"Only the Light", written and composed by Richard Peebles, was the United Kingdom's entry at the Eurovision Song Contest 1987, performed by Peebles himself, who was credited at Eurovision as Rikki.
Rikki won the right to perform at Brussels by winning the UK national final, A Song for Europe, where he was the first singer to perform. At Brussels, the song was performed fourteenth on the night, after Luxembourg's Plastic Bertrand with "Amour Amour", and before France's Christine Minier with "Les mots d'amour n'ont pas de dimanche." At the end of judging that evening, "Only the Light" took the thirteenth-place slot with 47 points. It came as a huge disappointment to the United Kingdom as it was the lowest placement any of the country's entries had received up to that time.
Like the previous year, a rock song was in the offering, with an unclear theme (it is never explained what "the light" is, what kind of metaphor it is, why "the light" is after him or why he is avoiding it). On-stage that year were three backup singers and dancers, dressed in white, in addition to a keyboardist. Rikki, a native of Scotland, also accessorised with a tartan cloth slung over his shoulder.
The song placed at #96, not charting on the UK Singles Chart (the Top 75 songs) but as an addenda on the "Next 25" version of the charts. This was the second year of dismal sales for the UK's Eurovision entrant.
| Preceded by Runner in the Night |
United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1987 |
Succeeded by Go |
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Famous quotes containing the word light:
“My paternal grandmother would not light a fire on the Sabbath and piled all Sunday’s washing-up in a bucket, to be dealt with on Monday morning, because the Sabbath was a day of rest—a practice that made my paternal grandfather, the village atheist, as mad as fire. Nevertheless, he willed five quid to the minister, just to be on the safe side.”
—Angela Carter (1940–1992)