpet event, highlighting some of the crazy outfits!

More recaps now…and then a final 15 seconds countdown – obviously the graphics, hosts and audience members aren’t in time with each other. Standard!

Another quick gag about the Australian commentators, then there’s a short slide short show highlighting all of the Semi Final 2 acts still to perform on Thursday. This is quite a good way of hearing who is popular with the crowd, and thankfully there was no booing when Eden was shown – keeping within the inclusivity of the contest – although the audience reaction was notibly less enthusuastic than the other acts. I do hope the audience members will be as well behaved in the rest of the upcoming shows.

After that, we have another gag from Petra, featuring an audience member and their phone. I personally didn’t get the reference, but I assume it was a joke about the Grindr dating app.

There’s now a quick look into the Eurovision archive with a clip from Nicole & Hugo, and a short dedication to the late Nicole who is no longer with us – then a montage of dance routines throughout the years of ESC!

‘Mother’ Petra is back in the Green Room with some food related jokes, which again are very funny for a script that’s written for Eurovision. There’s a focus on Hera, Luna and Bambie, and Petra is helped down the stairs by Olly Alexander’s dancers.

Malin introduces Benjamin Ingrosso onto the stage for the next interval act performance. He performs ‘Who’s Laughing Now’, ‘Kite’, and ‘Honey Boy’ and looks pretty fancy in a white ‘Saturday Night Fever’ style suit! He appears to have forgotten his shirt, however. He’s accompanied by a band, and there’s a nice brass section! Plenty of energy, and quite Harry Styles-like, and all three songs are miles apart from his ‘Dance You Off’ Eurovision song. All crowd pleasers, though – so he’s a great addition to the line up!

Malin and Petra discuss this year’s returning ‘United By Music’ theme, and once again delve into the vault to showcase some of the previous styles of music that have been featured. As soon as we return back to the hosts after the VT ends, we see them in position at the podium, and the enormous door to the Green Room slides up to reveal at 15 artists, there’s a brief chat with Martin Østerdahl, then we’re ‘good to go!’

The voting sequence is now rehearsed, with 10 dummy acts being revealed as qualifiers. These will obviously be geniune qualifiers tonight, but were just chosen at random in this show for the benefit of the technical team and broadcasters, to test running times for the show etc. If it’s of interest to you – the fake qualifiers were Serbia, Portugal, Slovenia, Cyprus, Azerbaijan, Australia, Ireland, Lithuania, Moldova and Croatia. How many of these do you think will be the same this evening? Let us know in the comments below!

After a short recap of the 10 qualifiers, the two hosts say their goodbyes and the credits roll.

We wish all our readers a enjoyable and safe Eurovision week. You can watch the live Semi-Final 1 show tonight from 21:00-21:30CET. If you’re not in a completing country, the Rest of the World stream via the official Eurovision Song Contest YouTube channel. A link will be provided here, once the stream is scheduled by the EBU.