11/03/12 GREECE

The Greek Final was held on March 12th at the River West Mall in Athens, hosted by Maria Kozakou & Giorgos Frantzeskakis. The winner, chosen by televoting (50%) and an "expert" jury (50 %)was former x-factor Greece contestant Eleftheria Eleftheriou with “Aphrodisiac”

The song is a modern up-tempo number which Greek influences, in a similar style to Kalomera a few years ago but this is nowhere near punchy enough. The song is quite formulaic and does get quite boring after a while. The chorus, it has to be said, is very poor as most of it is made up of a string of ‘oh-oh-oh’s and then has maniac rhyme with aphrodisiac (saying that there is not much choice!)

Eleftheria is flanked by 4 dancers whom she interacts with a lot and even walks on their backs in heels – OUCH !!!! The performance is a bit on the showy side and her walking abilities are really quite over dramatic and OTT. I think she may have to tone it down a bit for Baku. I say this as the performers mimed in the Greek final and was more of a ‘show’ than a song selection contest. In addition the stage was in the middle of a shopping centre (?) and waswas not very big at all and so the performance in terms of its size and movement has scope to improve.

Although the song does not deserve much praise it will almost certainly get enough votes to qualify – with ease – even if she sings flat from start too finish. Obviously if she can sing live and in tune she will increase her chances much more.

SONG – Aphrodisiac

ARTIST – Eleftheria Eleftheriou

COMPOSERS – Dimitri Stassos, Mikaela Stenström, Dajana Lööf

LANGUAGE – English