ESC2014 2/3
Eurovision Song Contest 2014 2nd semifinal has this year 15 countries looking for the 10 places in the final.
You as our reader can be part in the worlds largest jury, thus without power, but anyway :) Make up your mind and write it down, as the votinglink will be in post number 3/3 :)
1) Malta Firelight band is a new folkgroup which was formed 2013. They released their 1st album in february.Their website and the official website for eurovision speaks more about the leadsinger and nothing much about the rest of the group, which I find bit odd and sad.
2) Israel Meital Slonimsky, born 1982 uses the stage name Mei Finegold. She debuted in "israeli idol" 2009 and was voted of in final´s 1st round despite she was the judges 1st choice. After the Idol she released her 1st album in 2010.
3) Norway Carl Espen Thorbjørnsen was born in 1982 in Bergen. Eurovision entry is his 1st single.
4) Georgia The Shin is german based georgian group whom is known from mixing traditional georgian ethnic music with the pop elements and worldmusic. Mariko Mebralidze, born 1984, is joined for this project.
5) Poland Joanna Klepko, born 1983 in Warsaw uses the artistname Cleo.2011 took part in X-factor and since 2013 worked along with Donatan. "my slowenie" is her 1st single.
Witold Czamara, born 1984 in Krakow. He is musician, musicproducer and soundengineer. He has released 1 album and 5 singles by himself 2007 and produced bit over 50 albums. He debuted 2002. He has russian mother, polish father. And he is often mixed up with satanism,paganism and red army symbols.
6) Austria Thomas "Tom" Neuwirth, born 1988, colombian austrian singer and better known by his drag artistname Conchita Wurst. Before everything he worked as the window decorator and he is designer. He will design his own dress for the Eurovision Song Contest. 2006 he took part in "Starmania" 3rd edition and got 2nd place. Took part in "Grosse chance" 2012 and got 2nd place which gave the spot in Austrian national final 2012 "that´s what I am" which got 2nd place. Eurovision entry is 3rd single from Conchita.
7) Lithuania Vilija Mataciunaite, born 1986, is recording artist,actress and songwriter. She debuted 2002 and turned professional 2005, when she took part in Lithuanian nat.final with "oh my god" receiving 7th place and after this she has taken part in various contests around Europe. She has released 1 album in 2006.
8) Finland Softengine is new popgroup also playfully called as the finnish Bon Jovi back in 2011. They came from nowhere to UMK and won both jury and audience votes and the ticket to Copenhagen was reality. So was also their signing for an recordlabel Sony. Finland sends teenagers group wishing for "something better" for the Europe
9) Ireland Can-Linn is gaelic and means practically "singing along" and in this case it´s an irish folk-pop group Song is written 80% in sweden, 20% in ireland. Kasey Smith is born 1991 in Dublin and from very musical family in several generations. She was part of girlband "wonderland" and after that splitted up she went to Tennessee US. 2013 she took part in Irish selection with the song "kiss me" which got 3rd place.
10) Belarus Yuriy Vaschuk, born 1983 in Hidry, uses the artistname Teo. He is artist,composer and musicproducer. He won the childrens contest at the age of 7 and that can be seen as his debut. He took part also in Belarus nat.final 2009 with the song "behind" receiving shared 6th place. He co-wrote Belarus winner 2010 "3+2- faraway and later the song was changed. and Alyona Lanskaya winning song "all my life" 2012, which was disqualifield as the televoting was full of unsolved still unclear matters.2013 he wrote song for Alyona for nat.final "rhythm of love" which won, but once again song was changed. 2014 Teo wrote 2 songs for other artists Tasha Odi 6th place and Natalia Tamelo 10th place in nat. final and 90 minutes before the deadline he decided to send in also his own song.
11) Macedonia (F.Y.R.O.M) Tijana Todevska was born in 1976 in Skopje. She was born to an music family father being music professor, mother primadonna in opera stages and her sister Tamara also an artist. She has debuted 1996 and released 5 albums and she is also teacher of sello. She won the festival Suncane skale in 2002 with the song "negativ" in 2006 and in same year she took part in Serbian nat.final with the song "greh" receiving 8th place
12) Switzerland Sebastiano Paú-Lessi, born 1985 in Ticino and he is better known as Sebalter. He started in swiss hardrock band "the Stalkers" 2000-2002 playing bass and switched to swiss folkgroup "the Vuc" 2002-2012 playing fiddle. Eurovision entry is his 1st single release.
13) Greece Freaky Fortune is greek duo; Nicholas Raptakis, born 1990 in Athens and Theofilos Pouzbouris, born 1991 in Athens. They have released 3 singles ( our destiny, stronger, all I need) which did receive massive success. Riskykidd alias Shane Schuller, born 1994 in London. Father from Germany and mother from Jamaica and now he lives in Greece. He has released 2 singles as him self and 3 as featuring artist since 2012.
14) Slovenia Tinkara Kovac, born 1978 and she is slovene singer and musician.She debuted in 1997 when she won the Portoroz festival and she has released 9 albums.She have 3 earlier participations in nat.final 1997 veter z juga 10th place, 1999 zakaj 2nd place ( only those 2 missing points) , 2001 sonce v oceh 4th place
15) Romania This duo represents Romania for the 2nd time. Paula Seling, born 1978 and she debuted in 1995. She has released 14 albums. She took part in Romanian nat.final in 1998 receiving 4th place with te iubesc returned 2010 with Ovi and won. 2010 she took also part in dancing with stars receiving 3rd place Ovidiu Cernauteanu, born 1974 and is also known by Ovi Martin and Ovidiu Jacobsen. He made the debut in 2008 while competing from Norway.
OPINIONS
1) Malta This is the type of music I dislike and it´s pure screaming from the beginning to the end and the only question really is why on earth such is done? Malta had so many times better songs than this, so sorry, this is not good.
2) Israel Also not my favourite from their nat. final, but that´s life. Here is many things that annoy. She looks very aggressive and that is eating her votes for sure, if the stylist and make-up artist isn´t changed till the semifinal. From the video annoys her look, then the music which doesn´t feel that it belongs to her one bit, I don´t buy it one bit. Still I admit without looking at the artist the song works somehow quite well.
3) Norway Again an another cry for help. This time I am crying. What the heck is going on with this years songs. Can it get more disappointing than this? More depressing melody? Hardly. More monotonic? Hardly. This is awful, so sorry Norway, you can do better and you had better songs than this. If only this would have been instrumental...
4) Georgia Yes and this was what? Excuse me. Maybe the biggest disappointment for me personally as I have liked the entries from there, but this is totally extraordinary,if not strange and for sure unique. In songcontest like this I am just pointing out, that whether the point is to trying to do as well as possible this is totally trying to get the last place.. wrong direction my friends.
5) Poland Finally one of great songs. When I heard this song it reminded me a bit of our "wild dances" which won 10 years ago. If the show is created around this song as well as it was with ours then Poland takes home the trofy. I like the melody,rhythm and this is such a hit in Poland and there is so many clever coverversions too. One thing though ... this was better in polish.
6) Austria Finally such a powerballade, but but but can I watch at the screen? When I at first heard the song this was something I had to listen over and over again as it was so good and I sang along from 1st hearing. That´s a sign of somekind for sure and this typical eurovision ending :) yes I like it so much.
7) Lithuania As typically lithuanians had the longest selection ever and as typically they managed to select badly. In the end there was just this song and 3 different artists performing this and this was the worst alternative in my opinion. It sounds at first so amazing, but it just doesn´t last the whole 3 minutes. No this is a flop despite she plea for attention... no way.
8) Finland Well - this time Finland is offering something better. This is quite catchy poptune with rock influences and that should work especially this year, when the ballades seems to rule. Softengine is new band and they have done only few gigs before UMK our selection for eurovision nowadays. Let´s see, if Europe wants something better :)
9) Ireland This was quite an refreshing song, that comes from Ireland. We have rarely heard popsongs from this green island. This is very good and all the pieces fits in perfectly, the irish fiddle, the clever rhythm behind and the whole act. I like it a lot :)
10) Belarus When I heard this song at the very first time I fell for it and I was hungry for cheesecake with Teo. I adored the humour of the video and the song in whole, which was clever poptune as it should be. Now the new version is bit different and I am not that keen of it, but I hope all the best for this and am still looking for good slice of cheesecake with Teo :)
11) Macedonia As so often they produce two versions and unfortunately they chose the song in english. It was so much stronger in macedonian and would have worked so much better in Copenhagen without any doubts. I am happy though that Tijana comes to eurovision, but I also wish her to rock the boat and do well. I am afraid that this is not going to be such a trip...
12) Switzerland Oh how I hate these whistling types. Don´t they know, that it´s suitable to whistle only to call girls and to the dogs... I dislike it so much, but must admit, that despite the broken english the melody attracts and maybe just maybe, but knowing how it looks on stage and how oh well.... this is so and so most likely 11th
13) Greece This is very catchy number and I am rising up to do some dance moves :) The only thing that I would leave totally away is the short rap-number, as this song doesn´t need it at all. This will qualify for sure also without the help of diaspora.
14) Slovenia Difficult to say what to think of this as this is quite typical poptune in the end. I like Tinkara from before and hope, that she would do well enough to qualify, but I am bit afraid.She is professional and has talents for much more than this despite It´s cool song, but it has one problem ... it just doesn´t stick ...so it is easy to forget, which is not a good thing. I adored her songs 1999 and 2001 which did have the catchy elements and it kind of is lacking from this one.
15) Romania Magical it just ain´t. Paula is superb and Ovi is killing it, just like the last time. Song is good enough to do wonders, but this combination in my eyes doesn´t do the trick. Paula has the voice, the looks and talents, but is that enough? Diaspora takes care, that this goes to the final.
previews semifinal
austria 12
poland 10
belarus 8
ireland 7
greece 6
israel 5
finland 4
slovenia 3
switzerland 2
romania 1
