Skip to main content

EUROVISION 2018 REVIEW: LATVIA, LITHUANIA, RUSSIA, CROATIA


Latvia - Laura Rizzotto - Funny girl
Latvian-Brazilian Laura Rizzotto (23) has lived her life so far between Minnesota, Rio de Janeiro, New York and Latvia. She has studied in Berklee (Boston), California and Columbia Universities so she certainly knows music. And no doubt she's talented singer and songwriter. That doesn't however hide the fact her Funny girl needs some what acquired taste for this kind of music. Generally this could be my cup of tea so to speak, but no. This is dull and uninteresting. Live it works a bit better but about one minute mark my attention drifts elsewhere and I find myself checking the contents of my fridge while she's still singing her song. Very long three minutes. 2/10

Lithuania - Ieva Zasimauskaitè - When we're old
I managed to ignore this song all those eternal weeks the Lithuanian selection was going on - maybe because I didn't follow it live and just checked the videos later, if even that. I did watch the final, and all of sudden I fell in love with this song. So fragile, simple. I checked the Lithuanian version and was under a spell. Even the remix fits and ads something to the mix. The best Lithuanian entry to date by far!
Ieva (24) was 5th time lucky in the national selection and while being somewhat ignored by the fandom in the bubble could become a real surprise in Lisbon. This is touching, real with a message and if she performs it well when it matters, who knows? This deserves the final more than most. What else can I say? I love all the versions of this little pearl. 9/10

Russia - Julia Samoylova - I won't break
Julia Samoylova (29) should have been there already last year. Or really she shouldn't be here this time either. Last year used as a propaganda weapon between Russia and Ukraine her presence this year feels even more out of place than last year. Her first live performance underlines the whole madness of this affair. Russia would have so much better to offer if they played by the cards to win or do well with music alone. Not propaganda. This put aside, judging only her voice and presence, and the song's quality this has no place in the final, but sadly will steal some other better one's place because this is Russia. One can only hope for justice and Russia staying in the semi as with this package they don't deserve anything else. The song has zero originality no matter how deep you dig. 2/10

Croatia - Franka - Crazy
Last lady in her twenties in this post is Franka Batelić (25). Her career started in a talent show in 2007 with a win. She also tried to get to Eurovision already in 2009 without luck but went on to win local Dancing with Stars before retiring from the business. Now she's back as internally chosen artist. Crazy has somewhat disappointed the expectations and no wonder. Great production values and video for sure but... what about the song? Echoes of Sam Brown's Stop come to mind immediately and that's just about it. Long and rather boring quite depressing three minutes that can of course be hidden by a stellar staging and performance but I doubt it's enough to make this qualify. Which is a shame as it seems Croatian tv really tried this time. Sometimes too much trying leads nowhere but sterility... 4/10

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

ESC 2016 WISH LIST: MARGARET FOR POLAND

Małgorzata Jamroży aka Margaret has also been tipped for Eurovision and apparently she did turn it down but she'd be perfect. She's got a look and persona you can't unnotice nor forget, she's got hit songs, she has been voted or nominated for everything from Trendy artist to the Hope of the Year, Fashion Icon and Glamour Woman of the year besides the usual best video, song, album, debut..... Oh she's also a fashion designer! She's very clever with social medias and would surely use it to her advantage if selected for Stockholm 2016. Her debut album is titled Add the blonde , do we need to say more? Except it includes mostly Swedish written pop tunes like Tell me how are ya , Wasted , Start a fire and Heartbeat . And of course her debut single and internationally noticed Thank you very much that you can enjoy below with all its anti-textil feel. I think she's Eurovision perfection, she's cheeky and fun, can we have her?

SONGS OF THE YEAR 2015: #5 KRISTA SIEGFRIDS - ON & OFF

Krista Siegfrids is delivering nice pop tunes one after another and this one is particularly catchy and soon you will be singing along..... Hopefully her Melodifestivalen entry will be equally good!

ESC 2016 BELARUS: NAKED WITH WOLVES?

Today's funniest Eurovision related story comes from Belarus. Some sources claim Ivan wants to perform on stage naked and with live wolf or wolves. It surely would be a first on Eurovision stage! We have seen some forgotten underwear over the years, and some cardbox animals though..... Is it time to take things a bit further?  No, according the rules live animals are not allowed, and Eurovision being a family show nudity won't do either. (It seems to be ok to be half naked if you are a dancer though..... )

ESC 2016 ARMENIA: IT'S IVETA MUKUCHYAN!

Armenian tv has revealed tonight the name of their artist for the 2016 Eurovision song contest in Stockholm. It's 29-year-old Iveta Mukuchyan. Born in Yerevan she moved with her family to Germany when she was 6. At 23 she moved back to Armenia and continued her music studies. She has taken part in the Armenian Pop Idol finishing 5th in 2010 and she also did The Voice of Germany . In 2012 she was voted the Sexiest Armenian.  Armenian tv has made a call for songwriters all over the world to submit a song for her by November 13, 2015.  Let's see which direction the final choice will go, Freak or her latest release that you can hear below.... Whatever it is it will be an improvement from last year's fiasco.....

Regina Lund - naked and censored

Regina Lund's new video Jag är osynlig was censored by Youtube only minutes after it had been uploaded. In the video she was playing a female Jesus who gets crusified in the end. "I was shocked!" she says. "There's nothing more naked in it as in every church! It's ok to have naked man hanging on the wall but my nakedness is too much on internet? ". Oh well, no comment. She's prepairing a new album Dare Regina Lund and we of course remember her from her Melodifestivalen 2007 adventure with Rainbow star .

CAROLA'S BOOBS STEAL THE SHOW, SVT APOLOGIES

Update! Another thing got Swedes talking last night: Carola's boobs when she was giving away an award. This is not the first time her boombs cause headlines; her misfortunate adventures in the 80's in Japan wer explained with her boobs being too big for Japanese market. Ok.... Or was it the song ? Anyways, Carola apologies and says she thinks the dress is stylish and elegant (even her friends said so) and she's a mature woman in her 40s, not a 16-year-old girl and looks like one. The Swedish Oscars, Guldbagge awards were given out last night. Carola was there as a guest star to sing Barbra Streisand's The way we were when honoring the movie stars who passed away during 2012. However, the cameras were too much on Carola, not on the stars showed in photos in the background and that upset many viewers as that part of the show was to celebrate them, not Carola. Oh well...  The producer of the show tells in Aftonbladet the part of the show was made the sam

MALTA: THE QUEEN OF L-GHANJA TAL-POPLU - CORAZÓN MIZZI!

If The Travellers have proven recently one can do great singing in Maltese there's also someone else doing great stuff: Corazón Mizzi. While in Malta I was looking for some Maltese CDs only to find out they pretty much don't exist, and the most helpful staff in legendary D'Amato - probably the world's oldest record store today - suggested me Corazón's Hawn jien (2014 album). Having nothing else really to bring home I decided to go or it without even realizing it is the Corazón from Maltese Eurovision selections. And what a find it was! Thank you D'Amato! But let's start from the obvious: Eurovision. Corazón has been offering us songs in the Maltese Eurovision selection since 2009, actually making her best result this year with Falling glass , one of my favorites btw. I also liked last year's Secretly but that failed even the final. But Corazón's true calling is singer-songwriter in Maltese as this excellent album clearly shows. We have al

EUROVISION TWEETS REVEAL DETAILS....

Brandwatch, one the world's leading providers of analytics of social medias has summed up the Twitter buzz during the Eurovision 2013 final on May 18, 2013. Over 1,8 million tweets have been analyzed and it's rather fascinating stuff. On top you can see the figure showing topics. Romania and Ireland got the tweeting go wild as did Greece, Belarus, Malta and Armenia. And you can see political tweets took over during the voting..... The figure above is for the emotions. Once again Romania and Greece got it going wild. A lot of love and joy was spread all over during the show while hate & anger increased during the voting. Is someone surprised? But have a look and analize yourself here . And here you can access to country by country details. Did Ukraine's giant get people's attention? or Moldova's outfit? Did Ireland have sex factor? Or Azerbaijan? And what about Belgium's dance routine?

SUMMER SONGS 2015: ANNA TATANGELO - INAFFERRABILE

Anna Tatangelo is back with her kitchiest video to date, I guess. Inafferabile has a video that surely gets your attention but the song.... well, it's summer! Libera this is not for sure. Enjoy the scenery!