Tim: Good news Tom! While I was building my BRILLIANT new Lego Hogwarts, I spent some of the 21 hours listening through the rest of my five hour Melodifestivalen compilation album, which means we’ve got a good few fabulous songs coming up.
Tom: That is the most on-brand sentence I have ever heard you say. Right. What are your picks, then?
Tim: Let’s start with this one.
Tom: They went all-out with the costumes. That’s the first time I’ve seen someone singing while wearing oxygen tanks.
Tim: Now, I was attracted to this based on the music alone, because that’s quite a chorus, but then I watched the performance. And…huh. You may be wondering why they’re dressed up as firefighters, and the answer to that is fairly simple: they are firemen in real life, with the band being something of a side project. It’s been going twenty-odd years (Facebook page is still active), and they always perform in uniform (not sure about the drummer, though).
Tom: That is… well, I was going to say it’s a fantastic gimmick, but it’s not even a gimmick. It’s just endearing. Although it looks like they got one extra singer in the back for Melodifestivalen, just to give them a bit more vocal power.
Tim: The song went straight through to the final from its televote-only heat, where it proceeded to get no points at all from the juries but came third with the punters, probably because it’s just five guys on stage having a laugh.
Tom: It is! It really is, and it shows. For the folks at home, this is the sort of dream-come-true “if me and my mates put a band together” story that lots of folks can relate to. And they’re really not bad.
Tim: I like it when that happens – particularly those high fives, which I’m fairly sure I’d keep missing. Well done everyone.