I look at this video of Carola singing "Invincible" for Sweden in 2006 and think only one thing. Let's throw as much as we possibly can at the lighting budget and pour the rest into the rental of the wind machine assuming, of course, there's something left over from the costume work.
It should come as no surprise that this particular song actually makes my skin crawl.
Don't get me wrong. It's punchy. Carola (Eurovision stalwart and one time winner for Sweden) gives a very polished performance and proves beyond any doubt that her singing abilities are totally reliable. She owns the stage and more importantly shows how comfortable she feels singing in such large arenas. Carola is made for television.
But that's also my problem with it. The song, the performance and the act feels packaged. It feels like the same kind of factory driven output I detect when I pick up a packet of supposedly "freshly made in the capital" sandwiches. It's like the people behind the thing know exactly the recipe for what the niche audience wants - ie tub-thumping, anthemic choruses delivered by a relative Queen of Eurovision - and delivers it time and time again.
Carola is lovely - the hour I spent with her in her hotel room accompanied by her entourage was an absolute joy. She was interested in answering my questions and what ever preconceptions I might have had regarding her personal beliefs and how they fitted in with her love of Eurovision seemed irrelevant at the end of the interview she participated in.
Still, I can't bear listening to this song. It's horribly cliched, more so than many other Eurovision songs.
Friday 29 February 2008
# 26 Invincible
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2 comments:
Mmm. Can't say I'm a huge fan of it either - though for slightly different reasons.
Above all, the English version of this song is a shocker. The sparse nature of the lyrics is even more horribly obvious, the lyrics themselves are simple platitudes...the whole thing is so much more palatable in Swedish, it's not funny.
Neither does the presentation work much, either. Never mind that Carola has suddenly developed a REALLY bad and distracting "gospel jaw" - who on earth gave her 40-foot trains and decided to dress her up as Edina Monsoon?
Still, it's a professional effort that you can't help think was devised entirely to restore Sweden to the top five on the scoreboard. In that much at least, it succeeds.
Why? Well, I was there on both occasions it was performed in Athens, and I can assure you that Carola is indeed a brilliant singer, and it really did make the hairs stand up at the back of your neck.
Thank you for the use of the word "cliche", because now I understand why I feel the way I do about this song. It really does have all of them - of the Scandinavian type. I kind of like it - and I kind of like it more each time I hear it - but I also resent that fact.
I always feel it's a "going through the motions" type of song, a really "easy option" for the singer.
But it does have some things in its favour. She knows how to perform. It's a very pleasant tune. It gets you up and dancing. Begrudgingly you kind of enjoy it, but you feel that doesn't do you any credit.
At last year's Birmingham Bash dsico it went down a complete storm - including Paddy O'Connell doing the wind machine for the dance floor.
And my wife would put it in her top ten Eurovision songs, so there.
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