Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

GEORGIA - ETHNO-JAZZ BAND IRIAO - FOR YOU you own only what you share Vocals **** Staging ** Song ** Overall *** Borderline qualifier POLAND - GROMEE feat. LUKAS MEIJER - LIGHT ME UP Light Me Up My baby Light Me Up And tell me where to go Vocals ** Staging ** Song *** Overall *** Borderline qualifier MALTA - CHRISTABELLE - TABOO It’s time to break the taboo Before we all become animals, animals Vocals **** Staging **** Song *** Overall **** Borderline qualifier HUNGARY - AWS - VISZLÁR NYÁR Summer gone, now you’re all too late That you’ll be mine was just a lie You never came. Vocals **** Staging *** Song *** Overall *** Qualifier

Day 4 and today we will see the rest of the semi-finalists rehearse, aka the second half of the second semi-final and then we have a clearer picture of all acts. There have been some surprises already in both semis, as well as some letdowns (apparently Australia's Jeessica left the  press center in tears last nigth after she came aware of the unison negative reception) so the competition is fierce in the first one, and those who thought the second one is the easy one - think again! Georgia - Ethno-Jazz band Iriao - For you Mystery revealed: only three band members are on stage singing, with added keyboardist and guitarist, Suits with white shirts, read and light blue turns red lighting. Apparently nice close ups but not so much camera contact so they are pretty much waisted. No show whatsoever, except some arm choreography towards the end it seems, let the music speak to itself.  Some say they looked bored and forced to perform together... oops! On the other hand o...

  San Marino - Jessika feat. Jenifer Brening - Who we are Jessika Muscat (29) has the faith of fellow Maltese Christabelle: several national final attemps and now she gets finally to Eurovision with the worst of them. Or almost. She is joined by German Jenifer Brening (21) who took the original rapper Irol's place when he turned down the song stating it's not his cup of tea. He would have given this at least some Sammarinese touch. Anyways, the innotative Sammarinese national final selection promised a lot but in the end gave us this. I would have chosen differently but what we have is a rather anonymous and heard before anthem against bullying, well sung by Jessika with Jenifer's rap as bonus. Sadly unforgettable and the only thing that might get attention and viewers to remember this are the robots. If they travel to Lisbon, too. What's their deal anyways?! 3/10 Macedonia - Eye Cue - Lost and found Eye Cue is Bojan Trajkovski and Marija Ivanovska...

Israel - Netta - Toy Netta Barzilai (25) is this year's Francesco Gabbani, the one given as a winner before we hit the stage in Lisbon, she has gathered record breaking Youtube views and Spotify streams and is the one everyone's talking about and also dividing opinions to heat up the discussions. I liked this when I heard it the fifrst time for it's craziness, then I put it aside a bit when everyone was screaming this is the Winner and eventually settled to like it a lot. It's refreshing, different, memorable with a gimmick everyone will note. It's fun! Yet I tend to think this is more like Dancing lasha tumbai , a great runner up rather than a winner. To be that it's maybe just a bit too weird and crazy for the great public who seeing/hearing this for the first time might take it as a joke. But who knows? 10/10 Belgium - Sennek - A matter of time Laura Groeseneken (27) aka Sennek continues the Belgian trend of quality entries and when this ...

Fourth time lucky Christabelle came and conquered. I was a bit wrong about runaway winner and she certainly was one. All international jurors placed her first and so did the televoters. Her staging had some gimmicks and as usual she did deliver live. And surprise: her song is written by Swedish Thomas G:son and Johnny Sanchez with Maltese Muxu and Christabelle herself. Christabelle has participated three times before in Maltese selection: 2014 with Lovetricity (8th), 2015 with Rush (2nd) and 2016 with Kingdom (4th). Richard and his dad finished second and Brooke third. Actually these three songs were above all the rest clearly as you can see below. Christabelle — Taboo (jury 60 + televote 73) 133 Richard & Joe Micallef — Song for Dad (31 + 67) 98 Brooke — Heart of Gold (37 + 47) 84 Aidan — Dai Laga (34 + 8) 42 Eleanor Cassar — Back to Life (19 + 17) 36 Petra — Evolution (27 + 6) 33 Matthew Anthony — Call 2morrow (26 + 6) 32 J...

  Malta's Eurovision final takes places tonight in Valletta's Ta'Qali and there will be 50-50 televote-juries. What can I say about the songs? There's no Eurovision winner this year either among them, that's for sure, sadly. Nor a sure qualifier either. I guess my favorites - not thinking at all in Eurovision terms - are Richard & Joe and Eleanor I guess, followed by Deborah C and Dwett (maybe for all the wrong reasons though). Turn it up needs a good remix and it could become something great though. Christabelle and Brooke are quite good if staged and sung well live, Jasmine, Matthew Anthony and Tiziana follow on my list with Lawrence Gray , even if takes some moments to let it sink in it's Lawrence baby. Aidan leaves me borderline, I might learn to like it a lot or then not with further listenings but these comments are based on hearing the songs when they came out, and now for the second time after all these weeks. I have no clue who's goi...