Friday 6 April 2018

Eurovision 2018 song reviews (part 4) - Lithuania, Armenia, Austria, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia

With almost month to go until the contest, we power through with the track reviews for Eurovision 2018!

Lithuania - Ieva Zasimauskaitė - "When We're Old"
Semi final: 1
My score: 6/10
Chances of qualifying: 5/10
Can it make the top 10? Very unlikely but I could see a scenario where it could.
Can it win? Nope.

As with the vast majority of this year's national selections, Lithuania's seemingly never-ending marathon „Eurovizijos“ dainų konkurso nacionalinė atranka 2018 did not go my way. On the plus side, the entry they selected is far superior to what they ended up with last year - so yay for that. 

As for 'When We're Old', it's a fairly unremarkable, mousy love song about growing old with that special someone - groundbreaking. Ieva's whispery, affected vocals are really not my thing, but I can admit that she has stage presence and can sell this live. The melody is memorable enough and she's a very charming performer - so I could see televoters and juries alike respecting this. Unfortunately for her, she's in the bloodbath semi and is sandwiched between some of the biggest favourites in the contest - so her chances of qualification are slim. This is a borderline qualifier at best.


Armenia - Sevak Khanagyan - "Qami"
Semi final: 1
My score: 7.5/10
Chances of qualifying: 7/10
Can it make the top 10? Possibly.
Can it win? I don't think so.

Armenia are one of my favourite Eurovision countries, constantly delivering quality bops year after year - Qele Qele, Jan Jan, Apricot Stone, LoveWave, Fly With Me to name a few. They continued to serve quality this year with one of the stronger national selections of 2018. Even though 'Qami' wasn't my favourite to win Depi Evratesil,  its victory was well-deserved. 

I love that this is the first Eurovision entry to be sung entirely in Armenian, but otherwise this is a rather safe entry for a delegation known for taking risks. Even though it takes a while to properly get going, Sevak delivers on the vocals and Armenia have form for staging. I'm fairly confident this will be going through. 


Austria - Cesár Sampson - "Nobody but You"
Semi final: 1
My score: 8.5/10
Chances of qualifying: 8/10
Can it make the top 10? Yes.
Can it win? I don't think so but I won't rule it out.

From one excellent male vocalist to another, we move onto Austria's Cesár Sampson. Internal selections usually bring quality, and this year was no exception. After performing at Eurovision twice before as a backing vocalist, it's time for Cesár to take centre stage. 

With one of the best videos of the year, I have high hopes for the staging. If they get the staging right, I could see this contemporary slice of gospel pop make the top half of the scoreboard, top 10 at a push. Semi one may be a bloodbath, but I could see Cesár making it out unscathed. 


Georgia - Iriao - "For You"
Semi final: 2
My score: 7.5/10
Chances of qualifying: 5/10
Can it make the top 10? Probably not.
Can it win? No. 

One of the first acts to be announced...with the last song to be released; Georgia's entry this year is a bit of an enigma. It probably has the least amount of hype out of all the entries, and yet I could see magic happen when this hits Lisbon, especially with those incredible harmonies.

After just missing out on a spot in the final last year, I'm sure just making it to Saturday night would be a victory for Georgia. Because of how weak open semi 2 is this year, I'm not willing to rule this out just yet. Perhaps the public will fancy a spot of ethno-jazz and chuck this a vote?


Hungary - AWS - "Viszlát nyár"
Semi final: 2
My score: 7.5/10
Chances of qualifying: 7/10
Can it make the top 10? Possibly.
Can it win? No. 

On the topic of genre diversity, we move onto a slice of Hungarian post-hardcore. Like many, I wasn't *quite* sure what I was listening to, but with repeated listens this turned out to be quite the banger. Success at Eurovision is very much dependant on atmosphere and emotion (see: Salvador Sobral last year), so I can see a lot of merit in this. 

Although one could dismiss this as being too aggressive and off-putting to do well at Eurovision, I would argue the contrary. This is completely unique in this field and will pick up support from what I call 'anti-eurovision fans' (people who watch the show to bitch, moan and generally be miserable) - and that could see them into the final and out of the bottom 5. Oh, and the key change SNATCHES.


Latvia - Laura Rizzotto - "Funny Girl"
Semi final: 2
My score: 7/10
Chances of qualifying: 5.5/10
Can it make the top 10? No.
Can it win? No. 

I'm far less confident about the success of Latvia's entry this year. Mid-tempos are notoriously difficult to get right at Eurovision; they're too slow to dance to, too up-tempo to evoke emotion and generally highly dependant on staging. Luckily for the Latvian delegation, they have an excellent vocalist and performer to tie this all together.

With an unfortunate running position in semi 2, I've recently become a lot less confident in the ability for this song to make the final. 'Funny Girl' lacks a hook, and for that I cannot see this connecting with televoters. Regardless, I think Laura can bring this to life in Lisbon and deliver a performance to be proud of. To me, this is a weaker version of Croatia's song. 


Updated ranking:

Semi 1 (by chances of qualification)
1. Israel - Netta - "Toy" - 9.5
2. Czech Republic - Mikolas Josef - "Lie To Me" - 8
3. Estonia - Elina Nechayeva - "La Forza" - 8
4. Austria - Cesár Sampson - "Nobody but You"
5. Belgium - SENNEK - "A Matter of Time" - 8
6. Bulgaria - EQUINOX - "Bones" - 7.5
7. Armenia - Sevak Khanagyan - "Qami" - 7
8. Azerbaijan - Aisel - "X My Heart" - 6
9. Lithuania - Ieva Zasimauskaitė - "When We're Old"
10. Belarus - Alekseev - "Forever" - 4.5
11. Albania - Eugent Bushpepa - "Mall" - 4.5
12. Iceland - Ari Ólafsson - "Our Choice" - 2

Semi 2 (by chances of qualification)
1. Norway - Alexander Rybak - "That's How You Write A Song" - 9
2. Denmark - Rasmussen - "Higher Ground" - 9
3. The Netherlands - Waylon - "Outlaw In 'Em" - 9
4. Australia - Jessica Mauboy - "We Got Love" - 8
5. Russia - Julia Samoylova - "I Won't Break" - 8
6. Moldova - DoReDos - "My Lucky Day" - 7.5
7. Hungary - AWS - "Viszlát nyár" - 7
8. Romania - The Humans - "Goodbye" - 6
9. Latvia - Laura Rizzotto - "Funny Girl" - 5.5
10. Georgia - Iriao - "For You" - 5
11. Serbia - Sanja Ilić & Balkanika - "Nova Deca" - 5
12. San Marino - Jessika feat. Jenifer Brening - "Who We Are" - 1

Overall ranking so far (by personal score - ties broken by preference)
1. Israel - Netta - "Toy" - 9.5
2. Estonia - Elina Nechayeva - "La Forza" - 9
3. Belgium - SENNEK - "A Matter of Time" - 9
4. Denmark - Rasmussen - "Higher Ground" - 8.5
5. Austria - Cesár Sampson - "Nobody but You" - 8.5
6. Bulgaria - EQUINOX - "Bones" - 8
7. Serbia - Sanja Ilić & Balkanika - "Nova Deca" - 8
8. Moldova - DoReDos - "My Lucky Day" - 8
9. Australia - Jessica Mauboy - "We Got Love" - 7.5
10. Azerbaijan - Aisel - "X My Heart" - 7.5
11. Armenia - Sevak Khanagyan - "Qami" - 7.5
12. Russia - Julia Samoylova - "I Won't Break" - 7.5
13. Georgia - Iriao - "For You" - 7.5
14. Hungary - AWS - "Viszlát nyár" - 7.5
15. Albania - Eugent Bushpepa - "Mall" - 7.5
16. Latvia - Laura Rizzotto - "Funny Girl" - 7
17. Czech Republic - Mikolas Josef - "Lie To Me" - 7
18. Lithuania - Ieva Zasimauskaitė - "When We're Old" - 6
19. The Netherlands - Waylon - "Outlaw In 'Em" - 6
20. Belarus - Alekseev - "Forever" - 6
21. San Marino - Jessika feat. Jenifer Brening - "Who We Are"
22. Romania - The Humans - "Goodbye" - 4
23. Norway - Alexander Rybak - "That's How You Write A Song" - 3
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