Whatever happens in Copenhagen tomorrow, regardless of who gets the highest points and who scores badly, Conchita Wurst from Austria is already as much a winner as anyone can be.
The ovations she received from the live audience during her semi final, the fact that Danish tv saved her for last to keep excitement at a maximum, the media attention she has already had and keep getting, the love.
It's not a particularly advanced guess that Ms Wurst will have a very busy year touring Pride events of all sorts, with a chance of building up a faithful audience in the process. The talent is there, the personality, the unique selling point. With the aid of some really nifty songwriters, Conchita could have the potential of imposing herself as Austria's first major pop export since the glory days of Falco.
It is tempting to compare with Dana International who also had a major media following but whose international career never took off. Dana's team moved way too slow and no new material made for the global market was released until a year after her victory when the momentum was over and gone.
In this new day and age of iTunes and YouTube, Conchita could tour and release strong singles to keep her audience amused while collecting enough strong material to make a killer album.
A victory would - frankly - just be the icing on the cake. But what a lovely icing it would be, one that Austria wouldn't forget anytime soon. And neither would the rest of Europe.
Good article, but not sure how Dana and Conchita are even remotely similar?
ReplyDeleteFor me they're not. Dana is a transgender person and Conchita is a drag queen. But I think that in the eyes of a heterosexual and heteronormative audience, Dana is the natural point of reference for any performer that could labeled queer or with a "non-mainstream sexuality".
ReplyDeleteSince Conchita is a role it would be more fair to compare with Lordi but far too many people would misunderstand that comparison and think you call her a monster.
Conchita is much better singer than Dana and the song is also wayyy much better. It could do well with some other good singer as well, whereas Diva had only a minor part in the equation in 1998. Without Dana and the hype, the song would have very little to offer.
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