Athena is joined on stage by 4 male dancers all of which are wearing jacket tops and trousers - no shirt - with odd black eye make up. Across their chests are some golden chains to tie in with the song. Athena herself is wearing thigh high boots and a spangly leotard number which has long sleeves and puffed out shoulders. Centre stage is a large golden throne which Athena uses throughout the song. The backdrop is mostly blue/back with diamonds spinning and falling behind her. There are also a lot of blue striped lights and an ample amount of dry ice at the start.
The instrumentation of the song is rather one dimensional and barely changes throughout the song. This means the changes in dynamic, tone and volume has to be done by Athena herself rather than using the backing track to cue the audience up. It begins with a very sparse Eastern melody which finds itself on repeat non-stop from beginning to end. When Athena first starts is it more of a singing/spoken rap style which takes you by surprise somewhat and it actually quite difficult to interpret. Once she gets into the main singing parts of the song her voice is much clearer. After the rather random "fake chorus/more verse/actual chorus" structure she goes back to more rapping and the cycle repeats again. After 2 repetitions of the chorus proper she repeats the diamond refrain which is rather odd as I would have thought it best to end on the title of the song.
Athena is very active on stage and she has a full on routine involving her dancers. Although I say full on, it's rather more strutty and gestural rather than cardiovascular. As there is a lot of action on stage it gives the impression that she is doing more than she actually does which is a rather clever tactic. Luckily her throne prop means she has points where she can sit and her stage act can vary in flow to match the different parts of the song. The stage show is rather contained and could be replicated easily for Eurovision although I would go against making the space she uses too much bigger as this might point out how little she's moving around. If she does start moving more I am afraid this might affect her vocals.
This is a rather modern entry and something I think as a studio version would go down well on many radio stations. Although the Eastern instrumentation is rather old hat it still gives the whole thing a great hook to hang all the other bits on. Unfortunately the 'other bits' are in excess and non-descript. It takes numerous listens to work out the structure and by that time you've lost interest. Athena has a good strong singing voice but the rap bits are badly done (maybe something can be done in production?) and changes will need to be made for Eurovision to add in a few backing singers which she will need to pump up the richness of sound in places.
This is not really my cup of tea at all but it the Armenian diaspora can get behind it, as well as capturing the imagination of the younger viewers, this could get some votes. The make up of past juries might suggest this might not go down well with them - unless one of the categories for voting is to err more to the side of modern, contemporary chart music. It might do well, but I'll be skipping this track on the cd.
Artist - Athena Manoukian
Song - Chains on you
Composers - Athena Manoukian, DJ Paco
Lyricist - Athena Manoukian
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