Welcome from Sunny Malta! The ESC Insight team are all here and keeping up to date with everything from the Press Centre. For a round-up of our articles, podcasts and the best of the rest check out the latest edition of the ESC Insight Newsletter.
As always the newsletter features Robertson’s Reflection, featuring what life is like for the energetic if tiny acts around the Eurovision bubble.
“A musical all about Melodifestivalen means that only one man could write this and have the clout to attract the big name singers. Fredrik Kempe is the songwriter I love to hate in Melodifestivalen (or should that be hate loving?) and that doesn’t change with this. Fredrik is the king of the key change and his style is synonymous with the modern sound of the contest and this musical. All the big numbers here feature big, obvious clunky key changes in his usual style (even the ending song, Aldrig Ska Jag Sluta Älska Dig, is pumped up to the 9’s on those final key changes for the hell of it from the film version), but he does produce a score of needed diversity alongside this, producing a more cabaret style of show than you may expect.
The big stand-out song showing Kempe’s maturity to the task is Ingen Är Där which ends Act 1. Often Kempe’s sadder songs in Melodifestivalen often frustrate by their inability to shake off their pop credentials and four chord major key loops. Here we witness a darker side to Kempe’s songwriting never seen before with a crafted clashing instrumentation with reveals the torment Candy has to deal with. It’s masterfully done and is the only song that really makes full use of Jöback’s world-class voice. Annors Vore Jag Inte Jag is the song perhaps most familiar to geeky Eurovision fans as it represents Sweden in the OGAE Song Contest this year, However this is a rather safe and gentle musical number in comparison to the brilliance of Jöback’s dark scene before the interval.”
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