Tonight SIL and Yass topped the combined votes of the public and panel in studio in the second of three Semi Finals in Eurosong 2014. They join Eva Jacobs and Udo in the final which takes place March 16th in the Sportpaleis Antwerp.
Four acts perform and only two places in the final. Tonights Semi Final 2 live from Vilvoorde four new songs are debuted as potential entries for Belgium at this years 59th Eurovision. As is the case with this show all songs are available to download once the programme is over.
The studio panel’s scores and the viewers votes both decide who makes it through to the Grand Final. Belgiun will perform in the second half of the first Semi Final (Tuesday May 6th) in Copenhagen.
Tonight the second batch of semi finalists took to the stage and to find out more about them simply click here.
The Songs
1 Chasing Rainbows – Axeela (M & L:) Bernd Klimpel / Dimitri Ehrlich / Lauren Amaris
The original song that Axeela was to perform Apocapypse has been used as a winning song in a different competition, and so Chasing Rainbows was her second song. Bit of glitz and sparkle with this first song. Axella has her name in large print behind has as she opens this slow tempo ballad. Joined on stage by two female backing singers and two sparkle vested dancers who work with her to perform the chasing rainbows message. Her vocals are good and consistant but she seems uncomfortable, the overall look is very strong too, a blue/green corset with a large train at the back. She is lifted a number of times from her feet and the vocals seems unaffected. A good start to the show but not sure this will be a qualifier tonight. She manages to secure 81 points from the panel.
2 Need You Tonight – Yass (M & T:) Yass Smaali / Yves Gaillard / Ashley Hicklin / Leon Paul Palmen / Rupert Blackman
An ode to King’s of Leon and Use Somebody in the initial sounds here which I’m sure may require a slight change. Yass is wearing a Bruno Mars inspired mustard flock style jacket and black hat combo with guitar over the shoulder. Verses of Need you Tonight are in French and then chorus in english. It’s quite a radio friendly track, slow and guitar based throughout with a brief stomp drum break. Seems like the setting could be a dark cold spot on a lonely night. On stage he is joined by 4 backing dancers, who seem to be cold, lonely, afraid but they come together to perform and feel warmer by the need you tonight chorus.The song certainly has more presence and confidence to it than song 1. The experts are impressed and Yass gets 89 points from them.
3 She’s After My Piano – 2 Fabiola feat. Loredana (M & T:) Ovidiu Jacobsen / Phillip Halloun / Simen Eriksrud / Cecilie Harboe
Camp, catchy, uptempo and with some magic mixed in. It has a slightly similar beat to Verka Serduchka’s Dancing Lasha Tumbai, on stage the lead singer is in white, like a very short wedding dress. The rest are a mix of circus and costume folk who are running about and the magician continues to perform tricks and even drops his head down his chest. The only piano that’s seen is a mini piano on a tray. I have to say this isn’t good enough in my eyes. It’s camp and it’s cheesy but it’s not good enough for Belgium this year. One of the composers of She’s After My Piano is none other than Romania’s 2010 and as of last night 2014 entry, Ovi!The expert panel give it 84 points.
4 What’s The Time in Tokyo? – SIL (M & T:) Marcella Detroit / Marcus Winther-John / Paul Drew / Greig Watts / Pete Barringer
Well this is in a different league to the others tonight. Accompanied on stage by piano, cello and viloins Sil performs in a very stylish black dress. The lyrics are very strong, and the pace is just right. I believe her performance, and she sells this so well. I could imagine this on the semi final in Copenhagen as she performs. As Sil sings it out she almost sheds tears. A class act. Score of 93 is awarded.
The Show
Peter Van de Veirs and Eve Daeleman are our hosts tonight and introduce the four acts. This evening Eve wears a black sleeveless top with an upsidedown golden creditcard necklace and a leopard print skirt while Peter is in a black suit with white shirt with a patterned colalr. This Eurosong studio is very impressive in terms of light entertainment production with the jury panel on the right side as seen on screen. To the left is a large stage floor backed by a large LED screen which reminds me a little of Helsinki 2007. As is expected the colouring and image changes for each entry.
Tonights guest performer was Kate Ryan – 2006 Semi Finalist who sung Je t’adore. She is due to appear on the Eurosong Final 2014 from Antwerp a Euro line up including Roberto Ballaroso, Alexander Rybak, Katrina of Katrina and the Waves and Sandra Kim.
The Voting
Eurovision 2004 contest winner Ruslana of the Ukraine, Piet Goddaer, Bart Peeters, Jef Martens are in studio as the judging panel to give a critique and their points. The score for the acts is worked out as the average score of their individually given points out of 100 to the semi finalists. The studio jury panel has a 50% say in the final result as do the the viewing public.
After the initial scores from the panel the order was: 1st Sil, 2nd Axeela, 3nd Yass and 4th 2 Fabiola feat. Loredana.
Once the vote is combined the top two artists through to the final are: Sil and Yass
Third place is 2 Fabiola featuring Loredana and forth place is Axeela.
Semi Final 3 of Eurosong 2014 is next Sunday 9th March at 20.30 CET – stay with Eurovisionary for full coverage
Belgium at the Eurovision Song Contest
Belgium are one of the original participating nations in the song contest having taken part in the very first Eurovision held in Lugano in 1956. To date they have won the contest on one occasion. This was with the teenage Sandra Kim who sang J’aime La Vie in 1986. Belgium staged the 1987 contest in Brussels.
In Belgium there are two large regions that split the country: French speaking Wallonia and the Flandern, where Flemish is spoken. Along with this region split comes seperate broadcasters namely RTBF and VRT. The broadcasters take it in turns to participate in the song contest. This year VRT are looking after the proceedings.
Since the introduction of the Semi Final’s Belgium has experienced some disappointments as they attempted to advance to the final. From the Kiev contest in 2005 to the Moscow show in 2009 and again from Dusseldorf 2011 to Baku 2012 they didn’t manage to make it out of their respective semi finals.
On a much more positive note Belgium successfully made it to the final in Oslo 2010 with Tom Dice who sang Me and My Guitar that finished a very respectible 6th place. Further promise was shown last year when Roberto Bellarosa, who performed his entry Love Kills in last weeks 1st Eurosong Semi Final, made it to the Malmö Final and finished in 12th place.
