I always see it as: you dont send a song to eurovision, you send a complete entry to eurovision. So it includes song, lyrics,performance, charisma of the singer, staging, backstory, vocals... All of that. So there are entries which rely in vocals to try to win, there are entries which rely in staging, there are entries which rely in the lyrics... Or entries with a combination of these. All of them are trying to do their best effort to win, and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesnt. What I mean is, cha cha cha is an entry which rely in the originality of the concept, staging, catchy lyrics and most of all in karijaa's charisma and interaction with the public. So, that is what made it televote winner, and would had been an amazing eurovision winner, very deserved. So it makes sense that people dont listen to chachacha in the studio version in spotify because its not the lyrics or the vocals what made it a winner in this case. Loreens song on the other hand, rely in vocals more than anything, so it makes sense people can hear it on spotify, and dont need to see the staging etc to enjoy the song. You can note, to prove my theory, that Karijaa consistently ranked 1st after the show in the official "eurovision most watched" on the eurovision youtube channel every month. And even now, he still ranks above loreen every month on that. And it makes sense, because people dont wanna listen to the studio version of chachacha, but they wanna see the staging, performance, choreografy, etc of cha cha cha, because thats what they voted for.

Came for the analysis, stayed for the needlessly fancy 3d-renders.

Did not read all comments, so this might already be have been said but a simple basic truth would be that people watching and voting Eurovision isn't the same group of people just "happening" across a popular song and streaming the living daylights out of it. Those people often do not know nor care that it is a Eurovision song. They randomly hear it, like it and done. So streams and ESC televoting figures are a Venn diagram with a probably smaller crosssection than Euroheads love to expect.

Also music industry and marketing... Tattoo was heavily pushed on streaming platforms. I listen to mostly death metal yet I got ads for Tattoo. I guess it's because I listen to Eurovision songs once a year, because normally I wouldn't listen to anything like it ever. Marketing was strong on this one.

I also would wanna resort to views on KZfaq. Since Eurovision is first and foremost a visual medium. Cha Cha Cha is still 7 Million views ahead of Tattoo as of now

It is common for people to say, I like this song, I can see my self adding it on my playlist, but it is not what I want to see on Eurovision.

I will be honest: the stuff people stream is kinda bland. They are acceptable pop songs, but they're not particularly interesting or fun.

"Cha cha cha" was my 3y.o. daughter's favourite. I am not able to count how many times we've played it in the car for her. It was also our (my husband's and mine) winner, but my daughter was obsessed :D

The secret to high streaming numbers is to be on playlists (then people do not need to seek out your song anymore, they just get it "delivered" to them without really realizing, its kind of like radio in that way). All three, Snap, Arcade and Tattoo were added to Today's Top Hits (the first two after going viral, Tattoo after winning I think). It is spotify's biggest playlist and a spot there basically guarantees your song becomes a streaming hit if your label pays and Cha Cha Cha or other popular televote songs just did not get that kind of privilege. Hence, spotify streams arent really a good indicator for how beloved a eurovision song is but rather how much reach it has on the platform. KZfaq still has the algorithm influence it, but yt views are a better indicator for that kinda thing as people seek out the videos more deliberately

Tattoo is made in the best swedish labs by the masters of pop science, made to be objectively really good. And that's it. There is objectively nothing wrong with it and it is well produced, but there is subjectively nothing to exciting about it. They made perfect jury bait and it worked

The damn song was on all radios even before she won eurovision, thats why a lot of ppl streamed

I could see la noia having most streams after winning the contest. If Switzerland or Croatia win i don’t see it happening.

I imagine a lot of Tattoo's post-contest streams come from the fact it was embedded on news sites all over the world as the winner, it is 'news', rather than 'music'. Tbh, a year later and I still couldn't sing you Tattoo, it's a Teflon song, non-stick in the memory. There are some metrics which *people* don't influence, we know this, and then we keep forgetting it...

It's a television show after all, so there are more focus on the visual aspect and the put up a good show. That also makes the live vocals more important, which is why Cha Cha didn't get a better jury score. They were slightly disappointing compared to the national final.

Well done overthinkers, you delivered another fantastic video! ❤

Rewinding in time- Loreen had a similar treatment in media back in 2012. Not that she was returning and ESC royalty, but the dominate favorite to win. I went into the 2012 contest thinking it’d be overhyped because we expected the win, but was won over by her performance.

I wonder if the whole televote vs. streaming difference for "Snap" is also caused by age groups. In my country voting is 1€ per song. As a student and later as somebody at the beginning of my career I didn't have the budget for something like ESC votes. And for the even younger people the question is if their phone contract even enabled them to vote. But TikTok and Spotify don't have that limitation and TikTok especially has probably young people as its main audience.

I continue to be bemused by the popularity of Tattoo in general. As a musician it's a perfectly fine song that is artfully produced -- there's nothing wrong with it, but I don't think it's particularly special, and certainly not especially entertaining. It's a head-scratcher for me. *shrugs* Cha Cha Cha is musically not that interesting either, but in terms of subject matter and performance it sure is entertaining. My favorite song was neither of those, though I was still rooting for Cha Cha Cha at the end like most people.

My favourite from the show was by far Cha Cha Cha in 2023 (Sweden was my third/fourth). And although I’ve streamed Cha Cha Cha quite a lot, Tattoo is my most streamed song ever. The song is kinda ok and the performance great though not the best imo. But it is a good song to stream. To stream Cha Cha Cha you kinda have to get in the mood, while you can basically put on Tattoo whenever and wherever you want.

Awesome video as always! I do think that this year is entirely unpredictable! La Noia seems to be “winning” in the Spotify streams, but it is clear to me that it isn’t the favourite to win. It can, of course, and I doubt anyone would be too upset about it, but it isn’t as hyped as Nemo or Baby Lasagna or Joost. Guess we’ll have to see what TikTok says, huh? 😂

I would rephrase it a bit.... Loreen was performig _at_ us, Kaarija was peforming for and to us. Also Tattoo seems like jury bait (juries are far more into conventional pop formats sung in deracinated English) while the audience is now, ironically enough a lot more sophisticated and is okay with unconventional songs or songs not sung in euro-English.

Are you ever going to talk about Europapa? I keep hoping to see it.

I see it as obvious and it is the problem with having both juries and televotes. They work against each other especially from people who are heavily invested in to the contest. I think this has become more so (jury vs televote) with countries popular with the juries like Sweden. One has to remember that Ireland for example who was very popular at one time and nearly won everything. Would be totally destroyed by televotes if that existed back then. Because people just do not want the same country winning over and over again (Ireland also had language advantage). People have other intersest than just the best song and performance. Also one has to consider that a lot of people do not pay much attention at all when they see the contest. So here just standing out in nearly way could be good. This matters much more to the televotes. Another factor seldomly discussed is who votes. I certainly do not think they represent the average viewer. If I where to speculate I think it is a certain age group and gender that generally votes.

You forget one thing, votes are based on countries not population. Greece,albania,north macedonia, bulgaria, moldova and romania have less population than italy but 6 times more votes. Thus moldova going with something closer to balkan traditional music has an advantage that way.

The thing about that song is that is factory made to appeal to the music industry in the west, why the jury loved it and why a lot of us were pissed that it won over the entry that had life behind it. Eurovision is an event, a whole experience, and sweden's song felt like a product not a song. Personally I also didn't like it what so ever, but I do know people who did. But it is a feeling I get that a song with people behind it instead of lifeless corpos would work better in a setting where emotions are all over the place and Finland had it, made me feel like I was watching an event not an ad campaign.

Excellent analysis - now subscribed!

There's a subsection of Eurovision fans that have a narrow minded view that streams = televote success and this video shuts that down a lot.

Great video and analysis! I think there's something to be said about Eurovision fans (the type that watch, and most importantly, vote), compared to the general public. Once the night is over, everything is just in the hands of the wider public. I also agree that 'Tattoo' or even 'Snap' are songs that can be played in many contexts, but a song like 'Cha Cha Cha' only works in some specific ones like a gym or a party.

The best Thing about Tattoo is still the Singer.

One thing that really stuck with me was what one of the Swedish commentators said during the broadcast. Everyone was competing against each other, but Loreen was also competing against Euphoria. So she was measured not only against her opponents, but what is considered one of the greatest performances of all time in the contest. But I also think that if BBC had been able to replicate her national final performance, with the bigger screen and more advanced camerawork, she would without a doubt have lessened the margin to Finland or possibly even won the televote. A real shame!❤

because that was not the song we wanted to win

I must admit, it personally hurt me when you said no one watches Eurovision alone 🥲

I felt exactly that after the semifinals: I was rooting for Finland up until the finals, when I started to get very tired of Cha Cha Cha and wondered "is this really what I want to listen to every time I see anything mentioning Eurovision for a whole year?", "is this what I want to stream for the rest of the year and remember about the winner of ESC 2023?", and then I changed my favorite to my 2nd place at the time, Tattoo.

Streams come from all countries while televotes are only from participating countries

Because Käärijä's "Cha Cha Cha" won the Televote💚💪🇫🇮

I feel like another factor that isn't talked about enough is the fact that Loreen's Eurovision performance was kinda underwhelming compared to the previous Melodifestivalen. Not because she herself was bad, but because the staging had to be scaled down for Liverpool and lost its appeal in the process. I can understand how people seeing it for the first time during the grand finale might not feel the spark as much. I'm a Loreen stan, but i never really revisit her Eurovision performances, because the Melodifestivalen performances are just LEAGUES better.

I usually measure if an Eurovision song got really popular when people make the Brazilian "version" with Portuguese lyrics and my neighbor's bar is playing it. Tattoo and Arcade checks all of them

SNAP was interesting song, because I loved it, it was my favourite that year, but my friend with whome I watch Eurovision looked me like crazy person and were "You like that?". Turned out in the end I wasn't alone. But soon it's been a year, and I still can't stand Tattoo, well maybe it just isn't my music. First I thought that when I just here it without needing to see it, I will like it like Euphoria, which I truly disliked when it was winner, but soon after when I just heard it I started to love it. So I thought that there is something that I don't like Loreen's stage performance and when I don't see her performance and only hear the song, I will warm up to it. Nope, didn't happen. But nice analysis!

It's because Käärijä won the televote.

Because it's not as authentic as other televote favourites. Someone else (6 songwriters) wrote her a song and even the demo was sung by someone else. Loreen had a say and was allowed to add modifications, she is credited on the song, but it's not her or her usual team's composition. She performed it really well, but it's still just a good theatre performance in my eyes.

Need to look at the timing of the stream data. Snap got the majority of it's streaming hits after the competition. She got exposure in the competition, broke into the US market and BAM, streaming record!

So weird that Snap is so famous yet I've never heard it once since the festival last year

I would be surprised if the streams are that different after Eurovision to before. As you point out: streaming is done in different settings. I suspect the contest makes little difference to what ends up being streamed most. Maybe if a "dark horse" wins the contest, but otherwise I doubt it. I also presume Europapa is currently most streamed, will win, and will then remain most streamed. #blijfhiertotikdoodga

I mean, Tattoo is a radio friendly power ballad (which is not a bad thing!) which any major radio station and mainstream playlist can have, while Cha Cha Cha is a radio unfriendly mix of electrocore and EDM that would pop up only in more specific radio stations and Spotify mixes. That's... really it. Tattoo has more streams because it is more marketable to the general audience. Tattoo has appeared in one of those generic mixes for everyone on my Spotify many times, but never in my targeted daily mixes which are an ungodly mixture of dance/techno/house, death and black metal, and videogame music (having to go from "From The Cradle To Enslave" to "sans." is... an experience)

It's almost as if it's a "3-minute-piece-of-television" contest and a well-crafted, producer-led running order has a huge impact on the televote. Watch out for the latter as well, it's going to make allocation draws and juries redundant.

How does Spotify include songs in playlists? I think a lot of people listen to radio friendly pop as a background music, and Tattoo 'pops up' (no pun intended) once in a while, and doesn't mean people have selected to listen to it themselves. Cha Cha Cha on the other hand, is a very distinct mixed genre, and probably doesn't get included in such lists.

I know. Because Abba is celebrating their 50th anniversary of winning Eurovision this year.

The often repeated myth that "Sweden wins every year" is not true. ESC started in 1956, which is 68 years ago today. During these years Sweden has won 7 times. 7 out of 68 is not "every year", is it?

I think, based on personal anecdotal evidence, that the major voting demographic for the contest, especially the final, consists of children/non-adults who do not stream their music on Spotify. Households are typically voting for the favorite of their kids.

I remember always getting tattoo randomly directly after streaming cha-cha-cha, even though I always skipped it, it was fairly annoying

great video

I watch Eurovision alone. I wasn't sad about it before, but now I am.

My sister who loves "Snap" And knows *I love Eurovision* 🥳 ((Im always telling her to watch it)) Didn't know it was from Eurovision. (We live in USA) So i agree with comments. For this year i keep sending her the Semis playlists. I wonder what songs, if any, She might encounter without knowing it was from ESC 2024 🤨 Because i doubt she will watch the final 🥲

A song and a Eurovision performance are two different things. Connected, yes, but still can very much varying results depending on the details. Televote is not swayed by ads and suggestions popping up in the news or on your playlist for once, and spotify replays are not influenced by how well the live stage was prepared and executed with all possible aspects - live vocal, music, connecting with audience, stylization, special effects, camera work... This is way more complicated than winner = most streams, but to me, Cha Cha Cha and Rim Tim Tagi Dim were the show winners :D (And special shoutout to Ireland and Norway for the folk roots

Streams means nothing because in most cases people don’t or can’t choose themselves what it plays. For example if I would listen Spotify it would play Tattoo at some point. It doesn’t matter at all if I like it or not. To skip it I would need to pay the subscription fee and it could still randomly play. Old days when we bought physical media it actually mattered. We could vote with our wallet and no one else got choose what to play.

Loreen only duty was to win, and win easily.... Sweden never had in mind anyone or any song could be better....she can have billion's of streams, but I think Käärijä is the one they remember...

The mianstream likes Tattoo more and pushed it more.

Eurovision is a show. We want something different, something engaging. I won’t listen to «Cha Cha Cha» on the bus, wrong setting, but for Eurovision? Perfect!

Just an interesting fact, there's a Brazilian version of tatoo that actually has by it self more streams than cha cha cha. The name of the song is "daqui para sempre" and just listening to it you can immediately recognize it as tattoo, but in a Brazilian style

Will there be more song reviews soon? I'd assumed your schedule was one song review, and then one history or date related one each week.

the song that gets disqualified gets the most streams.

Never got into tattoo. Still don't like it

One of the most popular songs of Eurovision 2024 is Europapa from the Netherlands, and it could also win the televote. 🤔

I guess this is the problem with every mixed vote. The same problem happens every year with the winner of Sanremo: no one was really rooting for tue winner and the winner is never the one people remember with tue passage of time; usually is the 2nd or 3rd the one you ear the most on the radio or at public gatherings.

I think once their favourites have qualified or not, they will vote for those they wish to see win. Especially when it’s possible

If You transfer Spotify streams straight to (people) votes, there's no need to held a contest at all? Also could be thinking it will win anyway because of jury support, therefore will vote another?

How are you guys so good?

Spotify isn't that much of a factor in many voting countries in Europe.

Thank you!! I like how you explain so even I can understand😂 I think Loreen deserve more cred, because she has a huge talent! Cha-cha-cha was more a "fun thing", and I cant understand why People are so bitter? Really?😂 I can't see why People diden't care when ukraine won because of the war, and when Loreen won because she is Loreen People are really mad?

I agree. And also, televoting has its rules: it's basically restricted to EBU Zone and there's a limit of votes. The US itself can increase the number of streams of an Eurovision song, but Iceland can vote and give the same amount of points than Germany or France

While writing a very long comment, my laptop restarted randomly and I lost all the text. So in other, and shorter sentences: People like different things. We can try to be objective and recognize good qualities in a song, but as long as we don't like it, we probably won't vote for it (if we even vote at all, because there are costs connected with the voting too), because what we like is subjective. Some like live performances and party songs, others prefer studio sound and heartwarming songs. Some songs work best as live performances and since the show is just that, those songs get votes...from people who prefer live performances. Now, for this year's winner...Nemo, from Switzerland, with the song "The Code". The live performance gave me this impression: The melody is quite random, hard to follow, and has a structure that I don't like. Opera can be okay from time to time. This wasn't one of those times. Same goes for rap. Sometimes it works for me, other times it doesn't. This time it didn't work for me. Nemo ran around on the stage a lot, which made the text hard to hear for me, so I didn't get the full message of the song. I also didn't like their voice. I don't get hang up on the fact that Nemo is non-binary but still looks and sounds like a guy, because all of that implies to me too. However, I strongly disliked their clothes (and haircut), and the performance wasn't up my ally either. So a random melody with hard to hear lyrics from a person with ugly clothes and haircut, and a performance based on running around and jumping on things...or sliding off of things...it just didn't work for me. Nothing worked. At all. Strong dislike for me. So I did the video test: I listened to and looked at the studio recording with the added music video. The video told a story, that the live performance didn't do. The sound was much better, so I could hear the words better. On top of that, the video also showed the lyrics, so I could see what was being sung that I couldn't hear. Still didn't like their voice but it was at least slightly better in the video. Overall the video gave a much better visual performance than Nemo's live show. I caught a quick glimpse in the video of clothes that looked similar to what Nemo had on stage, but they were visible on for a short time. So based on the video, there are many improvements that make the song work better for me as a listener. But at the core the song is still the same and I still don't really like it. I might come to tolerate it, after hearing it a few more times, but this song just isn't for me. I strongly disliked the live show because of Nemo's clothes, haircut and performance. All those things go away if I just listen to the song. But then comes the randomness and Nemo's voice, and I don't like them either. So all in all, I probably won't appreciate The code very much at all, even after hearing it several times. But sometimes I grow to like songs I didn't like at first. And what does this mean for voting in eurovision? That people who like live shows will vote for songs like that, people who prefer studio sound will vote for something that sounds really good, and some people won't vote at all, no matter what they see or hear. All in all, the voting is as random and chaotic as the show itself. But I still want those jury groups removed permanently.

Because everyone knew that she would be crowned by the jury. Why even have a competition if the winner is already crowned before it starts.

to answer your question at the end: no I don't the two winners will match this year. Europapa and La Noia are both dominating the streaming charts but I don't see either quite making it to the top, especially if the jury tanks Europapa. The Code, which I still see as the most likely winner, is currently at a distant 7th place.

Hi, I should probably watch this video before commenting, but Cha Cha Cha was something fun and not depressing. Maybe it’s because I had a rough year and Cha Cha Cha really hyped me up.

call me boring but I never saw Eurovision as party. I'm always looking for songs I enjoy and would listen to again. I guess that's why my favourite never wins lol It's party only if every single song sounds like Moldova 2022 🤣

Are the Abbatars held up? I didn't get clue in this one

I agree with your analysis, and also with people in the comment saying that a Eurovision entry is about a whole package, including the performance, the staging, the artist's charisma, etc. Which, I think, makes Sobral's win in 2017 even more impressive. Like, his song was not really what anyone would call a Eurovision song. It's pretty impressive that it was the song that won the televote, and not Moldova's entry for instance (which wasn't even 2nd). Moldova was more memeable, more fun, yet the televote winner was a very calm and minimalistic song. I hardly doubt that anything like this could ever happen again, I think 2017 was a one time thing. Turns out Eurovision isn't always about partying !

And that is the difference. Eurovision is more than "radio" friendly songs. 60-70% is about the performance and engagement. The song and vocals need to be better than average to win but otherwise the performance is crucial. Some people will say that is wrong but I think it makes Eurovision much more exciting to watch. Last year you had Tattoo and Cha Cha Cha both doing well but obviously very different performances.

here we go again

I think it didn't win televotes because it 'sounded'/reminded people of her song "Euphoria." Was good, but I felt like she came with a similar song again, with which she already won. Another reason why was it most-streamed? Cause it was good and gave a fresh version to "Euphoria" in a way. So the nostalgic and know sound also plays the role here.

You wouldn't play Bryan Ferry's "Let's stick together" at a wedding...oh wait, people who haven't read the lyrics do 🤣

I am so glad that Loreen won, she was my winner even before winning Melodifestivalen. Its a rare thing to win both Juries and tele. We have winners like Duncan Lawrence that they didn't even win one or the two.

It’s because the public has taste.

There is like and dislike ratio. If you watch song 300 times it will be included as 300 by YT views. The same on other stream platforms. People just click a view to write a comment The artist can buy views in a certain countries or buy listeners that put the song in a loop

I do think this is gona happen again, Nemo is most likely gona get a lot jury votes, where Baby lasagna get the televotes again, though there is a few other contenders again, but I do think it will be decided with the jury votes again. People vote for what they love to listen to, where the jury again more votes for what they feel is the best perfomance, and voice, they dont realy ever look at the hole picture of how entertaining and replayable the song is, just how clean the singing and performance was, this is the biggest reason Kääriä lost also, becuse his singing was never at the same level as Loreen, even though his stage performance and song was what the people liked the most.

Fun fact: the Brazilian version of Tatoo, called “Daqui para sempre”, by singer Manu Bahtidao, has currently 300+ million views on KZfaq, which is 6 times more than Tatoo’s official audio, and around 13 times more than the winning performance at Eurovision.

Did you mention what place snap got in the televote? It wouldn’t have won, would it?

Spotify by the way is a Swedish company. So the pop scientists created the most popular streaming platform in the world.

I think the jurors will make another bad decision. The current popular songs will perform bad in the jury. Maybe i will chance my mind once i actual hear them and see they really aren't create. But currently i fear we will get another Looren moment.

spotify is a horrific proxy of popularity as u pointed out. I rarely listen to my favourite songs because im busy working & wouldn’t be able to concentrate.

Alternative explenation: the jury actually scores a different performance (the closed afternoon performance) than the audience. If you rewatch Loreens performance in the semis and in the final, you'll see that her performance in the final actually was not very good (compared to the semis). I suspect her afternoon performance was a lot better. So, the jury got to see a better performance than the audience and consequently scored it higher.

I may be alone in this camp, but I thoroughly believe if Loreen brought the staging from melfest, things would be very different. I think (at least part of) the reason she didn’t win the televote wasn’t that it’s a party song vs a power ballad sort of situation, but rather her staging was only at like 60% of what it was planned for. They had to quickly adjust everything according to the EBU regulations and it took away the magic that made the song popular in the first place. Liking a song or not is subjective, but I don’t think anyone can deny that the staging can make or break a song at Eurovision. Kaarija had elevated his staging from his NF, Loreen had a downgrade. To me, it’s clear it had an impact.

Your conclusion might be applicable to The Netherlands this year, we will see !

I wonder whether this channel will ever ve able to remove the tattoo of underestimating Trenetul from its thinking

I don't think I was annoyed by a winner so much.. Tatoo is just a rewamp of every eurodance song, and recycling the third and fourth verse in "The winner takes it all" by Abba. Think: "Though it's hurting me, Now it's history" or "Nothing more to say, No more ace to play". And the part with the Uuu-hu-huuu is also almost every 2000 american pop song. Very uncreative. Doesn't live up to the Euphorea. But anyways..

we love an american actually investigating in european topics :D

Tattoo didn't win the televote because it's a bland song, depressing and disappointing af, that only won the contest for lack of better contestants. Here we go, I finally said it.

The craziest stat for me highlighting SNAP's Spotify success is how it has 160m more streams than every other song that year *combined*

From someone who voted for Finland - Cha Cha Cha was everything Tattoo was not. Fresh, young, it was in native language and not bland English, it was a new level of rock which was never seen before on ESC, the performance and dance were electric and fun, i also checked the lyrics and it had Finland all over it (a shy boy having social anxiety so drinks alcohol to get out of his nervous shell and be able to get down to the dance floor). Sweden was just another boring repetitive ballad in English with bits sounding like Winner Takes it All....

Cha Cha Cha is a better song in my opinion. that is all. Tattoo is pleasant but boring to me.