If I say "Eurovision Song Contest" or "Schlager", you say what? If you don't have a clue what I'm talking about or if the concept makes you want to hurl, you should stop reading. The rest of it will not be interesting. But if you're a fan like I am, please feel free to continue.
Sweden decide which song to send to Eurovision Song Contest by having four elimination rounds, followed by a "Second-chance" and finally a finale, where a winner is selected. On Saturday it's time for the first elimination round. As a preparation, I will write a brief presentation about the eight artist preforming on Saturday and my expectations. Please know that I write this without knowing anything about the actual song they will be preforming:
Dilba: By far mostly know for her 1996 single, "I'm Sorry". She has released a few albums since but she has never been as successful as with her first single. I'm not too familiar with her work and don't know what to expect, but I do like her voice and I did really like "I'm Sorry".
Swingfly: He's a American-Swedish rapper mostly know for collaborations with Swedish and Internationally known artistis, such as Dr.Alban, Looptroop, Ken, Robyn and Lutricia McNeal. He had major success together with Teddybears Stockholm and the single "Hey Boy", which I happen to LOVE! He's music is upbeat and has a clear melody and I have high expectations as far as music quality goes. I'm pretty sure he will not preform a song "suitable" for Eurovision, but I'm pretty certain I will be jumping around to it in the near future.
Jenny Silver: Jenny Silver was originally known as Jenny Öhlund and she had her musical breakthrough in the beginning of the 90s as a Swedish country singer (aka dansband) in the band Candela. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TXJXOTZY3o
But over the recent years she has gone solo and is now doing alternative pop music. She participated in last year's Melody Festival, but didn't make the first cut. No wonder, if you ask me. I did not appreciate her last year!
Jonas Matson: He is a web-joker. He is a young and totally unknown artist and not elected by a jury to participate. He was one amongst thousands who sent in their song to the official website and the general public wonted him in. Because of the special circumstances, I have heard this song and it's best described as a young guy with a guitar singing an upbeat summer song. Like Jack Johnson, but not as professional. It will be interesting to see if he holds up when asked to preform live. Last year's Webjoker failed miserably. I couldn't find any of his own material on Youtube, only covers.
Le Kid: I had never heard of them, as a group, before this competition, however three of the five members have previous experiences of the Melody Festival, but as songwriters and producers. Le Kid has several videos on Youtube and after scanning through some of them I would described them as Gwen Stefani and Katy Perry's love child, if they had one in the 90s. I have no idea what to expect, but I'm hoping for it to be good.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Qw4BURBbfU
Rasmus Viberg: Yet another young and unknown artist. He has released a few song on his MySpace and on Youtube, in a group called Oldschool. After listening to a few songs I can't help but to smile. I do have a soft spot for adolescent pop-punk. The teenager in me is jumping up and down the sofa just like I did when I used to listen to Blink-182 and No Doubt. But I have no idea if this is the kind of music he will preform on Saturday, when he is going solo. I hope so.
Pernilla Andersson: After six albums since 1999, she is no newcomer to music. She deserves extra cudos because she wrote the music and lyrics herself. I would describe her as a classic singer-songwriter. She has a lovely voice and is sure to deliver a confident and professional performance, however, I'm not sure how exciting her material will be.
Danny: If all Eurovision voters would have been 15 year old girls, Danny would easily win the whole shebang. He became famous through Swedish Idol 2006. Since then he has released solo singles such as "Tokyo" but also singles with his boy-band E.M.D. He performed at the Melody Festival in 2009 with E.M.D and they made their way into the finale with "Baby Goodbye". He is a fairly main-stream pop-artist and I'm expecting a solid delivery this year.
Without knowing anything about the competing songs, I'm mostly looking forward to see what Swingfly and Le Kid has to offer. My guess is that Danny will go straight to the finale, maybe accompanied by Pernilla Andersson. I will report back next week, after the fact.
For those of you who are interested you can watch the live streaming on Saturday, 8pm (CET):
how i wish i could watch the live stream..
ReplyDeleteAre you sure you can't? The show starts on Saturdays, 7 PM (CET). You should be able to stream it live at www.svt.se.
ReplyDeleteYou can also use the following link to se all the past week's shows: http://svtplay.se/t/102943/melodifestivalen
Good luck!