Over the last two weeks, we’ve gone back in time to discover the Top 5 Crazy Costumes, with part 1 focusing on 2005 to 2008, and part 2 focusing on 2009 to 2012. In today’s final instalment of this Top 5 series, we’re uncovering our Top 5 Crazy Eurovision Costumes between the years of 2013 and 2016. It is safe to say that there were enough options for a list longer than 5, so we’ve really rounded it down to the craziest of the bunch!
5. Pollapönk – No Prejudice
It’s quite standard to see a number of artists each year wear suits, but usually they stick to the classic black, or maybe even blue or more recently dark purple, however all very subtle. Pollapönk didn’t do subtle, they did outrageous. Each member of the band on stage was wearing a suit of a different colour, so we had pink, orange, blue, red, yellow and purple. Their performance was all about doing away with prejudice, so featuring something colourful was their way to show that each person is different, but ‘inside we’re the same.’ What was even greater about this was throughout their entire pre-contest promotion, they wore the same coloured outfits but rather than suits, they wore tracksuits and that is just simply amazing.
4. Who See – Igranka
Apart from being one of my personal favourite songs of 2013, Igranka also falls into the crazy costume category. In the official video, we see the two members of Who see in what looked like raincoats, ready for a heavy downpour. Part of me expected this to be the costuming used on stage, however we ended up with something out of this world, literally. The two members of who see are wearing spacesuits, illuminated in the helmets in a yellow light to match in with the stage lighting and graphics. Nina Žižić joined the duo on stage with an equally intense costume, featuring a strange headpiece with a lens attached, some sort of Perspex looking backpack and some wrist pieces. Their movements on stage were a mix of zero-gravity space walking and robotic, especially from Nina, so it made for an interesting 3 minutes.
3. Cezar – It’s My Life
Even without the staging and costuming, Romania’s 2013 entry was one that managed to stick in the memories of all Eurovision fans. The pop and opera combination had been used before in Eurovision, even in our previous Top 5 Crazy Costumes the winner was a ‘popera’ entry, however Cezar really brought it to a new level. If we put his vocals aside, we can see that he’s chosen a very vampiric looking costume, half suit, half dress, although we then see throughout the song that underneath the bottom half of the costume is a mechanism to elevate Cezar on stage, as if he needed to bring yet more attention to him! The costuming also featured the drapes around him, which of course were concealing the backing dancers who are also wearing some crazy costumes, but this song is just so eccentric and so camp that every part of this makes sense.
2. Nina Kraljić – Lighthouse
Only last year did we see this costuming masterpiece from Croatia, and out of the 2016 acts, it was definitely the most talked about. At the beginning of the song, Nina is covered in a huge mesh looking overcoat, with black detailing across the mesh. If this was the costume for the entire performance, we wouldn’t hesitate to put this as our number one, however the mesh overcoat that drowns the natural beauty that is Nina, is pulled off by some trusty backing performers and revealed is an incredible metallic dress, which has so much detailing it’s hard to know where to look! The dress has long streams of fabric which reflect the light, and they also reflect just how much work has gone into this dress. It’s crazy, but crazy good!
1. Moje 3 – Ljubav Je Svuda
Our number one crazy costume had to be pretty crazy to beat the previous four, but we think we’ve made the right choice. The top crazy costume has to be the girls from Moje 3, who represented Serbia in 2013. I happen to really love this song, however the costumes are just straight up strange. Their national final costumes featured an angel and devil theme, and although it was a bit tacky, it actually made more sense of the song. Come Eurovision time, the girls had costumes straight from candy land. They were all pastel and cutesy, but completely messed up on telling the story of the song. As it was in national language (yay for Serbia!), having that devil and angel costuming gave those who don’t understand the lyrics a way to follow the story of the song, so the candy land costumes not only made it hard to follow the story, but actually cheapened the song. Regardless on their impact on the song, they’re definitely crazy enough to be our number 1!