Lopez Blogs

I got it wrong this week, but I think it would be safe to say that no-one anticipated that the "folk-Britneys" would overtake either Darin or Alcazar, but that's the surprise of Melodifestivalen for you :)

Anyway, three weeks in....and my own view is that this year's MF falls short of the usual expectations, as there are very few songs this year which will take on an iPod-life of their own beyond the contest. I was disappointed last week, and this week also disappointed me too. So here's my thoughts on this week's Melodifestivalen....

Intro-sketch: pretty dull.

Christine's bandage-dress: better than last week's outfit. But then anything would have been :)

Computer = traditional 7.15 pm (British time) strop = resulted in missing most of Alcazar which I was really p****d off about, anyway I got back in time for "we're on top of the game" and then the key change and then....oh just send this to Globen. I love Alcazar, and even when it's not as good as previous years, I'm happy that they are still around. Although I've got this feeling that this will be their last time at MF, in the same way I felt about BWO at MF 2009.

But I digress. Next up is Johannes Bah Kuhnke, with "Tonight" which again sounded better than the pre-contest clip, although I never rated it as a qualifier. He did his best though but it wasn't good enough.

And so to Elin Lanto with "Doctor Doctor" Unfortunately it was a foregone conclusion that she would fall victim this week to the MF-non-qualifying curse. Her PVC-leggings ensemble was very nice though:P and the song will probably do well outwith the contest.

After hearing "Hur Kan Jag Tro Pa Karlek" by Erik Linder I was firmly convinced that this would qualify. I wasn't too impressed with him, but I thought the song was quite sweet and nice...

Unlike "Yeba" by Getty Domein: had high hopes for this one and a potentially colourful stage performance....and it just let me down.

"Kom" - Timoteij - think Sarek meets The Corrs...anyway it wasn't long till I was hooked, and tapping my feet. The red wine accompanying this week's MF had obviously kicked in early :))))

And so to Darin. Arguably this year's most long-awaited entry (unless you were me, of course, in which case that accolade clearly belonged to Salem Al Fakir. Obviously.) anyway there Darin was, in a white jacket and black jeans, and blue lights being waved by the audience....it was all very awwww...nice, although I prefer him in uptempo-mode.

Finally, Crucified Barbara. Scary, eh? Although I though Vanilla Ninja did this kind of thing better. But hey, there were pyrotechnics and that (and the favourable draw position) was enough to drag them into the top 5....

But first there was the interval act shenanigans, which meant Dolph and Christine-as-Lisbeth-Salander - anyway this was really funny as ever, and the torture-by-schlager was right up my street :) and then there was the Blue Man Group, who did their usual banging-on-pipes thing as this week's interval act.

Result: Timoteij till Globen. Surprise result, but not toooo surprising when you think about it.

Second Globen qualifier: Darin.

To Andra Chansen: Alcazar.....and Crucified Barbara.

However all in all I found this week's MF heat to be a bit laboured and even though I always enjoy it, I was pretty glad when it was all over.

So anyway I thought it would be appropriate to have a bit of vintage Darin tonight - some "Money For Nothing" which is probably my favourite Darin song ever :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EICLzraNO6U

And while we're on the subject: let's have some classic Alcazar: my favourite Alcazar song ever to be precise - "Crying At The Discoteque" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bWSDaAdrBM = now I wonder how well that would have done at MF, back in the day ????