He emerged from a giant egg wearing a Windows 95 crop top.

0:00 Pamala Have any of the past ones made like mainstream American music?

0:03 Jordana ABBA.

0:04 Pamala Oh my God. Really?

0:06 Eva This is, you know, two months. Pamala. There's a music competition where you can vote as many times as you want from any country on earth, but you just can't vote for your.

0:17 Pamala Own sound source. Oh, it gets worse. Of course it does.

0:24 Eva Joining us today is Jordana Freydberg someone who knows way too much about Eurovision. Hey, Jordana.

0:31 Jordana Hi. My favorite subject.

0:34 Pamala Yeah.

0:35 Eva I was so excited. Where do we even start?

0:39 Pamala Yes, please. What makes Eurovision different? Like, I don't think as Americans were really exposed to. It's like, what is it? What makes it really different? What's exciting about it?

0:50 Jordana I think it's the cross-cultural aspect that makes it. I mean, for me that I think is so exciting, like it's so diverse. There's so many different voices and types of music and languages. I mean, some of these songs are in like 3 or 4 different languages. So I think it's like feeling that you're tapping into the world at large in a cultural way.

1:12 Jordana That's what's exciting. You're watching singers from Moldova, from Malta, San Marino. I mean, it it's it's like Bulgaria. You know, it's just a totally different way of engaging with music. And I don't, you know, my kids are is kind of funny. It's like geography. Lesson two. My son started asking me all these questions about these countries. And so in a weird way, it's yeah, it's like educational too.

1:39 Jordana That's amazing. It's it's like. And no, it's funny because like, no one else at our like my kids school, for example, what are you doing on Saturday? And I'm like, oh, we're watching Eurovision like Saturday, right? Like we're going to be of.

1:49 Pamala Course, from.

1:50 Jordana 4 to 8. We are in front of that television watching Eurovision or whatever at the time. You know, the amazing.

1:56 Eva Are they in costume for the rehearsals?

1:58 Jordana Yeah. It's like a full on dress rehearsal. So it gives away a lot of the surprise. Sure.

2:03 Pamala But why are the costumes a big thing?

2:06 Jordana Oh, yeah. I think they're ridiculous, right?

2:08 Pamala Oh, really?

2:09 Jordana It depends. Again, it's like. No, it really it's. That's what I mean about how diverse it is. There's no criteria that's like, oh, that's a Eurovision song, right? You definitely have different layers of what each country deems is the best representation for that year. So it can be like a really cool, like pop song that you would listen to if it came up on, you know, a mix on Spotify, regardless of whether or not it's Eurovision, to something so ridiculous that it could only be a Eurovision song.

2:46 Jordana Oh my god.

2:47 Pamala Interesting, interesting.

2:49 Eva Again, the audio accompaniment to this is going to be fantastic.

2:54 Jordana So listen and.

2:55 Pamala Okay, have so any of the past have any of the past ones made like mainstream American music?

3:01 Jordana ABBA.

3:02 Pamala Oh my God. Really?

3:04 Jordana The Eurovision.

3:06 Eva Origins.

3:07 Pamala Wow. So okay, so now let's get in. Like, tell me about the scoring because. Yeah. How does scoring work for this type of thing?

3:17 Jordana Bonkers. It's bonkers. And what I like about it is that it creates this very tense moment of surprise at the very end of the reveal. Right. So basically, okay, I want to break it down for you.

3:31 Pamala Yeah. I'm like, can there be surprise in scoring?

3:35 Jordana There's a big there's big surprises. So the vote is divided into two categories the public vote and the, you know, what's considered the private sort of like industry experts vote. Right. So each country has an expert panel that they put together, and they have to be like work, like working people in the music and in the biz.

3:56 Jordana Influential music people in each country. So you go into the finals and you kind of there's already public votes coming in. So people are, you know, and then and then the, the private scores start ranking who's leading right. But that kind of means nothing because until they bring in the public vote, like all bets are off essentially. Right, right.

4:21 Pamala You just don't know.

4:21 Jordana Yeah. So basically the public vote is where people, I think have the most that's where the most drama comes in. Yeah. Because it.

4:32 Eva Says voting by like Sabbath's text message.

4:35 Jordana Or has a message. I did mine on online. Maybe because I'm not a citizen of any of these countries. So you can vote. You cannot. So we anyone can vote. You cannot vote for your own country. That's the only rule. So like, why is an American could log on to the website and put in how many times I wanted to vote?

4:59 Jordana No, you could vote. I forget if it's unlimited times. Or maybe you know you can vote like crazy, but it costs money.

5:08 Eva Oh. Interesting.

5:09 Jordana There was a lot of talk going into the finals that Israel was going to regret with money box influence, like blood tax, blah, blah, blah. So yeah, in fact, there was there was a great moment, a lot of scandal there. And, there was a great when, when they, when Israel came. So what they do is they telecast right to each country and a representative of that country comes on a live telecast and says, you know, I'm blah, blah, blah.

5:38 Jordana I'm here in Israel and we here we are awarded our votes to, you know, and then they they announce it.

5:44 Pamala And he goes, right.

5:46 Jordana Exactly. And he made that Israel representative made a joke about, well, I apparently I already know who's going to win. So he was like, he actually made a joke to all that. Yeah. To that, that come over. I haven't done too deep of a dive into like the red of it, you know what I mean? Like that's where I sort of checked out where I was like, I'm just going to leave this here.

6:09 Jordana Yeah. But, yeah. So there's like a political thing to it. There's a wealth and influence thing to it. There's like it's it's wild.

6:17 Pamala It's wild. So could I like essentially open a fund and be like, I'll reimburse anybody if they vote for, you know, Germany or Moldova. Yeah. Yeah.

6:28 Jordana You could rally all your friends. Like I think, you know, it's interesting because you can you can. Yeah. You can get groups to influence the vote for sure.

6:39 Pamala Wow. What what percentage of the vote is the public vote? Is it. It's 60% 5050 5050 okay.

6:47 Jordana 5,050% private, 50% public. They put the the rankings up on the screen and they're like, you know, they it's like and the public vote for Moldova comes to. And then it's like 250 points and it goes and it's like the oh my God. You know the tension is so there. And of course, once it gets to the last few countries that are up here, because they do it, they do it up the, you know, up the chain to make it really intense.

7:18 Jordana Yeah, yeah. This year it was down to Bulgaria and Israel, and I was on a WhatsApp with my Australian family and we were genuinely like scared for the outcome because of the protest, because of the, you know, people were going to it was going to have a very intense reaction.

7:35 Pamala Yeah.

7:37 Jordana You know, so down to the wire, down to that last second where they announced because the public vote for Israel was big, like it was a big, big boost. And then, you know, and then of course you're like waiting till the last second and they drag it out and they're showing the video. It's like classic like like reality TV drama.

7:56 Jordana They're showing, you know, the Israel, the guy from Israel with his, you know, he's got his little Israel flags and his buddies around him. And then they cut to Bulgaria and she's like, you know, oh, I got a gun. She's got her people and the little flags and everyone's like, oh my God, my God. Then finally they announce it.

8:14 Pamala That's crazy.

8:16 Jordana And there's actually another, there's another layer, which is that there are there's a, there's something called the Big five and they are grandfathered into the finals.

8:25 Pamala What, like every year. Yeah. What?

8:29 Jordana Yeah.

8:29 Pamala Just buy your way into that. Well, they just grandfathered.

8:33 Jordana It's interesting you should ask. So one thing we have not touched on is like how who runs Eurovision? It's the European.

8:40 Pamala IOC. Shit. Yeah, it's.

8:42 Jordana The European Broadcasting Union.

8:45 Pamala Here we go.

8:46 Jordana I know the people who spend the most money across the Europe that, you know, whoever makes the largest contributions to the European Broadcasting Union are grandfathered into the finals.

8:57 Pamala For just that year, though.

8:59 Jordana I believe it's been consistent for a long time in perpetuity. It's like, based on the GDP, I'm sure. Like, it's like, you know what I mean? Like it's. Yeah. And the host country from, you know, will also be grandfathered in. So that's six right there in terms of the actual number I blanking on what that is.

9:22 Pamala There's so many like asterisks to this.

9:27 Jordana It's this what I bet it's like once you dig in there like you go forever a living, breathing like frickin global thing. Like it's so complicated. It really is.

9:40 Pamala Yes. You can buy your way in. You can be, you know, there from the last year. You can you.

9:48 Jordana You don't have to, do you guys. You don't have to be European. That's the crazy thing. Like Australia, UK like lot like, England, Ireland. They're still they. Well they Ireland wasn't in it this year because of Israel. So that's one of the countries that but England was and they, you know, they're not European but as long as you your country is an affiliate of the European Broadcasting Union, then you can submit to Eurovision.

10:21 Pamala Wow. Crazy.

10:24 Jordana I personally think.

10:27 Jordana There should be more control over voting publicly. I don't love that it becomes something about not the craft, right? Because it becomes about who can organize, who has the money, the influence, the power. And that's not really fair.

10:51 Eva No.

10:52 Jordana Because how do you put like, Lithuania. Yeah. Or or Malta or Moldova or like these countries that are.

11:00 Eva Poland and there's.

11:01 Jordana So many like obviously like Ukraine, you know, it's just like with everything going on in the world, like I just wish there that it was a little more regulated in terms of how you can impact.

11:13 Eva That, that public 50%. Yeah, that's not insignificant. Or maybe they could change the weighting of it so that the in person judges have more of an impact so that it's, it's less of a risk. But yeah, that does seem unfair.

11:28 Pamala I mean, I will say I appreciate that they can't you can't vote for your own country because it's one of those things like based on the size of your country, you could be like, boom, if we all just called in once, we're good, you know? So especially that smaller countries wouldn't make it. Yeah. I mean, I wish I guess we could also say I wish the troubles and the crises of the world weren't so large and big to where.

11:48 Pamala That's why we're making campaigns to vote for certain things.

11:53 Eva In the first place.

11:54 Pamala Yeah, well, to just enjoy it and look at the craft of it.

11:57 Jordana This is the thing. And I, you know, Eurovision was always supposed to be about the connectivity of song. You know, the way that music and song and art connect everyone and it's kind of a it's like, I get it, I get it. I'm not saying we shouldn't give a shit about any of this stuff, but I think I just wish it was just about the singing and the spectacle and the fun of it all and that we could, as cheesy as it sounds like, all come together for the love of song.

12:28 Eva And enjoy the costumes, right? I hear.

12:30 Jordana You. Oh the Cossack. Oh my gosh, the costumes. Yes.

12:34 Pamala Did you have a favorite this year? Like what do you favorite last year? Do you have a favorite this year?

12:39 Jordana Yeah, I have a lot to say about the favorites because I think as I said, diversity is the thing here. Right. So I think you can pick your favorite. I like to pick a favorite of each type of thing. Right.

12:51 Pamala So yeah.

12:52 Jordana I think every year there's a song that's like truly ridiculous and hilarious, right? So this year I wasn't crazy about the goofy songs. I think actually this year really lacked in humor, whimsy, and humor. Whimsy was low this year for the record. Okay, last year whimsy was phenomenal. We had, Windows Night. Oh, baby. Actually, I might be messing this up.

13:18 Jordana Windows 95 actually might have been 2024.

13:22 Eva That's the name of the song.

13:23 Jordana That's the name of it. Okay, so windows, windows 95 man was the artist from Finland, and he had a song called hit, a song called No Rules.

13:36 Pamala Big Bill gates fan.

13:37 Jordana Yeah. I don't even know how to like. It's so ridiculous. But I will say this. He emerged from a giant egg. Okay? He was wearing a little crop top with the windows 95 logo or windows logo on it. Yeah, yeah. She was was wearing one of those, like, privacy song things so that it looked like he was naked, but he wasn't naked.

14:01 Jordana And he at some point, Jorts jean shorts literally came down from the sky, and he put them on, and he had, like, sparklers and stuff. And it was so much fun. And, oh, it was so goofy and silly. And the song actually was really good. And my kids frickin love, you know, it's like we literally would, like, pump it in the house and be, like, dancing and singing to it.

14:23 Jordana So that was that to me. That was like my favorite ridiculous song of the last probably three years. And then my favorite serious song would be last year from Italy, which was Bullet Volleyball yesterday on doodle. And it was by Lucio Corsi from Italy. And it was, it's like a song that I actually would listen to outside of Eurovision.

14:48 Jordana So I think that's to me that's like the two different.

14:51 Eva Deal.

14:51 Jordana Sides of the spectrum.

14:53 Pamala Yeah. Yeah that makes sense. I love that song. It's so good. Oh thank you Jordana. Well that's all for this episode of, You Know Too Much. A huge thank you to Jordan for sharing her insights into Eurovision, the voting system, and what makes the world's largest live music competition such a global phenomenon. And honestly, now we know too much as well.

15:13 Eva If you enjoyed this conversation, please subscribe, leave us a review and share it with someone who would love it. Explore more episodes and behind the scenes content at You Know Too Much stop media.

15:25 Pamala Follow us on Instagram and YouTube to keep the obsession going. Thank you so much, Jordana.

15:30 Jordana Everybody go listen to Eurovision. Yeah.

15:33 Pamala I've I've never seen it. I'm definitely going to go dive.

15:36 Jordana Oh yeah. Watch it too.

15:37 Eva Thanks for tuning in, everyone.

15:39 Jordana This is really fun.