With all four heats now having taken place, there’s one more week to go until the Melodifestivalen final. And what happens in that week is the Andra Chansen round. Literally translating as The Second Chance, it’s where the songs which finished in 3rd and 4th place in their heats all get a second chance to reach the final.
In previous years, only two of the eight songs in Andra Chansen would progress the final. But this year SVT have expanded it to four songs. Meaning that the 2015 Melodifestivalen final will have a whopping twelve songs in it. The more the merrier, we say.
In order to reach the final, the eight second chancers will have to compete against another song in a duel that is decided by the public televote. So four songs face four songs to find four more finalists.
As is our weekly tradition, we’ve done a guide to the weekend’s contest. This week we’ve picked apart each song’s chances against the other. So here’s how each of the four duels are going to look;
Duel 1
1. Andreas Weise – ”Bring Out the Fire”
2. Linus Svenning – ”Forever Starts Today”
It’s pretty much a given that both of these songs finished 4th in their respective heats (behind Kristin Amparo and Samir & Viktor). And in their duel we’ll have Andreas Weise bringing the showmanship and performance, and Linus Svenning bringing the better song. Linus of course progressed to last year’s final through Andra Chansen, and we’d be surprised if he didn’t do the same again this year. Andreas won’t go down without a fight though, and it’ll be an entertaining run through of his song on Saturday night. But it’s looking like a foregone conclusion already. ‘Bring Out The Fire’ is currently on just over 200,000 streams on Spotify, whereas ‘Forever Starts Today’ has already passed the million mark – with over 1,160,000 plays.
Duel 2
1. Hasse Andersson – ”Guld Och Gröna Skogar”
2. Kristin Amparo – ”I See You”
Another one that on paper would seem like a foregone conclusion. Kristin Amparo’s ‘I See You’ doesn’t just sound like an obvious finalist, it sounds like an obvious winner too. A fanbase such as Hasse Andersson’s can never be discounted – but will all that many of them be app happy on Saturday night?
Duel 3
1. Dolly Style – ”Hello Hi”
2. Dinah Nah – ”Make Me (La La La)”
Most definitely the hardest of the duels to predict. Dinah Nah edges it with the better song and the more contemporary sound, but then that’s hardly an area that Dolly Style are trying to compete in with ‘Hello Hi’. At the time of writing, their song is less than 20,000 streams away from passing the million mark on Spotify, which is pretty incredible. Sweden would never in a million years vote for ‘Hello Hi’ in the Melodifestivalen final, but they WOULD vote for it to reach the final so that they can watch it again one more time. The outcome of this duel on Saturday night is going to be down to how sober the adults are, and how demanding the kids are.
Duel 4
1. Behrang Miri feat. Victor Crone – ”Det Rår Vi Inte För”
2. Samir & Viktor – ”Groupie”
The cruelest aspect of the Andra Chansen duels has always been the anti-vote – where an artist divides opinion so much, that their contender picks up a lot of votes simply because of a mass dislike of the other artist (for example, the anti-Carola vote sending Nordman to the finals in 2008). And if any Andra Chansen artist is going to pick up an anti-vote this year, it’s Samir & Viktor. And that’s Behrang Miri’s ONLY hope of making it to the final. At present, despite being out for a shorter period of time, Samir & Viktor’s ‘Groupie’ is at 2.8 million streams on Spotify, in comparison to its contender’s 280,000.
