Romania
There is a strong argument that this got through on the back of the fact that 2/7 of the jury had a complete change of mind between reviewing it and the national final, but the less said about that the better.
Esther is trying hard to sell the song in the preview video by borrowing Alexis Carrington’s shoulder pads and giving it some hard shoulder.
It does everything you would expect it to do, but Esther isn’t actually any good at selling the package, and it leaves me cold, wanting to go “next”.
It’s well-written, if formulaic, and without some brown envelopes full of Lei, I suspect Romania will be missing out…. Or perhaps they’ll claim the Televote didn’t work, like they did last year.
Phil’s Score – 3 Points
Russia
Oh look, Sergey is back, and this time he seems to have toned down the ‘I need to win for the fatherland’ vibe, and put in a proper song.
‘Scream’ definitely has all of the Eurovision-winning credentials you might expect from a team that are desperate to win the contest.
To me, though, instead of a refreshing change, it smacks of box-ticking so they can get a good result.
I know the Swedes do that as well, but this sounds even more cynical, and maybe that’s just me and my inbuilt bias.
Having said that, I like how the middle eight syncopates to break up the blandness of the rest of the song, although it peters out towards the end.
Yes, it will be given a good performance, but I am a bit weary of the same old, same old.
Phil’s Score – 6 points
San Marino
A quick musical history lesson for you: the person who co-wrote this with Serhat – Mary Susan Applegate – also wrote the lyric for the Jennifer Rush/Celine Dion hit, ‘The Power Of Love’. Isn’t it amazing what you can do for a shedload of Euros round the back of bins these days?
They’ve clearly raided one of said bins, because the only decent thing about this is Serhat … and even that is relative.
‘Say na na na’ is hardly the height of lyrical genius and has a tune that is as simple as simple can be. (I’ve got GCSE in music and my arrangements were more complex.)
Fans and opinion formers will love it, and I too love it for all the reasons it’s wrong, but, sorry Serhat…
Phil’s Score – 2 Points (12 in my heart, of course!)
