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Austria's JJ wins Eurovision 2025 with emotional ballad Wasted Love

Austria's JJ wins Eurovision 2025 with emotional ballad Wasted Love

Irish Examiner17-05-2025

Austria's JJ has won the Eurovision Song Contest with the emotional song Wasted Love, as Israeli singer Yuval Raphael becomes the runner-up.
The singer, real name Johannes Pietsch, opted for a black and white staging in Basel, Switzerland, which looked like a disastrous boat trip as he sang about someone he cared about being overwhelmed.
Yuval Raphael from Israel. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner)
Vienna-born JJ is an Austrian-Filipino opera singer and has been studying at the Music and Art Private University of Vienna (MUK).
Previous Austrian wins include drag artist Conchita Wurst in 2014 with Rise Like A Phoenix, and 1966's Udo Jurgens with Merci Cherie.
The UK gave its public vote of 12 points to Israel during the Eurovision grand final in Basel, Switzerland.
Singer Yuval Raphael's entry New Day Will Rise received 297 points in total from the public vote, finishing in second.
The UK's Remember Monday scored 88 points with their song What The Hell Just Happened? at the Eurovision grand final and finished in 19th place, receiving nothing in the public vote.
They received 12 points, the highest amount a country can award a contestant, from Italy, which saw its results announced by a puppet mouse.

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