Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

 Marija and her dog  Douwe feeding his family  Alexander trying to selfie a duck Vaidas doing good Amber feeling melancholy in Birmingham Amir in photoshoot for the new album! Hovi in photoshoot Iveta launching her own robe collection Aram mp3 inviting you for a bicycle tour Artsvik posing Carola studying new songs Conchita relaxing Yo! Polina adding drama Sertab leaving holidays she needs after breaking the Eurovision  fandom bubble with Turkish rumors....

Poor Amber. She has to share the song title and comparision with Georgia, and the backdrop comparision with Conchita and she seems to lose both. And someone compared her dress to Andorra's Jenny! How much can a girl take? Anyways, the song is what it is and her vocals are what they are. Not my cup of tea I'm afraid. The backdrop in blue features some caleidoscopic images that make me think of pelvic bones, smoke and dandelion seeds blown away. Later the color changes to warm copper red and the wing image is more evident. All through the song she remains in one spot just doing divalike arm movements. Oh well. I¨'m not conquisted by this warrior and I'm afraid the televoters aren't either. We will see.

After four quite excellent performances we have one that doesn't seem so interesting or captivating, Malta's warrior is dressed in black lace and giving a classic diva performance just standing still and waving arms while yelling out her tune. The backdrop in flames goes from blue to orange to red and there are some pyros, too. Quite unoriginal and standard in every way. Nah, I'm not impressed. 

The Maltese national selection took place tonight. No changes in anyone's performances from the Friday's semifinal, only that some did sing slightly better perhaps, while others... Oh well.  Conchita Wurst opened the show with Rise like a Phoenix . Then the 14 songs were presented before neverending interval acts borrowed from last week's Junior Eurovision while waiting for the results. Among them last winners Firelight with their Coming home,  follow up Talk dirty to me  and the new one Backdrop of life.  Then Conchita returned with Heroes and we had hope the interval acts were over.... And indeed.... the voting was the most uninteresting ever Amber scoring full 12 points from televotes and each juror. Amber has been a regular in the Maltese selection for years already. This spring she came 4th with Because I have you , in 2013 also 4th with In control , in 2012 3rd with Answer with your eye s and in 2010 with Catch 22 13th.

All eyes on Marsa Shipyards tonight again when Malta picks up its represent for Vienna 2015. At least the artist, the song maybe as there are rumors and speculation it could be changed between now and the deadline to present entries in mid-March (the same goes for Macedonia). Anyways, 14 acts remain in the race after last night's semifinal and one could see PBS is putting on an extra effort this year. Besides the show hosted on the same stage as the Junior Eurovision song contest a week ago - yet they have managed to make it look rather different - many artists have dancers and all that usual stuff to make every entry look different and thought after. Well done.  Amber  (pictured) is the front runner followed by the Eurovision cliché act by Jessika , but the girl can't hold a note for full three minutes, it's painfully evident by now. The nuns could win with televote but surely they won't win with jurors unless they are in majority foreign and want to make Malta ...

The Junior Eurovision song contest ended with Italy's victory in Marsa Shipyard's stage and the day after the rehearsals started for Malta Eurovision song contest, aka their national selection for the real thing in Vienna next May. A clever planning of using the same stage and venue for two different festivals - something that YLE did ages ago when hosting Euroviisut and Emma Gala (the Finnish Grammys) on same stage, but even on the same night! But that's another story... Malta is also making propably a certain kind of history as they are having the second national final this year, as the one for 2014 was held on February 8, some nine months ago! The special guest for the final is none other than reigning Eurovision Queen Conchita Wurst.   Twenty entries will battle the 14 final places on Friday night (see the running order below). Some previous entrants are trying to win again: Glen Vella (2011), Ludwig Galea of Trilogy (2004), Gianluca Bezzina of L-Ahwa (2013). Fiv...

I have been following the Maltese selection closely for years now and generally liked it quite a lot but this year seems to be the weakest effort so far. I mean, the songs aren't bad but they are very even, bland. No particular highlights - except a couple that stood out with the first snippet hearing -  nor lows. It feels like these are mostly songs that didn't make the selection this spring considering these exceptional circumstances this time. I may be wrong but that's my impression. At this point every song could make the final and any song can drop out. Propably it all comes to the staging, live performance and shining on stage when it matters come semifinal time. And talking about nuns. Sister Cristina in Italy is from another planet compared to these Maltese sisters. The whole affair is lacking the heavenly inspiration of any kind. If the song was sung by anyone else it would have never made the cut, I think. I wasn't a fan of Bezzina's last effort and ...

The entertaining interval acts were still going at 23.10 when eurovision.tv already announced Amber had won. How is that? Are we ready for a scandal? Some 20 minutes later they apologize for the technical mistake.... nice...."We apologise for prematurely announcing the result of the Maltese final! A slight technical hitch." A slight? Around midnight the voting was over and Gianluca Bezzina emerged as a winner, Amber reaching only 4th place. 00.02 eurovision.tv had corrected their news. All is well that ends well :-)Almost, their beforehand prepaired article still has Amber as the winner in the end.... That's why hardly ever prepare anything like this beforehand :-) But it's good to see that also the big, respected and famous make mistakes, not only us minor bloggers ;-p