ESTONIA

The Estonian Final was held on February 16th at Saku Suurhall in Tallinn. Before the final there were 2 semi-finals where the field of 24 was cut in half. The winner was selected in chosen in two rounds of voting. In the first round the top 3 was chosen by televoting (50%) & an international "expert" jury (50%) but in the second round the winner was chosen solely by televoting. The winner was Victor Crone singing “Storm”.

The staging of the song was rather unusual and I am not sure how, or if, parts can be replicated on the Eurovision stage. He starts off playing guitar but this is ditched early on once he grabs the microphone. Behind him are diamonds and strips of neon which illuminate during the song and the crowd also had light sticks to wave about at the appropriate moments. He is joined sporadically by a female backing singer who seems to appear and disappear within a moments notice. During the last rendition of the chorus it seems (I say seems, it could be live but the timing is very tight for the turnaround) this is replaced by a pre-recorded segment where he is singing behind pictures of storms and from the top of a mountain and at the end he is back in the studio with his guitar.

The song starts off with a mid-tempo country feel, possibly because of the strumming of the guitar. After the first verse and chorus the beat kicks in a little harder and Victor starts moving around the stage more. After the second verse he repeats the short chorus twice and on the second time round the full electronic backing track comes into effect AND he sings it an octave higher than before! Because the verse and chorus length are relatively short there is a lot of repetition, and I mean *a lot* however he kind of gets away with it because the backing track alters the mood each time it is sung. Unfortunately, his voice seems to get more strained at the top notes as the song goes on and it starts to sound quite off.

This is quite the stereotypical modern Eurovision song and has a broad appeal. Victor has good stage presence but I think the staging needs paring down. I particularly don’t like the CGI part at the end of the song but maybe with the use of LED screens a similar effect might be possible to do live. I would also suggest that Victor gets himself a better stylist as he looks so nondescript on stage (a la Jan Johansen 1995). I would say that Victor’s Swedish roots might favour him in the televoting but, unfortunately, Estonia have been drawn away from the majority of the Nordic countries so it will have to qualify on pure merit rather than familiarity.

I don’t think the song is bad, but in a year where diversity and breadth of genre is very evident this comes across as quite safe, and almost bland. This is the kind of song that will do better in the final than in its semi-final IF it gets that far. I am kind of on the fence with this one but with clearer stage direction and more help in the chorus this could be much better.

                                               

ARTIST – Victor Crone

SONG – Storm

MUSIC -  Stig Rästa, Vallo Kikas, Victor Crone

LYRICS - Stig Rästa, Victor Crone, Fred Krieger