Since 2008 the annual Eurovision Song Contest consists of two semi finalists which are responsible to deliver 10 qualifiers each to take part in the grand final where they join Italy, France, Germany, Spain and the host country, this year Azerbaijan. Over the past few weeks we’ve been going through the semi finalists. Today we have a closer look at the entries from Bulgaria, Slovenia and Croatia.
Bulgaria: Sofi Marinova – Love Unlimited
Bulgaria made its debut in the 2005 edition of the Eurovision Song Contest and has made its appearance in the grand final only once in 2007 with the Safri Duo inspired ‘Water’. This year the country selected singer Sofi Marinova, in a national final, to represent her country with a 90ies dance track, which shows quite a lot of similarities with Romanian Inna’s European breakthrough single (we let you decide if you can hear it too). ”Love Unlimited” is a dance track which is almost entirely sung in Bulgarian. The chorus however is a mixture of ‘I Love You’ in different languages including French, Greek, Turkish and Italian. Shame Bulgaria is right behind Ukraine, but let’s cross our fingers both tracks make it to the final with ease.
Slovenia: Eva Boto – Verjamen
16 year old Eva Boto, is this years youngest participant in the Eurovisiong Song Contest, carrying the flag for Slovenia. The singer won the ticket during EMA 2012, in which she challenged a Twins duo. Her entry, ‘Verjamen’ (English: I Believe) may sound very similar to ‘Molitva’, the winning song of Serbia in 2007. The similarities are definately there, the song sounds very much like a fairytale and builds up towards the end. We’re not sure why Snowwhite (awww) has brought her Fairy Godmothers along.(we didn’t know Snowwhite had Fairy godmothers… wrong fairytale?)… because again the set up is very similar to the Serbian entry we referred to, although the Slovenian backing vocals are a let down really. The backing’s solo in the middle of the song is also a pit off-putting to us. Will be interesting to see how this beauty will fare. It’s Slovenia’s 18th attempt to win the Eurovision Song Contest for the very first time.
Croatia: Nina Badrić – Nabo
Nina Badrić was internally selected to represent Croatia at this years Eurovision Song Contest and decided to revamp one of her ballads, which also appears on her latest album. ”Nebo” (Engl. ‘Heaven’) might on a first listen sounds a tough nut to crack and a bit dull, but in fact it’s a rather beautiful song, which grows on you the more you listen to it. Nina is really going for Eurovision success as her ‘No sex until Eurovision is over’ campaign was even mentioned in the English newspapers. (Beat that Russian grannies!) Since the singer’s undergone a surgery on her vocal chords (we don’t think it’s related to the no sex campaign) and has already announced that she will soon hit the studio to record her entry in more languages. Croatia has never won the Eurovision Song Contest before, but came 4th on two occassions; 1996 and 1998.
Our verdict
1 Ukraine
2 Netherlands
3 FYR Macedonia
4 Bulgaria
5 Serbia
6 Croatia
7 Slovenia
8 Malta
9 Belarus
10 Portugal
Coming up next are: Sweden & Georgia
