During his live performance he mainly stood and sang his song with the band and his backing singers behind him. He was wearing a rather colourful paint splattered effect jumpsuit. The video was also on the back screen. In the video Jeangu is looking at old photos of himself on a projector screen. He then gets ready to go out and starts walking through town. Newt thing we see him in a room with a group of people looking quite dour and serious - it seem to be some sort of therapy/counselling session. As the song nears the end the people in the session get more animated and look much happier.
Because of the style of the song and how the song is sung I can't see there being much of a stage show. Most of the song depends on Jeangu's clear and precise vocals as well as him emoting to the audience. There are also some points in the track where there are some very close harmories and it seems like he already has a tight band of backing singers with him that pulls off some of the many soaring notes in the middle and to try and make a fuller sound at the end.
The song starts off with a single long note which Jeangu sings over with the tune of the verses. The tune then starts to change as he reaches the chorus but there is no other instrumentation at all until verse 2 starts. This verse is much shorter than the first and is also where the harmonies come in, this is followed by the chorus and then there is a short break in proceedings. Just before the two minute mark the song shifts slightly and moves to the final part of the song. Here Jeangu repeats the same refrain until the end. It starts off gently at first but as the drum beat joins in, their voices get bigger, almost gospel style, and then on the last word the song finishes.
In many ways you can see this as an extension of the themes from last year's winning entry. Jeangu's voice is so perfect for this style of song and the mood of the piece feels really authentic. The build up of the two parts of the song work really well although on first listen it can be a bit weird to think you are going in one direction and end up in another. personally, I find the ending very odd and too jarring. I am sure they could come up with a way of making the end much more final and aurally different so it feels like the end rather than a 'we have to stop here'.
I can see this getting a fair number of jury votes because of the songwriting and performance aspects. From many of the comments I have seen about this song, a lot of people find this song speaks to them and depending on how many that is and how many of these people vote for this could be a televote winner too... I wouldn't be upset if this was to win,I'd prefer something more off kilter and different to "Arcade" to win this year's contest. Looking back in recent history, home entries have not done well at Eurovision - and this is not always through lack of trying! At least this is a competitive home entry with a definite style and genre and has a really good artist at the helm.
Artist - Jeangu Macrooy
Song - Grow
Composers - Jeangu Macrooy, Perquisite
Lyricist - Jeangu Macrooy
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