The fourth and final heat (*sad face*) takes place in Malmö this coming Saturday. So forget Eric, Sara, and Shirley (for now!) – we have eight new artists and songs to obsess over for the next week! Heat 4 is traditionally the strongest in any Melodifestivalen contest. The names this week are certainly big, the songwriters this week are quite possibly the biggest and most international songwriters that Melodifestivalen has ever had, and indeed Christer Björkman did say to us in Luleå a few weeks ago when we met him, that this heat IS the strongest this year. So it’s fair to assume that it’s going to be ABSOLUTE CARNAGE on Saturday night in Malmö. We’ll be there of course, and are approaching it with a mixture of excitement and cold, hard fear!
As always, we’ll be publishing our report from the front row at the Friday afternoon rehearsals on Friday evening. The studio versions will be uploaded to SVT’s website on Saturday afternoon, and the grand contest itself takes place on Saturday evening.
And here are the songs that will be battling it out;
…………………………………………………………………………………………….
Melody Club – ‘The Hunter’ (Melody Club)
Relatively popular in the grand scheme of things, and surely a safe bet for progressing to at least Andra Chansen, if not directly to the final.
Julia Alvgard – ‘Better Or Worse’ (Manne Hjelm, Ola Holstad, Joar Lenz and Julia Alvgard)
Most Melodifestivalen fans may already be familiar with this one, as it was one of the two winners of the webjoker competition late last year. We liked it then and we’re sure that we’ll like it now, but how will she fare amongst all of these much bigger names?
Lasse Stefanz – ‘En Blick Och Nånting Händer’ (Alexander Bard, Ola Håkansson and Tim Norell)
Now THIS is the kind of dansband music we can get excited about, NOT those Playtones from last week! We’re hoping for a schlager number from these dansband legends, and with those composers on board, we don’t think we’re gonna be disappointed.
Linda Pritchard – ‘Alive’ (Fredrik Kempe and Oscar Görres)
Those vocals on a Fredrik Kempe pop ballad – it’s clearly going to be immense. Ballads haven’t been doing very well at Melodifestivalen so far this year, but if anything can buck the trend, it’s someone with a voice like Linda’s. The last note in particular is just incredible, Fredrik told us at the weekend.
Anders Fernette – ‘Run’ (Desmond Child, Negin Djafari, Hugo Lira, Ian-Paolo Lira and Thomas Gustafsson)
He’s a popular gent on paper, and with those international songwriters at the helm, one would think that success is guaranteed. But after his contemporaries Sebastian and Christian Walz proved over the last two weeks, nothing is guaranteed where the Swedish televoting public are concerned.
Linda Bengtzing – ‘E Det Fel På Mig’ (Pontus Assarsson, Thomas G:son, Jörgen Ringqvist and Daniel Barkman)
Linda Bengtzing + Thomas G:son = multiple orgasm of the schlager variety. We know she can bring it, we know that those composers can back her up, but does Sweden want to see any of that in the final? We really REALLY hope so!
Nicke Borg – ‘Leaving Home’ (Jojo Borg Larsson, Nicke Borg, Fredrik Thomander and Anders Wikström)
Like it or not, this genre always does well at Melodifestivalen, so long as it’s kept to a minimum and done well. One wonders though if the more adult and alternative type of voter will be stuck for choice between this and Melody Club, and if perhaps the two entries will cancel each other out?
Love Generation – ‘Dance Alone’ (RedOne, Bilal ‘The Chef’, Teddy Sky, AJ Junior, Jimmy Joker and BeatGeek)
One of our favourite new artists to come out of Scandinavia in 2010, we love these girls. And with Red One plus his team of hitmakers behind them, this is seen as one of the most likely winners of the competition. A 30 second clip of it appeared online briefly and accidentally last week, and has received mixed reviews from fans (we really like it, personally). With Danny and Eric Saade, the big club number with the massive stage show has won two of the three heats so far in this year’s Melodifestivalen – leaving it open for Love Generation to step up and repeat that trend.
