Melodifestivalen 2011 is finally upon us, and scandipop.co.uk is here amongst the throng of it all in Luleå, North of Sweden (actually, we think it’s North of everywhere in the world!).
Last night SVT uploaded 1 minute video clips from all of yesterday’s rehearsals. This afternoon though, we sat through the full rehearsals of each of the artists. They all got 30 minutes on the stage to perfect their songs,vocals, choreography, and camera poses, before tonight’s first dress rehearsals which will be open to the public, and tomorrow’s BIG SHOW!!!
And here’s what we thought of them all;
Dilba: ‘Try Again’
This song is our favourite of the heat. A pounding, pumping powerhouse of unrelenting dance music. The production on it is so exciting, and the lyrics totally uplifting and inspirational. It’s not ‘tears on the dancefloor’ (like for example, Robyn’s ‘Dancing On My Own’, it’s ‘wipe those tears away, and get back up dancing on the dancefloor’! And with a bassline like the one this song offers, we don’t know how anyone could fail to heed such a message!
The staging is jump-out-at-you stunning too. A troupe of eight hot dancers dressed in black jumpsuits with white body length stripes, cavort and carry around a delicate and demure Dilba who’s dressed in white corseted knee length dress with black stripes. Sort of like how loyal subjects would to their Queen in a time gone by…………but this time it’s their CLUB Queen in a future age to come!
It’s also during this performance that the lyrics come into their own too – particularly in the middle eight during an almost beautiful moment between Dilba and her young leading male dancer. He’s broken, on his knees, and looking for guidance. And she makes it all better with her sage wisdom, advice, and experience – ‘Try Again’!
Swingfly: ‘Me & My Drum’
We think the song sounds like Outkast’s ‘Hey Ya’ crossed with Frida och Headline’s ‘Upp Och Hoppa’ and given a hefty injection of speed. We like it. Not as something we think we’d listen to after the contest, but definitely within the context of Melodifestivalen. And it’d be good in a club too – so long as Dilba and Danny had already been played!
The performance is happy, bouncey, and quite infectiously so too. It sort of carries on from Dilba’s black and white theme. Swingfly himself is joined onstage throughout the song by a guy and a girl helping him out, so it feels more like a group number than a solo song. But that just gives it an extra energy which is needed for this song.
Jenny Silver: ‘Something In Your Eyes’
This song is just pure unadulterated joy, with a hefty dosage of unashamed gay abandon! It’s very traditional schlager, but dressed up in a suitably modern way. It’s got a fabulous key change and it ends with a triumphant repetition of the song’s title. We’d perhaps compare it to a little bit of ‘Story Of A Heart’ by Benny Andersson’s Band, and a lot of the recent Almighty remix of Tight Fit’s ‘Fantasy Island’. This, is what we more or less live for!
Unlike the song’s traditional roots, the performance is much more modern. She’s flanked by a team of male dancers, but lords over them, confidentally strutting her way across the stage, and navigating herself around a lit-up mic stand. Although she still manages a beautifully chessy bit of choreography to accompany the “something in your eyes” line.
Her frock is quite nice, but it does have these unneccessary strips of material hanging off the arms, which are too long and get in the way of the choreography. At one stage she was singing an entire verse with one of them strewn unglamorously across her face! The dress itself though (without those bits) is fab, even if it was quite arsecheek-tastically short from where we were sitting in the front row!
Jonas Matsson: ‘On My Own’
After the last three numbers, some might welcome this as a welcome break in genre, tempo, and style. We didn’t though. To our ears it sounded very bland, and not impressive at all. We’d heard this song before, as it came through the web-joker contest, but that just reinforced to us how forgettable it was – as it was as though we were hearing it for the first time in rehearsals today. This contest is all about variation though, and we’re sure that both him and the song will have their fans.
The staging at least, was actually quite interesting, and we did enjoy that part. It begins with him on a beach deck chair in front of a tropical backdrop, until he gets up and jaunts onto the stage to join his band. And even then it’s a pleasant scene, with the delightfully merry backing singers and musicians all having a happy-go-lucky lark!
Le Kid: ‘Oh My God’
The song is very typical Le Kid, like a more uptempo and bouncy ‘We Should Go Home Together’. The chorus is catchy, and the post-chorus section of “oh-oh-oh” is even catchier. It would sound great outside of the contest and works very well in the contest too. It’s a real head-bopper, this one. And we were beaming from ear to ear by the second performance we saw of it (during the first, it was just open-mouthed joy!). We just hope that Sweden realises that this is their next big export, as much as we do. And like Alcazar and Malena Ernman do too!
As for the performance, well it is just so much fun. In every way you could hope for. They get it so right, like we knew they would. It’s ADORABLE! From their pretty little outfits (the ones they’re wearing in the pic at the top of the article), to the big dancing sweets that join them on stage, not forgetting the giant cupcakes which hang from the ceiling. And we love the whole mixture of Helena and Johanna’s coquettish facial expressions, Anton and Felix’s unabashed enthusiasm, and Mårta’s understated nonchalance. They’re all as cute as buttons, chocolate buttons. It’s brilliant! THEY’RE brilliant!
Rasmus Viberg: ‘Social Butterfly’
Hmmm, it’s good, but it’s just missing that special something to make it wow enough. And in this heat it just gets lost amongst much bigger and better tracks.
The performance is a bit Hanson meets Rednex. Make of that what you will. Although we did quite like the sight of an enthusiastic Rasmus bouncing around the stage. He’s a charmer. And the band are at least presented in an interesting way – each placed on different sized podiums rather than just standing around the edge of the stage
Pernilla Andersson: ‘Desperados’
Again, this just doesn’t stand out to us in this otherwise super strong heat. We did find ourselves enjoying it a lot more on the third listen though. And perhaps we’ll like it a lot more in stereo, on its own, outside of this heat. But inside, we feel like it gets stifled. We think it’s progress further in the competition, as it’s so different to anything else on offer tomorrow tonight.
The staging is beautiful. Deep red lighting, velvet curtains, and chandeliers. It’s a very classy performance. And we love her short black lace frock too.
Danny: ‘In The Club’
This finishes the heat on a huge, almighty BANG! It’s massively wow. One slight critique could be that it’s focused on the production so much that it’s compromised any melody that exists within the song. But when the production is that immense (and it really is IMMENSE!), then you really don’t care at all. It sounds stunning in the arena, and we’re sure it’s gonna be brilliant on stereo too. It’s dance music, but almost like the Americans are doing dance music now, not the Swedes. It’s definitely very international, and could work not just outside this contest, but outside the country too.
The performance is equally as spectacular as the song. The choreography is tight beyond belief, absolutely perfect. And his vocals sound great too, despite the manic bopping around. Our favourite element of the staging is the fact that he begins the song by singing against a backdrop, which is then opened to convey the opening of the doors of this club he speaks of, and the TV viewer is greeted by the huge lights and the vast arena, as the inside of this club. It’s really impressive, we liked it.
There’s no way we’re gonna be able predict how the result will go tomorrow night, so we’re not even gonna try. But we want to see Dilba, Le Kid, Jenny Silver, and Danny progress from this heat. PLEASE!
Tomorrow night you can watch the show live at 7pm UK time, on www.svtplay.se. And we’d strongly suggest you do, it’s going to be amazing! Such an enjoyable heat. So much so that despite sitting through all of those multiple rehearsals just now, we’re going to the dress rehearsals tonight and tomorrow afternoon too, as well as the actual show. And very much looking forward to it!
