GREECE 2011 - Watch My Dance

I'm sure a lot of people will agree that Greece really rocked last year. I wasn't too fond of that entry to begin with, but after seeing them live a few times and listening to the song, ahem, a lot of times ;-) I ended up really liking it. They really put in a great effort last year. So the question was how they would follow up on that this year. Would it be something equally catchy?

No.

I'm not actively trying to repeat myself, but what is the deal with all this rap? Seriously, this is the Greek entry. Where the hell does rap come into it? And also again with the dumbass stage name. And the incredibly stupid lyrics. STFU!!

The song is far from all bad. That is actually the worst of it, they've ruined what could have been a perfectly good song. I like the mix of two languages, which has become quite a trend over the past few years. I also like the parts of this song that aren't rap; those parts are actually quite melodious, and the ethnic sound that they've managed to give it sounds really good. In those parts. The rest of it is just annoying trash. So they've basically managed to destroy their own song. Almost kind of impressive. o_O

This is Loukas Giorkas featuring - I kid you not - Stereo Mike. They are schizophrenically performing Watch My Dance by Giannis Christodoulopoulos and Eleana Vrahali. They will be competing for Greece on Tuesday, May 10th. They are going on stage last, so the first semi will be ending on a low note. >:-)

Widescreen here.

Lyrics with translation here.

GEORGIA 2011 - One More Day

Georgia's kind of a country to watch in the contest, because they've sent some really original and quirky entries in their very short ESC career, some really good stuff. I'm always prepared to like the Georgian song. But WHAT is the deal with all the rap people are trying to do all over the place this year?? What is up with that? Seriously, people need to stop doing this.

If you've heard the studio version of this song, you may quite like it. I do too; the studio version, I mean. It sounds pretty good. This is another one of those songs that are just sort of middling, not at all bad, but also rather too lacking in personality to stand out from the crowd much. We've all heard this umpteen times before. The rap parts are also not that obtrusive in the studio version. However.

In the live version you can see below, the song starts out OK but ends up sounding like shit. Partly because the rap guy is so in your face, you can't overlook him. But mainly because of the lead singer. I said that Stella Mwangi can't sing for shit, and that's true, but she's the next Maria Callas compared to this girl. I have no idea how anyone can have a voice this weak and still think they're a singer. I just want to punch her in the face. With this performance they wouldn't stand a chance ... and it's hard to see how anyone could think that they would.

But! Since then, the singer has been replaced. About bloody time too. The new girl is hardly world class but she is a great deal better than her predecessor. Which admittedly doesn't say much. But this is sure to sound a lot better on stage in Düsseldorf.

Even considering that I'm not all that optimistic about this song's chances. It's a pretty good rocked up pop song, but I'm not sure it's original enough to stand out much. What it does have going for it is that Georgia got slot #9 in the draw, which places them between Switzerland and Finland, both of which have entries that are very very different from this one. So that's a plus. But, meh. We'll see. :-)

This is Eldrine performing One More Day by a couple of the band members and - I assume - a friend of theirs, all with dumbass stage names. They will be competing for Georgia on Tuesday, May 10th.

Widescreen here.

Lyrics here.

BELARUS 2011 - I Love Belarus

Hearing the title of this song is kind of a window into the past for a Scandinavian. Into the rather distant past. I think most of my fellow Scandinavians will know what I mean ... a song like this could never ever be sent by any of us now. Years and years and years ago, sure, something like this might seem like a good bet. Voi voi, langt opp på fjellet ... !! But even then we probably wouldn't have been this glaringly obvious. We tend to downplay our nationalism now. But not everyone feels the same and that is SO COOL ... !! :-D

I'm not sure I can explain exactly why, but I really really like this song. It's freakishly catchy, that's obviously part of it. The singer is super enthusiastic and actually manages to sing this chorus with what seems like genuine joy ... I like that, obviously. But most of all it's probably just the total in-your-face attitude that this entry has. A little bit of folk music, dancers in national costumes in a totally inappropriate setting, a friendly, poppy, upbeat melody, and then that chorus which is just so totally unashamed and in our collective faces. It's like they've been thinking if we're gonna do this then let's really do it all the way. And it works! They've pulled out all the stops and just totally let themselves have free reign with this song, and it just really works. I dig this song. It's kind of a guilty pleasure, sure, but I dig it.

I obviously can't vote for them, that'd be so wrong in so many ways ... but I'm secretly hoping that they will do really really well. OK, not so secretly. It'd be really cool to see this song in the top ten. :-) The audience may hate it and throw it to the wolves but I think quite a few people will probably feel the way I do about it. :-)

I actually tend to quite often really like the Belarusian entry. Is that a bad sign?

This is Anastasiya Vinnikova performing I Love Belarus by Evgeny Oleynik and Svetlana Geraskova. They will be competing for Belarus, which they love!! :-D on Thursday, May 12th.

Widescreen here.

Lyrics here.

MACEDONIA 2011 - Rusinka

I know, I know ... 'FYR Macedonia'. But these post titles are long enough and that whole FYR thing is silly anyway from where I'm sitting. Will there be an angry Greek denouncing me and an angry Macedonian defending me in the comments to this year's Macedonia review too, like last year? :-D Save your energy, I already know the arguments and I'm not convinced. Obviously. We can just reread last year's comments, come to think of it. ;-)

This is the kind of song that makes you happy you don't understand what the singer's going on about ... although the lyrics in Düsseldorf may be partly in English and only partly in Macedonian, I'm not sure. (There's a full translation on the Diggiloo Thrush, of course - the link's at the bottom of this post, as usual. :-) Then you watch the video and it's like, WTF?? LOL! :-D

This song is first and foremost just really seriously annoying. Then when you find yourself kind of bopping along to it you start to get pissed off. I suppose it's catchy, in a way, but mostly it's just totally annoying. His voice is almost more annoying than the song. The 'ethnic' groove that they seem to have tried for seems tacked on and - dare I say it - annoying. I hope this sinks without a trace.

This is Vlatko Ilievski performing Rusinka by Gilgor Koprov, Vladimir Dojcinovski and Jovan Jovanov. They will be competing for Macedonia on Thursday, May 12th. Boo hiss!

Widescreen here.

Lyrics with translation here.

CYPRUS 2011 - San angelos s'agapisa

ESC-wise, 2011 is clearly the year of the dramatic ballad. Which is how it differs from any previous years, obviously. ;-)

This is another of those songs that start out very low-key and then build up to something rather dramatic about halfway. This sometimes works and sometimes seriously doesn't work. In this case I think it works, actually really well too ... because they've managed to insert something that 'feels' really authentic into that section, something that I immediately feel quite drawn to as being - to my ignorant mind - rather genuinely Cypriotic. That may turn out to be a really good move, a lot of people will probably like that. Hopefully with this song Cyprus will be able to break their five year run of bad luck.

The singer is some kind of X-Factor winner or something like that ... not in his favor, IMO, but what can you do. His voice is OK ... nothing special, but passable. A bigger problem is that he seems to have zero charisma on stage. The live presentation that I've seen is also bland and boring. So this song will have to rely on its own strengths in Düsseldorf. That may be enough since the lineup is so even this year, with very few songs that really stand out. But the audience will have to be paying a bit of attention for that to work, though. We'll see. Not the winner by a long shot, certainly.

This is Christos Mylordos - what a fantastic name!! hard to believe it really is his real name :-) - performing San angelos s'agapisa by Andreas Anastasiou and Michalis Antoniou. They will be competing for Cyprus on Thursday, May 12th.

Live performance, but not AFAIK from their national final:

Widescreen here.

This is the official video. I'm posting it because you have to see it to believe how much it sucks. :-D

Widescreen here.

Lyrics with translation here.

SLOVENIA 2011 - No One

I've been a little confused about this song ... whether she was going to be performing in Slovenian or English. I didn't look into it too closely, but was hoping against hope that it'd be the former. But alas, it seems to be the latter. She performed in Slovenian in their national final, but of course they're changing it for Düsseldorf. Sigh.

Slovenia is another country that tends to do badly even though they send good entries. Like Switzerland ... or as I like to call it, Switzerland the Damned. I don't get why this happens ... I mean, mediocre results would be understandable, but consistently shitty results I don't really get. Slovenia has only been able to get to the final once since 2004, and even then they didn't end up higher than 15th place. I don't know how they manage it. I'm afraid it may in part be to do with the presentation - or in fact I'm sure that's part of it - just look up their entries in 2007 and 2008 and see how they did with those, respectively. Alas.

In Switzerland's case it's probably different, but Slovenia certainly can't be accused of not taking chances and not being original. Opera, classical, pop, ballads, uptempo numbers, complete and utter trash ... they've really tried a lot of different things over the past few years. It never seems to work. This year they're trying something else again - a completely standard ESC ditty with a pretty young thing in a tight dress. Maybe this time they're on to something. ;-)

They may be, actually. This song is kind of low-key, but also rather dramatic ... obviously not very catchy, but ballads rarely are ... although the chorus does have a bit of a hook to it ... but the song is really gripping when you're hearing it. The singer has a good voice with some character ... she's pretty and the performance is pretty good. I like this song a lot and I'm happy to see Slovenia back on track after last year's atrocious misfire. With their luck I wouldn't take anything for granted but IMO they could well get to the final with this one. Fingers crossed. :-)

This is Maja Keuc performing No One (or rather Vanilija) by Matjaž Vlašič and Urša Vlašič. They will be competing for Slovenia on Thursday, May 12th. Good luck. :-)

Widescreen here.

Lyrics with translation here.

LATVIA 2011 - Angel In Disguise

Again I have to apologize for my shallow-mindedness and prejudice. When I hear a band, or a solo performer, or whatever, who have given up their actual names and instead chosen to call themselves something that is just beyond pretentious, that immediately makes me dislike their musical efforts before I've even heard it. I'm sorry, I can't help it. I think I was just born this way.

So, when this song won in Latvia back in February, I didn't like it at all before I'd listened to it, just because the duo performing it call themselves Musiqq. WTF? Get over yourselves, silly boys. >:-(

Anyway ... I want to dislike it heartily, but alas, I cannot. I don't exactly like it that much either, but it doesn't completely suck (as I was hoping it would). You may think it does if you watch the video below, but wait for the chorus. It's really catchy. The verses are the problem ... they're trying to rap, they're just doing it very badly. Their costumes aren't much to write home about and the performance isn't really ... um ... it's kind of embarrassing, to be honest. But it does have some potential, because the studio version actually sounds pretty good. So I think it will depend a lot on how they've developed this entry since February. Whatever they've done I don't think they'll get very far. Probably won't see this in the final. But they may not totally bomb. ;-)

This is Musiqq (gag me with a spoon) performing Angel In Disguise by Marats Ogļezņevs - he's one of the guys in the band, so kudos for that. He will be competing for Latvia on Thursday, May 12th.

Widescreen here.

Lyrics here.