Romania - Semifinal 2 pre-review

Ok, it's time to have a look at the songs in the second semifinal of Romanian selecţia naţională tomorrow. Six of these will qualify for the Saturday's final.

Besa opens this one. She makes me think of Celine Dion for some reason, maybe the color of her voice or the way she pronounces as the song is not up for la Dion's standards, I'm afraid. Red Blond follows with some girlpower I suspect but the only thing that comes across is "Sex! Sex!" or I might be even wrong about that.... Things get a bit better with Adrian Molnar. He's in the same genre with first semis Zero and Tabassco. Pleasant but I guess it will all come down to the performance again. Catalin is one of the favourites I hear and he is mine for sure. I was a bit surprised for the performance though! I hope he won't ruin it all with that. Song's great but the performance is not! Soundcheck provides with their jazzy nightclub number the first candidate for null points in Moscow if selected. I don't think even juries would save this. Etnic starts their song very slow but when the chorus kicks in you think of Melodifestival but then in comes a violin solo... Hmmm.... The girls however seem so absent minded it's almost comic! This can go anywhere I guess. Then comes in Irina Popa and I get the shivers; she sounds so much like late Laura Branigan in the verses it's scary! The song is rocky in chorus and she seems to be really into it. Alexa comes in after her in a completely different mood to her first semi's offering. In an evening gown she delivers a standard ballad. Then we have a song that almost sounds like a Backstreet Boys song by Alin Nica. I like it, he is very convincing, the song is easy to the ear and catchy enough. After him we go round and round with IMBA not concluding much in my opinion. I guess this could appeal to televoters though. Costi comes in next and sings his own song, written together by one of the Blaxy Girls. They also wrote their song and if I liked that one, I also like this one. He needs a stylist though! Elena Gheorge wraps it up with a song that could easily be a summerhit and an anthem to all Balcan partygirls. Give me a caipirinha or two with this one and I will love it!

So, predicting the finalists from this one feels much tougher than from the first semi but I would say Catalin, Alin Nica, Costi, Elena Gheorge and two out of Etnic, IMBA and Irina Popa.

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Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

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