Tooji - Stay (Norway 2012)

[PopLife]

The 2012 edition of Melodi Grand Prix was fascinating. Plumbo, being the overwhelming favourites basically fucking up their chances with a racist joke, Reidun Sæther and “High On Love” and several female electropop bangers in the same lineup. And then Tooji won, with many Plumbo fans claiming it was rigged for him because NRK didn’t want to send Plumbo to ESC. The song was initially offered to Eric Saade who turned it down and Saade himself shaded Tooji on Twitter during the ESC final, from which NRK almost withdrew because their TV team who was doing the Borat-esque comedy sketches in Baku was arrested on the airport and interrogated by the local authorities for allegedly insulting Azerbaijan in their videos. In the end, they took part and finished last on Tooji’s birthday on top of it. He then came out 3 years later (that closet was made of glass tbh) and soon after, faded away from the spotlight altogether.

 

[Jacques]

I look back on this as one of my absolute favourites of the 2012 contest.

The fact it only just scraped through to the final and then finished with less points than Engelbert....

 

[Penelope]

I love to imagine the absolute queen-off in Baku between this one, Kurt Calleja and Donny Montell, with Tooji convinced the entire way that he was definitely the cutey of the evening

 

[VoR]

Always a sign of a classic year when you have stuff like this as roadkill.