It’s Eurovision fever right now in the Nordics, so obviously we’re on cloud nine! Norway, Iceland, and Finland had the second heat of each of their national selection contests for Eurovision this week and there was more than a handful of great music new music on offer. And a lot of tripe too, but that’s the whole point, and often half the fun!
Results wise, as always, we were pleased with some and disappointed with others. As with last week, we’re posting only our favourites (the best stuff!) here, as well as the full results of each country’s show, as there’s just too much to wade through otherwise, and it’d be a shame if the good stuff was lost in a barrage of boredom. So here are the highlights that we’d recommend you give a chance to;
NORWAY
Miles better than last week’s efforts, Norway brandished three corkers this week, Hanne Sørvaag, Mimi Blix, and Marika and one more that we quite enjoyed too, Babel Fish. Of those four, three of them progressed further in the competition thanks to Norway’s public vote, with only Marika stalling in her heat. The results were as follows;
Direct to the final: Babel Fish and Hanne Sørvaag
Through to the second chance round: Mimi Blix and Endre (who we also kind of liked for the super-cute factor!)
Hanne Sørvaag’s ‘You’re Like A Melody’ is a beautiful mid-tempo number, and oh so catchy. And she’s oh so pretty too, it’s difficult to take your eyes off her when she’s performing. The performance starts off with her holding a glittery silver guitar (if a poppet insists on holding a guitar, then we guess we’ll forgive her if it’s at least glittery, silver, and sparkly!). Then the guitar is lost and she launchesinto a semi dance routine, which was reminiscent of the one that Maria Haukaas Storeng gave when she sang ‘Hold On, Be Strong’ at Eurovision. Hanne didn’t come across as overly confident though, and she really needs to sort that out in time for the final. BELIEVE IN YOURSELF HANNE, YOU’RE VERY GOOD.
Mimi Blix performed the mini club anthem, ‘Allergic’. Her voice was spot on, and she sounded great. Although she did look as though she was either terribly bored, or scared stiff. We’re guessing it was the latter. So as with Hanne, we’d like to see her confidence improve in time for her next performance in the competition. It didn’t stop her show being all kinds of fabulous though. And those legs of hers are incredible too by the way!
Quite frankly though, the performance of the night, and we’re imagining of the whole competition in the end, was MARIKA! When we heard the audio of the song, we did hope that it would be divine on stage, but it surpassed even our wildest dreams! She was amazing! Think Rednex crossed with The Nicole (yes, you’re thinking, THAT good?!). It’s hard to pick a highlight, but we’ll go with when she got the crowd screaming for her during the middle eight. And then the ‘big’ finish too. We were DJing out in Stockholm later last night and can happily confirm that this song works very well being blasted in a bar at 12.30am to a crowd of drunk Swedes! They were joining in with the ”WHOOPA”s after only one chorus.
ICELAND
Last night’s Icelandic heat was heavily publicised in Eurovision circles, as it featured the return of the lovely Yohanna, who finished 2nd for Iceland at Eurovision in 2009 with the much loved ‘Is It True’. She returned to the national selections last night with the absolutely stunning ‘Nótt’, which we’ve listened to SO many times this week. Naturally, she progressed to the final with great ease, and gave a fantastic performance on her way. She was joined in the final by ‘Eldgos’ by Matthías Matthíasson & Erla Björg Káradóttir, which was absolutely horrific on every conceivable level. So so bad.
Left behind in their heat last night (as there are only two slots in the final available in each heat, no second chance round), were two songs that we really liked, which you can see below, under Yohanna’s triumph. Bryndís Ásmundsdóttir’s melodious retro ballad ‘Segðu Mér’. And Kristján Gíslason & Íslenzka Sveitin’s uplifting mid-tempo number ‘Þessi þrá’.
FINLAND
The Finns were quite clearly all on CRACK on Friday night. There was only one good song out of the five on offer, but it didn’t make any further in the competition despite there being THREE slots in the final available. Instead, two dire efforts were chosen, and another song which was just about ok in a certain frame of mind (Father McKenzie). Below are the three qualifiers.
Paradise Oskar: ‘Da Da Dam’
Milana Misic: ‘Sydämeni Kaksi Maata’
Father McKenzie: ‘Good Enough’
The best song of the night, which cruelly and ridiculously missed out on a place in the final, was ‘Party To Party’ by Jimi Constantine (nominee in the ‘Brightest New Hope for 2011’ category at the 2011 scandipop awards!). Not only was it BY FAR the best song, the performance was also amazing too – so much so, that it was actually more like a victory rendition by someone who’d just won the whole thing! His live show consisted of spraying the audience with champagne, drinking some of it mid-verse, throwing (what we assume was) fake money into the crowd, and finally (and our favourite part) stripping off to give a topless performance for the final chorus.
Seriously Finland, what were you thinking not putting this through?! It would have been amazing at Eurovision.
We’re disgusted!
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One more thing that we MUST mention and that you MUST watch is the interval act that Norway gave us. A duet between Guri Schanke and Alexander Stenerud, two of our favourite Norwegian Melodi Grand Prix legends of all time (along with Lene Alexandra and Queentastic. Naturally!). They performed a medley of songs including Alexander’s two recent MGP entries. There were only two things missing for us though – ‘Ven A Bailar Conmigo’, and a costume change on Guri involving her dress being ripped off! C’mon, she managed TWO costume changes in her Eurovision performance in 2007, and that dress she was wearing last night was so long and black that we were convinced there was a shorter and sparklier outfit hiding under there waiting to be revealed. It had us on tenterhooks for the whole thing!
Still though, we’re gonna be watching this youtube clip A LOT over the next week next year.
