We were lucky to interview the absolutely lovely Eva Boto from Slovenia earlier this afternoon after her second rehearsal today, for the first EVER interview esc-chat.com have ever done! She has become a bit of a favourite of ours so we were really pleased to sit down with her for a few minutes and have a little chat, and she even gave an exclusive performance for us!

Check out the video below:

We hope to have more interviews with other artists later this week, so keep checking esc-chat.com for news!

Hello again peeps! Another day dawns in Baku and the Eurofun begins again. Friday was esc-chat.com’s first proper day in Baku and we were up early to get to the press centre to catch some of the rehearsals! We managed to see the run throughs of quite a few songs, and the stage is looking really impressive! The Green Room which is located in the arena itself, similar to the setup at this year’s Melodifestivalen. Some of the songs have gone up in our estimation, especially Macedonia – Kailiopi was simply outstanding vocally – her scream gets us every time. Others, particularly Ireland were not so great, Jedward were wearing terrible white jackets with flags on them and they were all sweaty – not a good look. Their water fountain gimmick also looks a bit naff if we’re honest.

The rehearsals were running an hour late, which I’m told is a regular occurence, so we had to leave as Malta were on to get ready for the joint Sanmarinese/Swiss party at EuroClub, where we were promised free food and drink, so it would have been rude to say no! A little while after we got there, there was a flurry of activity towards the stage and Sinplus came on stage and performed a mini-concert of a few songs, which was really good.

Halfway through, we spotted Eleftheria Eleftheriou dancing at the front, wearing fabulous neon green high heels!

Most of the fans seemed to be more interested in getting a photo with Eleftheria than listening to poor Sinplus! She was lapping up all the attention and looked rather fabulous!

After Sinplus came off stage, there was a little break before massive pictures of Valentina were shown on the screens! A few people came on stage to say a few words, including Ralph Siegel before we were treated to a dance remix of The Social Network song, then we saw 3 diffrerent fan made videos of the song, by the end of which I was losing the will to live!

We saw Valentina standing at the side of the stage preparing to sing, and we managed to grab a few words with her to wish her the best of luck on Tuesday, then she went on stage and sang a lovely jazz number, showing she really does have an excellent voice!

After that, we partied into the early hours with some Eurofriends before crashing back at the apartment around 3am!

How is it day 6 already? Anyway, it’s been the first day for esc-chat.com in Baku, meaning, our new editor Danny began his work in the press centre today. He also started his daily diary blog. He will have a new post for each day, which will get updated every now and then. Remember to check it out!

Today, it’s my turn again to review the day from this side of the contest,  so you will also have to bear with my opinion.

It has been another busy day with 13 rehearsals, among them the Russian grannies, the Irish twins and the Belarussian Weeners. What remains by the end of the day? Earworms of a certain song with a certain trumpet, the impression that Hungary was the winner of the day, and that at least one tambourine lady is cheering Netherlands up a bit.

Otherwise, events have been more or less unspectacular – but let’s focus on the most notable developments from the first rehearsal!

Russia‘s favourite grannies are still baking bread, and they still don’t think about singing in tune or in beat. I doubt the bread became any better, either. Generally, this thing comes across even more messy than before, and although they all seem likeable, it’s one of the weaker entries this year, and by this point of the season it’s beginning to annoy me.

Joan Franka from the Netherlands now wears bleu islandais. Instead of a dolphin, she has a crossbreed of Alexander Rybak and Tooji in her personal boygroup. The only remaining tambourine lady is a bit more notable now, so I am kind of consoled. Only thing is, Indiana Joan was vocally rather bad today. Although I did regain some hopes that this will qualify. It’s not completely hopeless, but then none of today’s entrants is.

Austria‘s Trackshittaz and their dancers are now equipped with LED stuff, but it doesn’t really work like the use of blacklight in the Austrian Final. Their rehearsal was slightly better than the last one, but it’s still far away from the punch and catchiness that it had in the aforementioned TV show. They don’t rap in tune either (hah!). It’s an improved mess.

Then there was Ukraine, which is SLIGHTLY less over the top, but still. Gaitana’s incredible vocals were excellent, and in general it was more catchy and fresh than in its first appearance in Baku.

It needs to be mentioned once more that Moldova has developed from a rather pale entry to the biggest earworm of the day. The whole thing is more fun, more catchy, more authentic and more likeable than the piece from its neighbour country beginning with ‘R’.

There’s not a lot to say about Ireland (which was more or less the same with white, flags covered jackets – otherwise everything as Jexpected), Serbia (the same old mechanical bore), Macedonia (Kaliopi and her unique voice sang Zeljko off the stage), Malta (Kurt – vocally – must have seen better days), Belarus (decent but flat, the singer  is still dressed up like a seductive ghost from Haunted Mansion) and Portugal (-).

The 6th day of rehearsals closed with Bulgaria. Well. I am totally fine with the decision to let Sofi be on stage alone. And she sang great. But. The staging is one of the most unfortunate ones in the whole year. Sofi moves like she’s the funny neighbour auntie who comes to a children’s birthday party to dance a little. Honestly, and with all respect, she comes across – do excuse me – ridiculous. Why doesn’t she use this stage to put on an expressive show? (Note: “expressive” doesn’t have to mean “over the top”, dear Ukraine.) No, Sofi Marinova doesn’t have to dance, no, it’d be better if she wouldn’t at all. Good song, good vocals, pointless staging.

My Aha! moment of the day, though, was Hungary. Very impressive performance, decently staged. It’s one of the most normal “real world” songs in the contest, and it’s a good one. It is clear now that Compact Disco hadn’t really arrived in Baku yet for the first rehearsal, because now they are there in full scale. Very professional, and definitely a strong contender for a final ticket. The modern people in the juries will go for this.

Tomorrow sees one of the most hotly-awaited days of the rehearsal period – the debut appearances of the ‘big 5′ automatic finalists plus host nation Azerbaijan. Meanwhile, one of our team heads off to Lanzarote, meaning that esc-chat.com will become one of the most curiously triangulated fansite teams of all, with members in Baku, Berlin and just off the coast of Western Sahara! Stay tuned to our website and our Twitter feed for Danny’s on-site reports from the host city and everything else you need to know from the preparations for this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.

17:26 So as you have seen, I’ve finally arrived in sunny Baku! I landed yesterday at 3.30pm from Dubai on a flight where apart from an Australian girl who was also here for Eurovision, I was the only non Azeri on the flight! but didn’t get to my accommodation until around 7.30pm – I had quite an interesting journey that involved quite a few buses to say the least. After landing at the airport and collecting my case, which was one of the first on the carousel (makes a change) I headed out to the Eurovision stand, picking up an Azeri SIM card on the way. Texts to mobiles are only 3 qapik (around 3 cents!). I was told the best option was to get a taxi to the hotel, but then I spotted a sign for a Eurovision shuttle bus. The friendly volunteer told me this was only for the delegations but I managed to blag my way onto one, and I got a free ride direct to the Crystal Hall on a lovely air-conditioned Mercedes minibus which I had all to myself! The driver switched on the radio and the first song we heard was Euphoria. Wonder if that’s a sign? I managed to get a great view of Baku on the way to the Arena, Baku is definitely a city of contrasts. Part of it has been totally transformed, with lovely squares and green gardens, not to mention some striking buildings, including the famous Flame Towers. Other parts away from the centre of town are a lot more, shall we say, traditional!

He dropped me off at the press centre, which as right on the but then I had to take another shuttle bus to the accreditation centre. After getting my all important accreditation badge, I decided to make my way to the apartment, as I was a little tired and still with my suitcase, laptop bag and duty free. I got a shuttle bus into town that dropped me off at the Baku Business Centre, and two lovely girls who were on the bus, Firuza and Saida, who were Eurovision volunteers, helped me by organising another free Mercedes minibus to pick me up and take me direct to the hotel! They even waited with me for the bus to arrive! I must say, the Azeris I have met so far have been so helpful with everything!

After checking in at the Miracle, I freshened up and hot footed it to EuroClub. Sadly, I got there too later for the Georgian party but I still managed to have fun dancing to some Eurovision tunes with some Eurofriends! EuroClub is MASSIVE, plenty of room for dancing, and the rather nice Azeri beer, Xırdalan, was 3 Euro, which is good value, but it’s 5%, so rather strong! I bailed out around 1am as my roommate Roger was landing then, and crashed out soon after he arrived, as tiredness overcame me!

All in all, an excellent first day here in Baku, and plenty more to come! Let’s just hope my liver holds out though…

Salam! (That’s Azeri for hello, btw) esc-chat .com have arrived in a rather warm Baku! After a rather eventful journey from the airport which took 4 hours (more on that later) I finally got to my accomodation. I was up bright and breezy(ish) this morning in time for the first rehearsal from Russia, and walked into the rather large press centre to witness the grannies on stage putting something in an oven! Only at Eurovision… Said press centre is HUGE, with loads of desks with laptops to use, which saves me lugging mine around! Righty ho, off to watch some rehearsals, will be back with a full report later on! Sagh ol!

Day 5 in Baku, and today saw the start of what you might call the “hard work” phase of the rehearsal fortnight.

If the first rehearsals are all about getting the initial camerawork and technicalities right, and the dress rehearsals are there for fine-tuning, then it’s Thursday through to Sunday when the delegations from the semi-final countries have the opportunity to start properly turning their performance into how they want it to look and sound.

Some start from a lower base than others, of course. Rambo Amadeus from Montenegro had made it perfectly clear that he was unsatisfied with his first attempt at the weekend, and today saw a much clearer vision of what the Balkan nation intends to bring across in an effort to qualify for the final for the first time. Rambo enters the stage wearing a cape, the backdrop features colourful euro banknotes, a banner is brought on bearing the peculiar lyric “HEUTE HABE OBOTNICA”, and the whole thing generally has a sense of merry organised chaos. Apparently they still weren’t particularly happy afterwards, though.

Elsewhere, Greece changed its backdrop and tweaked its dance routine a bit, but Eleftheria’s vocals still sound extremely exposed in the sound mix. Romania‘s Mandinga strutted their stuff, with the boys in white outfits that make them somehow even more irritating to me – in a contest where Sakis Rouvas has reached the top three, though, annoying smugness is no barrier to success. That’s something that Israel will be hoping too, although I find Izabo’s performance of Time to be quite charming – I’m just worried that the chorus sounds particularly weak. See what you think, insofar as you can hear much of it in the official video!

Clothes were a common theme throughout the day, with Iris from Belgium raising a few eyebrows in a somewhat unusual two-piece – apparently she’ll be wearing something else on the night, at least – and Finland‘s Pernilla mixing and matching with a flowing jade-green dress accompanied by a black sweater of some description. It can’t possibly be cold in Baku, surely? Meanwhile, the girls from Latvia are dressed for a cocktail party, but for me the pastel shades just seem to clash with the background and the overall effect is less than pleasing. By contrast, Albania looked quite dowdy and plain, but then Suus was never going to have a Daria Kinzer-style performance.

Other delegations settling into the swing of things included Switzerland, whose dark and moody backdrop (similar to the promo video) really suits the song, and Cyprus, where Ivi Adamou’s performance continued to impress me, at least in the context of what a song like La La Love actually requires vocally and visually – although I’m not sure her backing girls are too keen on having to lift her up all the time!

Of course, some countries like to show their hand right from the start, offering absolutely no surprises during the second run-through. Today, for example, there were few changes in the rehearsals from the likes of Denmark or Iceland, both of whom had already turned up in full costume and with everything ready to go. Instead, they took the opportunity to relax and show off their skills in the subsequent press conferences – with Greta Salóme whipping out her bow and having a fiddle to everyone’s delight:

Perhaps the most noteworthy rehearsal of the day, however, came from San Marino. Not content with one having of the most garish backdrops to accompany the garish music and lyrics of The Social Network Song, today we discovered that Valentina’s happy gang will be dressed as a pilot, a cheerleader, a doctor… We’d call them a Village People for the 21st century, but since San Marino basically is one big village, that thought makes my head hurt. Anyway, the stage routine is actually sitting quite nicely, for all it’s still as cheesy as it could possibly be (think Let’s Get Happy, basically) – but you never get the impression that any of the people on stage are actually having any fun. It’s all delivered with a forced smile and is basically as late-stage Siegel as it gets. Bet it still doesn’t come last in its semi though!

If it does all go wrong and the jump into the final proves too much for Valentina and her Facebook friends, however, the unlucky non-qualifiers can comfort themselves with the knowledge that a fleet of sleek London taxis will be waiting to whisk them away to their hotel and onward to the airport for that unexpectedly early flight home. Here’s a sight you don’t necessarily expect to see in the middle of downtown Baku:

What else?
We must, of course, talk briefly about the hacker attacks that affected several fan websites earlier today. Most were only temporary denial-of-service attacks and have since been resolved, but the long-standing Eurovision fan site esctoday.com was taken down completely, with their site being replaced by an unpleasant anti-gay statement by protestors apparently originating from Azerbaijan (although Iran has also been mentioned speculatively as a potential source of the attacks).

There has been no official public statement by the EBU on this matter to date, although the prinz.de Eurovision blog managed to get the following reply from the press office (in German and in English). However, after a death threat purporting to be from the same group of hackers was subsequently posted on esctoday’s Facebook wall, with specific reference to the safety of esctoday’s on-site bloggers in Baku, we can only hope and assume that the EBU will take the necessary action to ensure the safety of accredited fans and journalists in the Azeri capital over the next two weeks.

In the meantime, we would like to express our sympathy and support to esctoday.com on having lost many years’ of work in today’s attack, and wish them a speedy return to the family of ESC fan sites.

Tomorrow sees a continuation of today’s pattern, with the second batch of rehearsals from the remaining semi-final 1 participants followed by Serbia through to Bulgaria inclusive. We should also have our first on-site report from our editor Danny, who will be living it up at the Georgian party tonight. If previous years are anything to go by, the wine should be flowing freely and the anecdotes will be plentiful – so stay tuned to esc-chat.com and our Twitter feed for all the gossip!

video source: eurovision.tv

Hello again peeps! I’m heading off to Baku tomorrow morning, (yay!) but before I do, here’s my rundown of the first rehearsals from Semi Final 2, and my predictions for who will qualify. These are based on one watch only, and as before, are subject to drastic changes!

SERBIA
Zeljko is back for another chance to lift the Eurovision crown, with this, very typical Balkan ballad. It’s not really a million miles away from his previous entry which I wasn’t raving about, and as such, I’m not a massive fan of this either. It’s very simply and well performed but isn’t really my cup of tea. Still in a semi full of friends it’s a definite qualifier and depending on a draw will probably do pretty well on Saturday night. But as a winner? I very much doubt it.

MACEDONIA
I saw Kaliopi perform this at the London Preview Party and it really shot up in my estimation there. She is a lovely woman and has a powerhouse of a voice and I rather like the fact they’ve rocked it up even more as they have ditched the piano and brought in guitarists that really add to the performance. The famous scream towards the end of the song is just immense! Despite the draw of Death, I think she’s got a pretty good chance to qualify, and change Macedonia’s luck over the past few years.

NETHERLANDS
Joan has become a bit of a fan favourite amongst certain fans, and it’s easy to see why. It’s a really catchy feel-good song. She’s kept the infamous headdress but she has changed the female tambourine players for a bunch of guys and I think it suffers for it. She performs it fairly well but there’s something missing, it just feels a bit flat. Still, I’d love for this to qualify as the Dutch really deserve a break. To do this, it needs a bit more work, but there is still time for that…

MALTA
Malta are one of Eurovision’s most eager participants and they try so hard year after year to lift the crown, without success so far. Sadly, I don’t think Kurt is going to change that fact. There is no denying it’s a decent pop song but the performance isn’t quite there yet. His vocals on the high notes were a bit shaky too, and it could have done with a bit more dancing instead of the guitar player. They came surprisingly close to qualifying last year though, so you can never write the little island off…

BELARUS
Litesound have gone for the dancier version of their song, which, contrary to other’s opinions, I prefer to the original version. The singer really reminds me of Magnus Carlsson, ex-Alcazar member (it must be the hair!) Not a bad first performance, but as Felix said, it is rather repetitive, and is not that different from the song performed before it. It’s nice enough, but I’m just not sure it stands out enough to get the votes it needs to qualify.

PORTUGAL
Now I must confess, I do love a bit of Fado. Filipa was another one I saw at the London Preview Party and she is such a sweet girl. Her vocals are excellent and the staging of the song is very simple, and quite Israeli with the backing singers walking around the stage. After a bunch of uptempo songs, it’s a refreshing change, and I think the juries could go for this. However, not quite sure it’s a televote grabber though, but Portugal have surprised us before, so you never know! I’d love for them to qualify though!

UKRAINE
Well…this isn’t one you are likely to forget in a hurry! It’s classic Eurovision with an OTT performancewboth in dancing and vocals – Gaitana really belts it out, and it looks like she wasn’t even giving it her all. The screens are really effective towards the end of the song and you just can’t help but dance along to it. After the Portuguese song, Ukraine is like a slap in the face, but in a good way! Qualifying? Hell yes!

BULGARIA
I LOVE LOVE LOVE this song in the studio version, it’s firmly in my top 5. The National Final performance was a little lacklusture and I was hoping that they would ramp it up for Eurovision proper. Sadly this doesn’t seem to be the case as Sofi is on the stage alone. For one of the danciest songs of the contest, this is a HUGE mistake. Sofi also sounds a little bit off on the chorus, and she doesn’t have any backing singers either to support her. Such a shame, as it had a lot of potential which has been squandered.

SLOVENIA
I have rather a soft spot for young Eva, the youngest of this year’s competitors, a full 60 years younger than one of the Russian Grannies! The performance was pretty good, but I don’t think Eva’s giving it 100% yet, especially in the earlier part of the song. It builds and builds well though and redeems itself at the end of the song. With a bit more polish I think this could do fairly well, and has a decent shot at qualifying. Wish she’d kept the dramatic hand move at the end of the song though!

CROATIA
Yet another Balkan ballad here, of which there are quite a few in this semi. There’s no question that Nina can sing well, and the performance was quite interesting, with the sheet being waved around. Not quite sure about her dress though! I just don’t think it’s really memorable enough to qualify though, and probably should have remained an album track on her latest opus.

SWEDEN
So here we go, the entry people love, or love to hate just because it’s either Sweden or the overwhelming favourite to win. There’s not an awful lot to say about this performance other than it’s pretty much the same as the Melodifestivalen performance, and Loreen peforms it out of the park. The backing vocalists work well though they could do with turning down the echo effect a bit. It’s difficult to judge this without seeing the camera feed as this song is based solely on that. I can’t really judge it’s chances to win though as it could really go either way. Definitely qualifying though, which I know will piss a few people off!

GEORGIA
By God I HATE this song, so it’s really hard to comment on it. To give it it’s due, it’s about a million times better than the National Final performance, and it’s kinda alright on stage although rather messy like the song itself. I’m sure loads of people round Europe will laugh at it though, but that’s bound to pick up votes just for the sake of it. I could actually see this qualifying over some songs that deserve it though, but that’s what often happens at Eurovision!

TURKEY
After last year’s disaster, Turkey try something a little bit different. The song is fine but Can is another one who seems to be holding back a little, and the whole thing is just a bit lacklusture overall, and a bit boring. I would have always said Turkey were sure qualifiers but then last year proved that theory wrong. Still some work to do here, I think…

ESTONIA
Quite a few people are tipping this to win, and I can see why, it’s a nice enough ballad performed well by a handsome guy. It is a bit old-fashioned though but after some of the rather dramatic performances it stands out a little. I just don’t think this has enough bite though to win and doesnt really build enough for my liking, but I’d say the qualification chances are pretty good anyhow.

SLOVAKIA
I find it hard to judge this as it’s by far and away my least favourite type of music. Max does perfom well, despite a few dodgy notes, but that doesn’t really matter with rock music so much. The performance for this could be so much better though and I fear that a lot of Europe will be a bit alienated by this, and it’s not helped by the fact that Slovakia doesn’t really have any friends to help them get over the line. I think he’s going home early, but then what do I know?

NORWAY
This is another fan favourite, and it hasn’t changed a lot from the Melodi Grand Prix performance either. Tooji sounds fine (helped by a backing singer) and I really like the dancers too. Norway has a rather excellent draw and I think it will do well in the semi, but as for the final? I’m not quite sure yet, a song like this heavily depends on the draw. It could do an Eric Saade or a Kati Wolf…

BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA
Maya gives a rather understated performance here for this sweet ballad, sat at the piano for the first half of the song before moving centre stage during the instrumental break. Her vocals are great though and I think it’s a jury pleaser. With that, combined with the Balkan votes, it should be enough to see it over the line, but I don’t expect it to light the scoreboard alive come the final.

LITHUANIA
And here we have the last song! Phew! Donny perfoms this better than I remembered and it’s certainly a toe-tapper but it’s all just a bit…bland…I do like the visuals on the background but the song seems way longer than three minutes and when it was all over I had a “is that it?” moment. He may have a good draw but I think it might just pass too many people by to have a decent chance of qualifying.

So there we go…I have to get up in 5 hours for my flight – eek! But before I go, here is my first shot at predictions. Bear in mind, this is with one view of each rehearsal performance. It’s a much tougher semi to predict than the first I think, as the field seems much closer. My choices to go through are:

SERBIA
MACEDONIA
NETHERLANDS
UKRAINE
SLOVENIA
SWEDEN
TURKEY
ESTONIA
NORWAY
BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA

I’d love PORTUGAL to be there, but I think it may JUST miss out in eleventh place.

OK, I’m off to bed, the next time you’ll hear from me is in Baku!

Day 4 in Baku, and today’s rehearsal schedule included easily the most hotly-awaited performance from the runaway favourite with fans and bookmakers alike.

But more about Donny Montell later. First, we take a look at the nine songs that preceded his appearance on the Baku stage, and how they came across to a pair of remote ears and a pair of translation-fatigued eyes over on the other side of the continent.

Slovenia

The Slovenes have a glorious history of wardrobe disasters at ESC, memorable recent examples including Rebeka Drivelj and whatever those people who did that Dailidounyancatni Rock song were called. And after last year’s competence, they’re back on form here. The look they’re going for appears to be “My Big Fat Austro-Hungarian Wedding”, which is not really what I’d expect for a 16-year-old girl (although I suppose she is freakishly tall), and there’s lots of slow arty movement from the backing group that’s probably terribly meaningful. As promised, though, there’s no ridiculous headgear. Yet.

I think Eva basically sings Verjamem pretty well. The first verse is tricky, but then the whole composition is basically geared towards the last, Molitva-lite minute. The problem I have is that I just don’t care. And based on this rehearsal, neither does she. Last year Slovenia got a decent result because the performance was committed and in-your-face, this year it feels like they’re striving for more of the same but can’t quite reach the same heights. Which puts it in a direct fight with Portugal for a borderline squeak into 10th place at best, in my book. Still, early days, and she might well bring her A-game later in the week.

Croatia

Much as expected – some will call it classy, others will call it dull. It was certainly a competent rehearsal, anyway, and we’ll see if the song turns out to be friendly/jury vote fodder or not.

What certainly can be said about Nebo is that Nina sings well, but her dress is pretty ugly – although it suggests the potential for a late-90s Croatian strip at some point. One can only hope, even if a late-90s Croatian result seems unlikely. There’s a big sheet being waved around towards the end too, which suggests that their points of Euro-reference really are a good few years out of date. Meanwhile, the rest of the routine features yet more Meaningful Artistic Group Movement, thereby successfully making it blend in even more with what we’ve already seen today. Bravo.

Sweden

The (actual) big favourite, then.

Having experienced the OMG SAADE IZ NOT SINGING hype bubble in the press centre last year, and remembering the similar blogkaos that ensued when Carola sensibly decided to save her voice at several rehearals in 2006, it’s important to bear in mind that Loreen is a professional singer, Sweden is home to a professional music industry and there are still eight days left until she has to perform in the first semi-final. It is worth mentioning that she seems to be riffing and improvising her way around the vocals somewhat, a common Eurovision pitfall – you’ve sung the song 3,000 times already, but most of Europe hasn’t heard it once yet, so stick to the melody! – but that’s precisely why I started with the disclaimer above.

With that out of the way, then, does Euphoria justify its favourite status? Well, the jury is still out (no pun intended), but I think Loreen and her team can be happy with the way things went today. The staging is very much still like it was in Melodifestivalen, although it remains to be seen whether the same is true for the camerawork – we were promised more long shots by the organisers generally, and the “arty” nature of the performance rather depends on the opposite being true. Apparently they’re getting the close-ups they require, though, and the video backdrop with its snow effect towards the end seems pretty effective. Plus the necessary introduction of backing vocal(ist)s works well enough. And the shallow “box” she’s standing on appears to be a neat way of using the real-life snow without having to sweep the stage with Nelly Ciobanu’s mop afterwards. And…

Well look, we could over-analyse this until the cows come home. Lordi only knows what result she’ll get on the scoreboard, but ultimately, any upside or downside will have nothing to do with the transferability of the concept from the Globen stage to here, as they’ve achieved that just fine. Next!

Georgia

From the sublime to… well, to Georgia. If this is supposedly a song from a future rock-opera-musical that Anri has planned, you’ll forgive me if I don’t rush to buy front-row tickets for the opening night.

But the thing is, I’m A Joker (I still want to call it I’m Jocker, but what can you do) sort of works as a song, in a grotesque kind of way. The key is to achieve the right kind of visual performance – a bit jo(c)key, basically, but not in a punchable way – and for all it’s hard to tell from the rehearsal camerawork, I’m not fully convinced they’re bringing it across the right way here. It all feels, God forbid, a bit… too serious? Anri starts on one of the catwalks, while his backing singers start on mini versions of Safura’s stairs that look more like zimmer frames. And, well, they do their stuff. There’s a grand piano that gets used towards the end in a Reverse Daniela Simons kind of move. And, OK, it’s pretty professional. I just expected something a lot more bombastic, and I think the song needs it.

But hey. Georgia always qualify. Don’t they?

Turkey

And hey. Turkey always qualify. Don’t they?

See, that’s the thing. Now that we know Turkey isn’t an invincible semi-final behemoth providing it has a dull enough song, a poor enough performance and an insufficient base of voting allies to draw on, the question is how good they have to be to definitely make it through. And Love Me Back has always been a curious case. A slightly rambling sea-shanty of a song that I still find quite charming, in spite of the general lack of structure and the fact that they didn’t bother to write any new words for half of it – and that, depending on who you listen to, the words they did write are somewhat less than appealing.

But it was all going to hinge on the performance, and the performance is… confusing. Can doesn’t really seem to be engaging with things yet, although he might be holding back at this stage, and the overall vibe is one of a bunch of pissed-up hipsters having a bit of a knockabout singalong in the pub accompanied by some gymnastic moves. Which might be great fun when you’re the ones doing it, but far less so when seen from the other side of the bar. So, is it a qualifier? Well, I think it is, despite last year’s lessons – it does fulfil a quirky niche that isn’t really being served by anyone else in this semi, there’s a decent slice of personality in there, and the various ethnic elements ought to have some appeal beyond that, without the whole thing having to be belly-dancingly über-Turkish about it. But they’re not making it easy on themselves…

Estonia

Interestingly, no blue in Estonia’s backdrop, with the initial darkness followed up by a kind of stormy sunset and blossom/rose petal effect at the key change. We’ll see how it looks through the real camera’s eye, but it certainly seems effective from this distance.

You could argue that a male ballad in a native language is a bit of a risk in this day and age, even with the return of juries. But Kuula seems to cut through that lack of commerciality in a way that might just return a healthy number of points for Estonia. Either way, it was a decent vocal performance from Ott today, although there’s not really much that can go wrong when your staging is so last-century. I don’t mean that in a bad way, either – following the excesses of Turkey and Georgia (and arguably even Sweden), Estonia couldn’t have a better draw. Pretty decent contrast to the next one, too!

Slovakia

To be honest, even though I’ve got money on him not to qualify (and I’ll roll out a betting blog in due course – there are some interesting markets out there, as always), the teenage metalhead inside me is desperate for Max Jason Mai to succeed. And even more so after he uploaded this awesome video! So what are the chances for poor old friendless Slovakia?

Well, you’d certainly have to say that Don’t Close Your Eyes stands out of the semi 2 line-up. The only thing even remotely in its ballpark is arguably Belarus, and if you like your faux-rock performances with decent vocals and a healthy dose of commitment, you’re going to plump for Slovakia instead. The question may simply be whether there are enough votes in that market to begin with. Good solid rehearsal, I reckon, though I expected a bit more in terms of performance – will we get the Slipknot-lite gimmick of his bandmates wearing bank-robber masks? I suppose they wouldn’t want to wear them to every rehearsal, especially at Baku temperatures… Convincing enough generic metal backdrop (in every sense), lots of black and white and steel and strobes, and Max basically hits the notes confidently enough, although I remain unconvinced about the higher end of his range – he always seem to end up a bit sharp on the chorus. Still no idea where this is ending up, anyway, but they can party happily enough tonight.

Norway

Ooh. For a while now, I’ve wondered whether Tooji might be this year’s Getter Jarni. (No, really, bear with me here.) See, for me, Stay is a modern but quite disjointed pop song with serious potential for car-crash vocals on the night, particularly given the amount of movement involved. Not a non-qualifier, but conceivably a song that could flatter to deceive and ultimately end up quite low down on the final scoreboard.

They’ve addressed the singing side of things by bringing one dedicated backing vocalist to Baku, plus some dancers who can carry a tune – and today’s performance has actually put Norway right back on my radar. Maybe not as a winner, but certainly as a solid scorer in the final. My one major reservation is that Tooji’s falsetto is still a bit hit-and-hope. He barely sings the “stay” lines in the chorus, and that’s perfectly sensible, but the last half-minute requires him to play a more active vocal role in that higher register of his and, unless the sound quality of the rehearsal videos is hiding something, he never really quite makes it to where he needs to be. I don’t think that’s vital to the overall impression though, and the performance is visually very impressive.

Bosnia & Herzegovina

I know I tend to write too much, so sometimes it’s nice not to have a great deal to say about a rehearsal.

Korake ti znam is an attractive if daringly low-key ballad. Maya sings it very nicely and honestly, starting at her piano and staying there until about halfway through, whereupon she hits the front of the stage in time to attack the last chorus. The stage looks pretty enough, with the backdrop full of what I can only describe as, well, architecture. No backing singers, just some heavy reverb on her voice at key moments. The whole thing is incredibly simple and understated, and maybe that’s not such a bad thing after what came before – or maybe it’ll be the song’s downfall. Who knows?

Lithuania

And a marathon day of rehearsal activity comes to a close with our first sighting (hah!) of Donny Montell. For the sake of full disclosure, I should point out that I can’t get on with this song at all – I’d honestly rather spend an hour in the company of San Marino on repeat. But rehearsals week is renowned for springing a few surprises and making previous no-hopers seem like easy qualifiers, so what chance of a turnaround in my view on Love Is Blind?

None at all, as it happens. Donny comes across as a very sweet lad, but really, this is a strangely structured performance of a strangely structured song. It’s much as we knew it already – he’s all alone on stage, there’s the glittery blindfold, there’s the semi-backflip, there’s hundreds of silhouettes on the backdrop (think the Rounder Girls but less colourful), there’s an all-pervading sense of utter tedium… Well, OK, let’s at least say something positive: his vocals are very strong, and with juries rewarding that kind of thing, that alone might be enough to keep up Lithuania’s comparatively decent qualification record in recent years. I can’t see it happening though. (And neither can he!)

What else?
We found out today that one of Latvia’s promotional giveaways this year is chocolate bars with Anmary’s beaming face on the front. I was hoping there’d be two Smarties embedded in the chocolate to represent her googly eyes, but sadly not. Wasted opportunity.

Also, for those who are yet to arrive in Baku – including our own roving reporter Danny, who will be giving you all the on-site gossip starting from later in the week – it might be worth bringing some waterproof trousers, as the combined forces of Twitter and Google have conspired to locate the venue (and its inhabitants. Poor Emma!) in a surprisingly damp part of town:

Tomorrow we go back to the future, with Sunday’s (and some of Monday’s) countries returning for their second set of rehearsals. Will Greece have solved their tuning issues? Will Valentina’s backing group remember to charge their iPads? Will Rambo Amadeus ever crack a smile? Stay tuned to our website and Twitter feed to find out!

video source: eurovision.tv

Good evening! Today has seen the third sequence of rehearsals this year, including surprises and disappointments. After Martin’s efforts yesterday, it’s my turn again to review the videos of the day and give my comments, based on my personal opinion.

Two things have disturbed my focus and passion today, one being my absolute favourite disappointing on all levels, the other being a chicken bone that I swallowed when watching Ukraine.

But more on those matters further down. Here’s my review!

Serbia

We ended blue with Jedward yesterday, and we continued blue with Željko Joksimović, who is a well known man to all of us, so I can’t really say anything new about him anymore. His rehearsal was good, no question. Vocally near perfection. Later, red joins the blue on stage and it reminds a bit of the Confluence Of Sound theme of the ESC 2008 (that he hosted). So basically, this rehearsal was absolutely fine, just:

Nije Ljubav Stvar isn’t memorable at all. The few notes that are kind of recognizable, are exactly that, because we have heard them before. For example last year in the Danish entry. This is not plagiarism, it’s just nothing new and authentic either. Surely, there are a few beautiful instrumental moments in this, but this whole thing is – despite the perfection – leaving me very cold.

Macedonia

(no matter what I call this country, someone will be annoyed, so I’ll alternate every now and then)

Kaliopi is the biggest problem that Zeljko has. She simply rocks that stage, delivers a solid performance. She has the most special voice in the whole year, which seems to do two notes within an octave at once. It’s not necessarily pleasant for everyone, but it is a very rare phenomenon.

Crno I Belo is another song in blue, unlike the black and white that one might expect. I can smell this getting more votes than Serbia, but my nose might be wrong too. Who nose.

The Netherlands

Joan Franka was my big favourite in 2012 up until this day. I am, frankly, disappointed to say the least. Not because she wears the feathers, that’s the only chance for Netherlands to actually attract some attention. Though, opinions are diverse on whether it’s causing joy or ridicule. I belong(ed) to the first group. What really bothers me is the way they changed the performance. The cheerful (and tacky but that’s why they were remarkable) tambourine ladies got replaced by boooooring (I would like to imitate Martin’s voice there cos he likes to pronounce this word in a special way) guys. Boring.

You And Me lost its dynamics. Its charming fun got replaced by masculine tediousness. Its potential to get very far in the final is gone.

Malta

Kurt Calleja is just there. The whole thing is just there, and it’s not bad. I am admittedly not a big fan of this kind of song, but this was a solid, tight, confident rehearsal.

This Is The Night is one of the more trivial entries, but Malta makes the best out of it, in all disciplines: Staging, vocals and (admittedly not my kind of) fun.

Belarus

Litesound finally made it to Eurovision, and they got oomph. Just sometimes a bit too much, maybe. The stage begins in blue (again! we blame Yohanna!), but gets very yellow with the chorus. The singer is wearing some Mando-esque medieval lingery and looks somehow like a guy from the 80s or 90s, with his Nick Carter memorial hairdo. He struggles to appear likeable, but is more photogenic than Rambo Amadeus, to say the least. There is messy singing and moving going on, but at least they make use of the stage.

We Are The Heroes is slightly repetitive, but catchy and good enough to make some fans of that kind of music listen… and maybe vote.

Portugal

Filipa Sousa, I have a confession to make. I underestimated this. The Portuguese rehearsal turns out to be my Aha! moment of the day. I had this on my list as “uninspired”, but today told me otherwise. The backdrop is one of the most beautiful we have seen so far in the rehearsals, the vocals are spot on, they can’t make it much better really. It will show if the song is instant enough for people to vote for it, but so far, Portugal has done its homeworks.

Vida Minha brings the Fado to Baku, and in a much better way than we expected.

Ukraine

Gaitana sings – as expected – like Gaitana sings. Totally over the top, and the same is her show. She kind of goes around the “6 persons on stage rule” by taking her own LEDs on stage, showing dancers, dancers, and even more dancers. In all kind of colours. I don’t know what is distracting from what more, the displays from Gaitana’s voice, or Gaitana’s voice from the displays – but I guess it doesn’t matter, because by the time she comes to an end, people will have noticed it. There is no way of missing this, unless you go get more food or do the opposite.

Be My Guest is over the top, messy, didn’t impress me, but will impress enough voters. I was more impressed by the chicken bone that I swallowed while watching it.

Bulgaria

Sofi Marinova sang well enough in her first rehearsal (like shockingly most entrants we heard so far), but something is wrong there. The song, the production is pop, but somehow different, more mythical if I can say that, but she thinks: “Oh, Joan Franka is wearing feathers, I can wear leopard skin”. And with this song, it doesn’t work. Even more, the way she moves is just wrong.

Love Unlimited could have been – and should have been – a hypnotic, mythical show like Georgia 2007 was, but she turns it into the karaoke hour of a children’s birthday.

Tomorrow will bring an end to some speculations: How much will Loreen’s performance be changed? How WTF will Georgia be? Will Donny Montell bring his blindfold again? We will see tomorrow, in probably the most anticipated rehearsal day of the week. Stay tuned, we will tweet our first impressions again!

video source: eurovision.tv

Before I arrive in Baku, I’ve done a quick detour to Dubai to visit my friend Michael, who will be accompanying me to Azerbaijan later this week. Since it’s 42 degrees outside at the moment, I thought I’d come in to cool for a bit, and what better way to pass the time than to watch the rehearsal videos of the first semi final! I haven’t seen ANY of these yet, and I’m only watching each one once and writing down my first impressions, so these are likely to change drastically over the next week or so!

So here we go…

MONTENEGRO

Along with Leto Svet, this must be my least favourite Eurovision song in the past few years, if not longer. It’s a terrible opener to the contest, with no discernible tune or hook, and it’s not helped by the fact that Rambo looks as if the stage is the last place he wants to be, and it’s only saving grace is the countdown clock on the screens behind telling us how much of the song we have left to endure. If this qualifies, I’ll run down the streets of Baku wearing nothing but a Montenegrin flag…

ICELAND

And now we move on to the Contest proper! Greta and Jonsi give a typically strong Icelandic performance, with both of them looking and sounding great. I imagine the violin solo will look wonderful too on camera. Jonsi might look pretty but it’s all about Greta for me! I’d say this was pretty certain to qualify, but can it beak the non-Johanna Icelandic curse of qualifying but then not doing so well in the final?

GREECE

I’m getting hints of Emmy from Armenia here, catchy pop song sung by a pretty girl with a little bit shaky vocals. The dancing looks great but there’s only one backing singer and it really exposes Eleftheria, who sounds ever so slightly off key throughout the song. They are guaranteed some high points from Cyprus and Albania, but will that be enough to see them through?

LATVIA

Along with France, the Latvian preview video was my favourite of the year, both for completely different reasons! Anmary is definitely an engaging performer, and her vocals are great, much, much better than the National Final. but it all looks a bit messy on stage, and it doesn’t really come alive until the last chorus here my favourite, the classic Israeli strut makes a comeback! I’m just not sure it’s going to be enough to catch the viewers’ attention though…

ALBANIA

This is definitely the Marmite entry of the year, either you love it or hate it. I was firmly in the former camp and this rehearsal has done nothing to change that. The staging for this suits the song so well, dark and mysterious. Rona gives an outstanding vocal as always, however, I think the song is just too left field to appeal to the masses to ensnare enough votes to qualify. I think the juries however will love this so it could go either way…

ROMANIA

Now this one was a pleasant surprise. I had doubts that the lead singer, XXX, would be able to carry this off but she sounded perfectly fine. I couldn’t really see the performance as the EBU decided to intercut the rehearsal with some behind the scenes clips for some inexplicable reason, (please stop! Let us just see the performances) but from what I could see it suited the song well. Looks like Romania will be keeping their 100% qualifying record!

SWITZERLAND

It seems like aeons ago that the Swiss song was the first entry chosen for Eurovision back in December. Over the past few months, it’s been mid-table for me. The performance on stage in Baku wasn’t anything spectacular, though their diction seems to have improved somewhat. Not really sure on its chances yet, I’ll have to think about that, but its borderline at the moment

BELGIUM

One word to describe this would be “sweet”.  Iris looks innocent and sounds perfectly fine, if not completely perfect, but that can be worked on.  This one might not be high on anyone’s list and most people see this as a non-qualifier, but I get hints of Filipa Azevedo with this one, and I think we’ll be hearing this again on Saturday night, despite all the odds against it.

FINLAND

Oh WHAT a disappointment we have here. I loved this in the National Final but something’s happened here. They’ve got rid of the dancers which I think added to the performance, and while Pernilla sounds great, it just looks very flat on stage and dare I say it, boring. Such a shame, as I was so pleased when my favourite language finally made a return to the Eurovision stage, and Pernilla seems lovely, but at this stage, I think they will be on an early flight home on Wednesday.

ISRAEL

This one has been a bit of a grower for me over the past few weeks so I was looking forward to this rehearsal, and, well, it went ok. The chorus is my favourite part of the song but I’m not sure whether it was the mix but I could barely hear the female singer at all. So I’m not sure what to think about this one.  At the moment, it sounds and looks like an eleventh place in the semi-final, and as such, will just miss out.

SAN MARINO

I have to admit this song is a bit of a guilty pleasure for me. I know it’s a lot of rubbish but I can’t help it! I saw Valentina perform live in London was rather surprised by her great vocals. It is a bit of a shame they are wasted on this song though. She performs it to the best of her ability, though not sure what to make of the performance. Nice to see a return from her “friends” from the video though, including the camp guy, who is holding an iPad!

CYPRUS

Many have this down as this year’s Kate Ryan and even I had worries about this, but this performance totally changes my opinion. While not having the strongest vocals ever, Ivi’s performance is good enough, Not sure what the table made of books is all about though but I’m sure that will become apparent when we see the final costumes. I’d love this to qualify, and based on this, I think she might just do it!

DENMARK

Denmark really seem to have got the hang of this Eurovision lark recently. They keep sending MOR entries that, while might not be the most amazing songs ever, are catchy enough to capture the votes of both juries and televoters. This year is no exception. Soluna performs this really well, in the same get up as the national final, and nice to see a return of the female drummer too. I think this will be top 3 in the semi, pretty much guaranteed.

RUSSIA

Ok, I have to get this off my chest. I HATE this song. If it wasn’t for the gimmick of the Grannies, it would crash and burn. They do have a great gimmick though that I think will get enough televotes to get them over the line but the juries are (hopefully) going to dismiss this. It all seems a little bit forced now though, as if they are just going through the motions.

HUNGARY

This is another one which has grown on me over the last few weeks; All in all, the Hungarian song is a pretty credible piece of pop music. Whether this type of music is Final material, I’m not sure. It’s nice but it’s just “there” and perhaps it’s just not memorable enough to get the votes needed to qualify. Shame though as it will probably miss out over songs which are not as good, but that’s the way of the Eurovision world…

AUSTRIA

I never really liked this and this performance completely cements that opinion for me. The only good part was the light show which they’ve had to take out for some reason, and it is a serious detriment to the whole package. The pole dancing just looks cheap and nasty and really leaves a bad taste in my mouth. The way it stands at the moment, it looks like an early bath for Austria.

MOLDOVA

While this isn’t my favourite song in the contest, it’s by no means the worst. It’s catchy and well sung. Pasha looks like he has the craziest backing dancers of the year so far, and some of the choreography is a little bit questionable to say the least but overall, it works, and I think it’s got a good chance of qualifying.

IRELAND

MEH. I’ve never been a Jedward fan at all so I’m finding it hard to judge this one objectively.  The song itself is a pretty inoffensive piece of pop music, and the vocals are fine, with a lot of help from the backing singers of course! As for the gimmick, well it looked all very unspectacular, but I have a feeling that’s just a stand-in until the final dress rehearsals. Overall, unspectacular, but I’d say their good draw will be enough to make the final but they won’t do anywhere near as well as last year.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Ok, based on those once only viewings, I’d put the following down as qualifiers:

ICELAND
GREECE
ROMANIA
BELGIUM
CYPRUS
DENMARK
RUSSIA
MOLDOVA
IRELAND

And one of HUNGARY or SWITZERLAND – they’re both so similar I can’t decide…

Right, I’m off to enjoy the sunshine, will be back with more views on semi 2 in a few days, just before I set off to report LIVE for you in Baku!