Estonia, Latvia, Ireland vs Belgium, Bosnia, France: Novelties?

I don't get it. I've read half a dozen accusations I'm sure of the Eurovision being especially novelty-heavy this year. But however I count them I only get to four proper full-blown novelties, Spain, Estonia, Latvia and Ireland. Maybe it's because I'm very restrictive in applying the tag, but something like Malta's entry is never a novelty in my book - it's a well-constructed pop song, conventionally sung, that happens to have a (subtle) spy theme. Is anything that's not
about love or dancing a novelty song?

That said, here are three clear-cut examples, two that I've seen labelled novelties but aren't, really, and one that maybe should be. Let's start off with one of the most obvious examples, Estonia.

Kreissiraadio - Leto Svet


Yup, this is a novelty, through and through, made by an appropriately "kreissi" comedy troupe. To me, that's not really a problem - I think the song works okay on its own terms. The skacid-like backing is energetic, the melody is okay, the earworm chorus is memorable (if a tad too closely connected to the Goliat theme song and the bridge of Buffalo Soldier). Whatever, though - the singers and the humour are not nearly as charming as Verka Serducha was last year, and it's going to sink without a trace. As could Estonia's neighbour Latvia, if things go against them:

Pirates of the Sea - Wolves of the Sea


This one failed to make the first round in the Swedish competition which doesn't surprise me because novelties rarely do. (Which reflects rather badly on us Swedes if anything.) The idea is obviously to create a Dschingis Khan for the nineties-- er, I mean, 21st century, by updating the semi-disco backing to some sort of bubblegum dance. It works fine in a Hits for Kidz kind of way and might do fairly well in the competition, since it's actually a well-connected, well-brought-together pop piece under the silly gloss.

Now you're probably asking, do I like all the novelties? No.

Dustin the Turkey - Irlande Douze Pointe


Ireland is a nation of Morons. Fed up with sending (and failing) with dozens of awful folk ballads they chose to "comment" on their own lack of success by sour grape blaming everyone else and making a joke of the Eurovision. Which could be okay if it was remotely funny or a worthy entry but this excrement is the worst song in the whole competition. By a mile and by every standard.

Two more countries that usually make the novelty lists this year I'm rather more reluctant to include.

Ishtar - O Julissi


This doesn't conform to any standard of novelty really, it's not meant to be funny, it's not particularly gimmicky and it's not bad at all (in fact rather pleasant and well-crafted). Except, of course, one thing: it's sung in a completely made-up language. Belgium (notorious for its language conflicts) has done this before and no-one went around accusing Urban Trad of being a novelty, because their tone was less light and springy. Mid-level final?

Laka - Pokusâj


This is where the accusation really gets weird and fairly disturbing - making fun of outsider musicians always gets my blood boiling. So, the man has a live hen on stage and dancers dressed as farmers. But how is this music novelty in any shape, sense or form? It's a heartfelt, slightly new agey pop song that's closer musically to Coldplay than to any other entry in this competition. Obviously the stage persona is not something thrown together for the occasion, and the humour is totally positive and a little sweet. I dig this a lot, I hope it does really well.

Finally, while I'm already worked up, time for an entry that no-one has dared label a novelty but which maybe should be.

Sebastien Tellier - Divine


Critics have been fawning over Tellier whose co-operations with Sofia Coppola, Daft Punk and Air supposedly makes him a "real musician". As far as I'm concerned he's a beard and not much more, and the video is by far the most gimmicky one of all the entries, with a bunch of fake Telliers in wah-wah funny locations throwing microphones at each other. I can just guess at how novetly-oriented his stage performance might be, but since he's "oh-so-distant-ironic" in his humour I'll assume it'll be far from a lone man with a guitar.

I guess the question is: why should the middle classes be excluded from the tag? To me, Belle and Sebastian are just as much a novelty band as ever The Archies. Totally another reason why the Novelty tag stinks, it's a method of propagating class repression.

Race and the Novelty Song

When the Spanish Eurovision winner was announced my immediate reaction was a very defensive one. Here was, I thought, a fairly straightforward humorous reggaeton track and it was being dismissed as a novelty song. Of course, once I'd done a bit of rudimentary research it turns out to actually have been a novelty song all along.

But the central problem still remains. As I prepare to write the mega-post on Eurovision novelty entries I promised, I have to face up to precisely the problematic connotations of the term "novelty".


The idea of the novelty song is a western construct, coming out of Tin Pan Alley in the twenties and thirties as one of three major categories of vapid pop. Over time it's come to acquire somewhat negative associations - it's a song that's exploitative of a fad or news item, without much musical substance.

I remember how livid I was when Mundian To Bach Ke was repeatedly reported as a novelty song, since it's actually well-rooted in a bhangra remix tradition going back a decade. But in the context it was being used - mainstream European house clubs - it functioned precisely as a novelty, something fun and throwaway for the moment. Innovation, or the potential integration of new cultural elements, was reduced to the mere temporary entertainment. That sort of thing has been exceedingly common over the years - look at the dance world, where wonderful, fully-formed dance genres like rumba and merengue were reduced to novelty dance crazes, never taken seriously.

I would argue that this happens all too frequently to genres from the third world, and that to some extent the novelty tag is a (rockist?) western master supression technique against other cultures. Look at the features usually associated with novelty music: flamboyant performers, extra-musical effects, innovative and unusual instrumentation and techniques, use of humour, connection to current events or fads. Is it a coincidence that these are way more common in a lot of third world music (and African-American music) than in mainstream rock-pop? (Exception: Metal.)

In any case, treating music as novelty is dangerous because it can often suppress innovation (Dickie Goodman famously presaged sampling), and be used to foster conformity and complacence. Every time I see this clip of Tiny Tim I feel angry at the bullies who feed this self-confident outsider musician into the mill of novelty, denying him the right to be funny on his own terms.

So while I'll sometimes use the word novelty for a deliberately constructed pop song, I'm going to be much more wary of bandying it about in the future. And I'll definitely look at every novelty song deeply and try to understand it on its own musical terms, including its background.