Eurovision 2013: Ireland



Yes, this came up on the first page of Google Images for "Only Love Survives"

The joys about being a Eurovision fan is that there are a lot of others that are much more fanatical about the show than I am.  (And some of my friends would be shocked by that one.)

The EBU has recognized this fanaticism, and has set up the web site www.eurovision.tv to help satiate the need for more information, and one of the ways they do that it provide links to stream a number of the national finals.  So instead of watching links posted up on YouTube, I spent a nice afternoon watching the Irish national final as a streamed program on the Internet.

Ireland's national selection process, Eurosong, was broadcast as part of RTE's The Late Late Show on February 22nd.   Five artists, mentored by successful people in the Irish musical community, performed their songs and a combination of jury and public voting selected the winner.

 

 

Ryan Dolan  "Only Love Survives"

 

Yep, Ireland sent a dance song highly influenced by last year's winning song.

 

Dolan's a good singer and a pretty compelling performer, and the success of the song is going to depend on him.  The song is bland and the music is generically techno--utterly unmemorable in my mind.  Yet if he's able to bring it on the night, I can see the song making it into the finals and placing quite well, just like the Maltese entry did last year.

 

I on the other hand, much prefer the second place song in the contest.

 

 

Aimée   "Crashing Down"

 





Who is this young woman?  Her voice is like velvet..

I have to admit that it does sound like a song rejected by Adele, but it is pitch perfect.   Jaw droppingly so.   The fact that this wasn't chosen over "Only Love Survives" surprises me, but again it's a matter of taste, and the Irish public preferred a dance number.

It will be interesting to see how Ireland fares in May...