Måns Zelmerlöw – Heroes

“Oh my stars, the Melodifestivalen crew have discovered projection mapping.”

Tim: Two nights ago, I got a tad intoxicated as Sweden put on the strongest Melodifestivalen final I can remember, so I think it’s only fair we dedicate a week to it, and let’s start with the winner.

Tom: Now, normally I stay away from hearing Eurovision songs until the actual contest itself — I’m assuming there’s something particularly special about this year’s?

Tim: Well, last year saw the closest win in the show’s history; this year, we had the biggest win, with Måns taking over a third of the televotes and top marks from 11 of the 13 international juries.

Tim: And that there is a potential Eurovision winner. A fantastic song, sung by a good-looking guy with a great voice, and what I think is the most novel staging I’ve ever seen.

Tom: Oh my stars, the Melodifestivalen crew have discovered projection mapping. That is incredibly difficult to pull off live – it won’t have looked nearly as good in person, but that doesn’t matter one bit.

Tim: The perfect syncing is impressive in itself, and anybody even slightly tipsy might find it hard not to get emotional at the friendship on display. Slight shame his trousers are too tight for him to put his light back in his pocket, but I guess we can’t have everything, and the quite frankly “how the hell did that happen???” camera shot starting at 2:25 makes up for it as far as I’m concerned.

Tom: And let’s actually talk about the music here: that sounds like a good Robbie Williams track. Maybe not a “Let Me Entertain You”, but certainly at least a “Bodies”. You’re right: it might just be a winner.

Tim: In fact, as far as I’m concerned right now, we really are the HEROES OF OUR TIME, and I’ll be amazed if this doesn’t do brilliantly in Vienna.

Saturday Reject: Kalle Johansson – För Din Skull

“He looks like he’s on Glee.”

Tim: This here is a guy who won a Swedish radio competition, Svensktoppen Nästa, to get onto Melodifestivalen, and in the tradition of all such winners, was likely to come dead last. So it was a pleasant surprise when he actually only came 6th with this, translating to For Your Sake.

Tim: And I’ll tell you the problem with this: he looks like he’s on Glee.

Tom: Oh my, he really does. The stares into the camera, the happy walk through the crowd. The jump as he comes out of the middle eight.

Tim: And that is quite the jump – it’s all there. It also doesn’t help that he bears more than a passing resemblance to evil competing singer Grant Gustin, but all combined together it’s really the enthusiasm that makes it – obviously it’s necessary with any major-key performance, but he comes across less as “this is great, join in!” than “OH MY GOD I CAN’T BELIEVE I’M HERE”.

Thing is, it’s a very good song – they’re giving it everything with the lights and the glitter and the backing band–

Tom: Speaking of which, are his backing band in fast forward or something? It’s like they’re being played back in the wrong speed.

Tim: They do look a bit sped up, don’t they? Huh. And the song’s also co-written by the ten-trips-to-Eurovision Thomas G:son, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with his voice.

Tom: I think it’d be a solid middle of the table at Eurovision: there’s nothing to make it stand out, but it is at least a good song.

Tim: Harsh as this may sound, I can’t help feeling that a more experienced singer might have done very well with this; I do hope he doesn’t get discouraged by this, though, because there’s a lot of future potential.

Madeon – Home

“…is pretty much exactly what I expected.”

Tim: Madeon’s releasing his first album in a few weeks’ time; here’s the new track from it.

Tom: It’s been a long time coming, but the tracks he’s released in the past have generally been good. This one…

Tom: …is pretty much exactly what I expected.

Tim: It always feels like I’m doing an artist a disservice if I ever say “don’t get bored, wait for it”, which is why I didn’t earlier; typically it’d imply that the verse is dull but the chorus more or less makes up for it. Here, though, well, yes, the first verse can get a bit tedious once you’ve got over the pleasant-but-not-all-that-interesting bottom line, especially if you’re not a fan of his vocals, but the chorus made me sit up and really go “whoa” and remember who I was listening to.

Tom: Yep. Same reaction here.

Tim: After that, sure, there was the obligatory dip for the second verse, but that was kept nice and short and then it’s hefty and hard-hitting all the way from two minutes onwards, with a by and large very good track.

Tom: It’s… well, yes, it’s not bad at all. I’m going to do my standard complaint about overcompression here, though: this is full-on wall of noise, and you can actually hear every other instrument dip when there are big percussion hits. Normally that doesn’t bug me, but here the effect’s been dialled up so high that, for me at least, it’s a little bit tiring to listen to. But yes: the track itself does exactly what it’s supposed to do.

Tim: So let’s have that album, please.

Dream Lake – World of Dreams

“Music to brighten up an otherwise aurally dull room”

Tim: 100 Songs, a reliably excellent label, having previously brought us such wonders as Amazing and Wasting Water (which incidentally I remembered this morning and listened to it a full twelve times, because I’d forgotten how incredible it is), seem to have been a bit more successful than they originally predicted; here’s number 106.

Tom: Oh, that introduction is wonderful. The track isn’t the typical kind of thing I listen to, mind, but that introduction was fantastic. After that…

Tim: Well, if you don’t remember Dream Lake, they’re the Swedish act you described as “soft and fluffy” last July; it’s tempting, and not particularly inaccurate, to say that they’ve found a formula and are very happy with it. I have no trouble with that, though, because I’m very happy with it too.

Tom: Yep, and I stand by that description. It’s not going to stand out for me, but it’s not going to annoy me either.

Tim: I tell you what this is: it’s background music. Sure, you can sit and pay attention to it, but you may find your mind wandering (or at least I did; apologies to the members of Dream Lake if I’ve inadvertently insulted their work). Instead, it’s music to listen to while you’re on other stuff, browsing the Twitter or something, there to brighten up an otherwise aurally dull room, and to create a wonderful surprise moment at 2:49.

Tom: Which is basically what happened to me.

Tim: Also a disappointing moment at 3:42, but another happy moment when you press the play button again.

Bryan Rice – Beat Of My Own Drum

“I’m wary of writing this off immediately”

Tim: Danish bloke, presenting us with a pop/rock ballad of the slightly funked up variety. Interested?

Tom: Yes, but I’m still not convinced by this whole 2015-funk thing.

Tim: Me neither, but have a go anyway:

Tim: It has taken me a long time to get onboard the whole funk resurgence; I only recently started enjoying Uptown Funk, and the intro to this almost completely put me off it before it had had time to get going.

Tom: Yep: the slow parts on this are definitely slow. Middle eights are meant to be a good break, not a time to think “is this still going”? And that intro…

Tim: Indeed, but once that backing humming had gone away in preparation for a decent chorus, I became somewhat quite keen on it, and when said chorus finally arrived: actually rather enamoured.

Tom: Mm. I’m wary of writing this off immediately, because Uptown Funk took me a few listens to get the hang of. While there are certainly some good bits in here, I’m not sure that they make up for the slower, and — to be harsh — duller parts.

Tim: Hmm. I’m just about on the side of “yes they do”, and this’ll do me nicely, as a somewhat halfway gap between genres; similar, I suppose to how Still In Love With You attracted me as a halfway gap between swing and electro.

Tom: There’s much better electroswing out there, you know, if it’s now your thing. Is it?

Tim: Well, it was, until you showed me a particular video and now I can’t stop singing “waffely versatile“.

Loreen – Paper Light (Higher)

“I’m really not sure what I think of it.”

Tim: New one off the Eurovision winner, unveiled just in time to be performed on Melodifestivalen’s Andra Chansen show, with one of the weirdest performances I’ve seen there. But here’s the proper version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gce8U1-JWew

Tim: And…and I’m really not sure what I think of it.

Tom: I opened this in a background tab, and I’ll be honest: I couldn’t make out a single one of those lyrics until I actually looked at it. I genuinely didn’t think it was in English.

Tim: I’ve listened to it a good seven or eight times now, over the past few days, and still I’m having trouble forming an opinion; from that, I reckon I can derive two facts: I don’t hate it, and I don’t love it.

Tom: I’m not sure my brain recognises it as “pop music”. It’s verging into the experimental.

Tim: I think it’s the fact that it’s a fairly complex song – you’ve got your standard vocal, which is pretty good, over the light piano instrumental, also good. But then you’ve the chorus, which has the dance part to it, but also has that pitch-shifted vocal, which is where things become unsure for me. What do you reckon?

Tom: Ultimately, we’re a blog about Europop here, and I just can’t count it as being good pop. Musically, it may well be extremely interesting — but I don’t want to listen to it again, and that’s what I’ve got to score it on.

Electro Velvet – Still In Love With You

“I really really like it.”

Tim: WELL THEN. “Electroswing”, apparently. Obviously EVERYBODY watched that massive, big budget ten minute interview tucked away on the BBC Red Button channel, but let’s remind ourselves of the UK’s Eurovision entry for 2015.

Tim: So here it is: I really really like it.

Tom: And so do I. I was expecting you to be in the majority of folks disliking it, and me having to defend it, but no: we both like it.

Tim: Unusual? Yes – standard song structure has gone so far out of the window, that there’s no actual chorus.

Tom: But there is a hook at least, and here’s the reason I think it works: I was humming it after only one listen.

Tim: And surprising in parts? Very much, because where the hell did at that scat stuff come from?

Tom: Agreed. That bit is shameful — out of place, bizarre, and closing with a horrible spoken interjection that grates badly.

Tim: BUT fun and catchy? Absolutely. (Those are, by the way, the three words from that “programme”, if it can be called that, that aren’t either boring, irrelevant or total bollocks. “Electroswing’s a really popular genre at the moment.” Sorry, love, but I have LITERALLY never heard that word before in my life.)

Tom: Oh yes you have.

Tim: All of which I had forgotten, but fine: sorry, love, but I have LITERALLY only heard that word three times in my life. But enough with semantics.

I watched it on my phone on the way home from work (via the pub, but that’s not important), and my immediate reaction was: huh. Because while I’m not really sure what I was expecting, I sure as hell wasn’t expecting that, and yet (unlike just about every Eurovision fan I follow on Twitter) I really liked it.

Tom: Which could be good or bad: let’s not forget the French entry about a moustache last year: horrible on first listen, but popular among those who’d heard it a few times. Growers don’t work in Eurovision.

Tim: There are bad parts – the first visit to the Tron soundtrack grates somewhat, and, as previously mentioned, that bit where he goes all Scatman John is just aurally offensive.

Tom: And many of the lyrics are dreadful — but perhaps that matters less when most of the countries voting don’t have English as a first language.

Tim: Other than those bits, it’s by some distance our best entry since 2011, and I can count on one hand the number of entries in my lifetime that I’ve preferred.

Tom: It’s no Katrina and the Waves, but it’ll do.

Saturday Reject: Andreas Kümmert – Heart of Stone

“The kind of everyman appearance that’ll do very well there.”

Tim: Well here’s a funny thing, because this really doesn’t deserve the title of Reject. Nonetheless, the song competed to represent Germany, and it isn’t going to, so it sort of fits (and there’s a performance video here, if you’d rather).

Tim: Pretty good track, right? Especially for just one guy singing with a band behind him. It’s more or less got everything, and it’s a lot better than his first one, where he just sat on a stool and sang so hard he almost fell off.

Tom: It really is good: I wasn’t surprised to learn that he won The Voice, because he’s got a ridiculous voice, and the kind of everyman appearance that’ll do very well there.

Tim: And then there’s the song: quiet start, big chorus, message in the lyrics that’s easily got across in one single chorus line – at the very least middle of the table, maybe top ten.

Tom: Yep. Given how bad Germany did with its wildcard entry last year, that’s a good choice.

Tim: The Germans certainly thought so, anyway, because after three rounds of voting and right down to the last two, he won the votes, and was duly announced as the winner. Audience cheered, everyone’s happy; well, everyone except the second placer, Ann Sophie. Except no, because he’s suddenly got cold feet about performing to the whole continent, and doesn’t want to do it any more, cue much booing from the audience.

Tom: Wait, what? He waited until… huh. You know, I’ve been in that situation before, Tim — let’s not go into the reasons right now — and I’ve got to say, choosing not to go would take a lot of courage too.

Tim: Suddenly representing Germany, Ann Sophie (as it happens, this year’s wildcard) who couldn’t quite believe what was happening.

I suppose it’s not all that different from the juries overriding the public vote, as happened with Ireland this year or Sweden in 2013, but at least there it’s built into the system. Here it was just “nope, I’m off, thanks for the opportunity, but SCREW YOU GUYS”.

Tom: It’s interesting, isn’t it? Perhaps he’s known that he didn’t want to perform at Eurovision for a long time, but assumed he wouldn’t win and so didn’t want to rock the boat. It’s a heck of a way to bow out, though.

Tim: And so, to people who ask me why on earth I bother watching all the national competitions: partly music, but also DRAMA (see also: Ireland 2014).

Shanta Liora – Black Hole (Part II)

“That was quite the sentence.”

Tom: I’ve looked, and apparently there isn’t a Part I, which annoys me more than it reasonably should.

Tim: There isn’t, no, as it’s actually Shanta’s debut. Well sort of: Marie Picasso became notable for having it off on Swedish Big Brother 2002, then hosted a couple of TV game shows, then went on Idol in 2007 and won, had a number one single and album, but flopped with her second single, so went away for a bit, but is now back under a different name. Got that? Good.

Other stuff to know: give the song time, because you won’t regret it, and you can cut off the video after four minutes because there’s no more music.

Tom: And a warning for viewers: although there’s nothing gory, there’s some startling imagery of a suicide attempt in here.

Tom: Now given the introduction you gave it, I wasn’t expecting that to be nearly as good as it was.

Tim: Hmm. This is DRAMA in musical form; the video is all very arty-farty and knows it, and while that would normally annoy me here it really does have the music to go with it.

Tom: It’s dark, yes, but even the verses have enough… how do I put it? Enough “oomph” behind them to keep me listening until the chorus. It reminds me aiv class=”tom”>

Tom: And is that a key change down? I’m not sure if I’ve ever heard that before, let alone heard it work.

Tim: I see the intro as basically “major character in TV series dies” level, and after that we’ve got the music that accompanies the scenes of all the other characters looking heartbroken and wondering what to think, and having a pan round that character’s now empty house, and possibly during the middle eight a shot of the antagonist looking very happy, and throwing around money or other ill-gotten gains, or packing up and leaving town with his work done; the closing section after the key change would then take place over the funeral, where we’d see (but not hear) supporting characters give emotional speeches, and then they’d emerge from the church into a sunny day, and you know that people will recover; it’ll take time, but it’ll happen, when the show returns from the mid-season hiatus.

Tom: That was quite the sentence.

Tim: Not that I’ve overthought this or anything.

TDK feat. Robin Sternberg – Let Me Dance With You

“Desperation, unpleasantness and downright lechery.”

Tim: In this context, a dance producer rather than a manufacturer of cassette tapes.

Tom: I was going to ask.

Tim: And it’s Robin’s turn to feature on a BIG DANCE TRACK, following other tracks with various other artists.

Tim: Starting out a bit like a mid-00s indie band, this gives that up fairly quickly, which is nice, because as a dance track it’s really quite good.

Tom: I know – when you said BIG DANCE TRACK, I wasn’t expecting that intro. You’re right, it’s quite good as a dance track; I doubt it’s going to be a full-on floorfiller, but it wouldn’t stop me dancing.

Tim: Lyrically, though – oh no. Come on Robin, you’re a Eurovision popstar, you shouldn’t need to spend three and a half minutes singing and/or shouting at a girl, because with this amount of insistence and desperation you’re not far away from sounding like Jedward in terms of desperation, unpleasantness and downright lechery.

Tom: It’s possible to pull this off successfully — but not with this amount of repetition.

Tim: On the other hand,… actually, no – can’t really think of any redeeming quality to those lyrics. Decent music, though, so can we have an instrumental remix? And then a mashup with some completely different lyrics? OK THANKS BYE.