Eurovision Insight Podcast: Juke Box Jury 2020 #7 Written by
Ewan Spence on
April 26, 2020 | 5 Comments
Our 41 songs for 2020 may not be going to Rotterdam, but they still have an appearance on Juke Box Jury to get through. You can listen to Juke Box Jury and the ESC Insight podcast online, add the RSS Feed to your favourite podcast application, or click here to follow us in iTunes and never miss an episode.
We’re approaching the end of the Juke Box Jury playlist. Ten performers left looking for the hits, avoiding the misses, and maybe a bit of satisfaction with a maybe.
Eurovision Insight Podcast: Juke Box Jury #7 with Coinneach MacLeoid and Ellie Chalkley
Estonia: What Love Is, by Uku Suviste. Israel: Feker Libi, by Eden Alene. San Marino: Freaky, by Senhit. Azerbaijan: Cleopatra, by Efendi. Russia: Uno, by Little Big.
British Academy (BAFTA) nominated broadcaster and writer Ewan Spence is the voice behind The Unofficial Eurovision Song Contest Podcast and one of the driving forces behind ESC Insight. Having had an online presence since 1994, he is a noted commentator around the intersection of the media, internet, technology, mobility and how it affects us all. Based in Edinburgh, Scotland, his work has appeared on the BBC, The Stage, STV, and The Times.
You can follow Ewan on Twitter (@ewan) and Facebook (facebook.com/ewanspence).
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Estonia – With so many options this year why did they choose this dated no hoper?
Israel – Not my genre but the song is interesting and Eden sells it. Would probably have qualified for the final.
Azerbaijan – 2000s ethno banger of the kind I absolutely detest. Nevertheless I could see a strong mid table finish for this.
San Marino – Dated disco but I rather enjoyed it. It at least had a chance of qualifying.
Russia – To my mind a bit of a one joke entry. But Eurojury scores so far suggest it would have come 5 or 6 with the juries and not all that far behind the jury winner. As Ewan said, it could have come down to a televote head to head with Iceland. The massive Russian diaspora could have swung it the way of Little Big.
Estonia-
My first reaction was meh,nothing special and over produced.. But than I heard him singing this during Eurovision Home Concerts and the stripped version he sung, sounded much better, was more focused and he can actually sing. The stripped version would have earned him a hit. Unfortunately the version we would hear during Eurovision is the one we hear in the video and this is just a MAYBE
Israel-
The discussion about this being 3 or 4 songs joint in one, threw me back to 2015. “Golden Boy” has just been presented and everyone was complaining about the fact it was 2 or 3 songs joint in one song. It ended up as top 10 in the final. Who wrote “Golden Boy”? Doron Medalie. Fast forward to 2020, Doron Medalie write another Israeli Eurovision entry and we hear the same complaints.
Here is the thing – I think that Doron Medalie has the capacity to somehow write songs , bring several elements to the songs, which shouldn’t be working at all and somehow make them work for the song. This is no exception. It’s cheerful, happy and ear-worm. In this year line up it would have sound different from anything else in the competition. Eden Alene brings her shinny personality to the stage and elevate the song. I would have imagine the same fate like “Golden Boy”-Easily qualifying and top 10 result for this song – HIT
Azerbaijan-
Behind this over produced song, lies a very thin tune, which should have been enough for 1 minute and is stretched to 3 minutes. I can imagine this being staged over the top, throwing everything in it but the kitchen sink. As a song, it doesn’t do anything for me . Doesn’t make me feel anything. It feels like a product and someone thought this product may win Eurovision and paid a lot of money for it – MISS
San Marino-
I don’t really think San Marino ever gets Eurovision. All the wrong choices through the year. I also understand they don’t really have a choice or the budget in regards to who they can sent. But why give me the feeling that they aren’t really even trying.
A 70’s disco tune can be so much fun if done in a right way but this is all kind of shades of wrong. The approach is too serious, where a bit of irony might be better. The musical arrangement is so straight forward and so unimaginative. I think she can thing live, so that should have helped somehow – MISS
Russia-
I am sorry but this rubbish. It’s based on one musical sentence, which repeats itself over and over again. It’s the kind of song which enforce the prejudice of people who don’t know the contest and think that Eurovision is the place with weird songs and where people has no musical taste what so ever – MISS
I could listen to Coinneach’s voice all day, but I think he meant Amharic rather than Ampharic. On the other hand, I watched Ilya Prusikin’s video and it made me feel sick.
Estonia – With so many options this year why did they choose this dated no hoper?
Israel – Not my genre but the song is interesting and Eden sells it. Would probably have qualified for the final.
Azerbaijan – 2000s ethno banger of the kind I absolutely detest. Nevertheless I could see a strong mid table finish for this.
San Marino – Dated disco but I rather enjoyed it. It at least had a chance of qualifying.
Russia – To my mind a bit of a one joke entry. But Eurojury scores so far suggest it would have come 5 or 6 with the juries and not all that far behind the jury winner. As Ewan said, it could have come down to a televote head to head with Iceland. The massive Russian diaspora could have swung it the way of Little Big.
Estonia-
My first reaction was meh,nothing special and over produced.. But than I heard him singing this during Eurovision Home Concerts and the stripped version he sung, sounded much better, was more focused and he can actually sing. The stripped version would have earned him a hit. Unfortunately the version we would hear during Eurovision is the one we hear in the video and this is just a MAYBE
Israel-
The discussion about this being 3 or 4 songs joint in one, threw me back to 2015. “Golden Boy” has just been presented and everyone was complaining about the fact it was 2 or 3 songs joint in one song. It ended up as top 10 in the final. Who wrote “Golden Boy”? Doron Medalie. Fast forward to 2020, Doron Medalie write another Israeli Eurovision entry and we hear the same complaints.
Here is the thing – I think that Doron Medalie has the capacity to somehow write songs , bring several elements to the songs, which shouldn’t be working at all and somehow make them work for the song. This is no exception. It’s cheerful, happy and ear-worm. In this year line up it would have sound different from anything else in the competition. Eden Alene brings her shinny personality to the stage and elevate the song. I would have imagine the same fate like “Golden Boy”-Easily qualifying and top 10 result for this song – HIT
Azerbaijan-
Behind this over produced song, lies a very thin tune, which should have been enough for 1 minute and is stretched to 3 minutes. I can imagine this being staged over the top, throwing everything in it but the kitchen sink. As a song, it doesn’t do anything for me . Doesn’t make me feel anything. It feels like a product and someone thought this product may win Eurovision and paid a lot of money for it – MISS
San Marino-
I don’t really think San Marino ever gets Eurovision. All the wrong choices through the year. I also understand they don’t really have a choice or the budget in regards to who they can sent. But why give me the feeling that they aren’t really even trying.
A 70’s disco tune can be so much fun if done in a right way but this is all kind of shades of wrong. The approach is too serious, where a bit of irony might be better. The musical arrangement is so straight forward and so unimaginative. I think she can thing live, so that should have helped somehow – MISS
Russia-
I am sorry but this rubbish. It’s based on one musical sentence, which repeats itself over and over again. It’s the kind of song which enforce the prejudice of people who don’t know the contest and think that Eurovision is the place with weird songs and where people has no musical taste what so ever – MISS
I could listen to Coinneach’s voice all day, but I think he meant Amharic rather than Ampharic. On the other hand, I watched Ilya Prusikin’s video and it made me feel sick.
Who is Ellie referring to as the LGBTQ artist who was supposed to sing Cleopatra?
Senhit was supposed to sing it for San Marino 🙂