Last night Iceland chose the song which will represent them at this year’s Eurovision Song Contest in May. ‘Hear Them Calling’ by Greta Salóme.
This year’s Icelandic selection – twelve songs and two heats – has been pretty bad. With only two of the twelve songs being anything worth listening to (thankfully the winning song was one of the two, along with ‘Now’ by Alda Dis). Nonetheless, they’ve escaped the whole process with a song that they can proudly present to the rest of Europe. A pairing of dancepop with folkpop with a dramatic melody that begs the need for an OTT performance. And boy do we get one!
Greta takes to the stage alone, and remains in solitude for the full three minutes – aside from a big screen animation going on behind her. It’s a performance that manages to borrow from both of Sweden’s recent Eurovision winners, starting off as ‘Euphoria’, before turning into ‘Heroes’ (though in general it perhaps has more in common with a section of the performance of a Eurovision winner that never was – ‘The Girl’ by Charlotte Perrelli!). It might be a bit risky to take this performance to Eurovision so soon after 2012 and 2015. Lest sneers from anyone who was sober enough to remember Loreen and MZW, detract from the quality of the song. But regardless of obvious comparisons, the three minute song and performance combination are compelling enough to give Iceland a shot at achieveing a very respectable placing in this year’s contest. And besides – Beyoncé did it first anyway!
‘Hear Them Calling’;
