The music extravaganza that has three million Swedes benched in front of their TVs every Saturday for the foreseeable future kicked off last week with a strong first heat. The Swedes take their Eurovision qualification extremely seriously, so you better hang along for the ride.
The first heat saw the audience voting the first finalists to Friends Arena on 7th March. The Mamas brought unbridled joy with their gospel vibes that people loved already last year when they were back-up singers for John Lundvik. And Melodifestivalen 2017 winner Robin Bengtsson had a catchy hit of a tune that convinced the people. Felix Sandman, who was a huge favorite beforehand, has to take the route through the Andra Chansen round, which may do good as people get to hear his cool song more. Malou Prytz joins him in getting a second chance.
The second week has already had it’s share of Mello-drama, as Thorsten Flinck was disqualified from the competition just a week before he was supposed to go on stage. He is facing criminal charges for violent road rage at the moment. As this is more a competition for the songs than the artists, the song is still in the running and got a new artist at the last minute: Mello veteran and previous winner Jan Johansen, who already appeared in an interval act in the 1st heat. He is a stable pro, but still a gutsy move to accept the challenge.
The evening will kick off with Klara Hammarström, who is known to quite a few Swedes from a reality TV show about her family (they are now 11 children, several of them very successful in equestrian sports). She is bringing an up-tempo song that commentators are saying is in the Camila Cabello or J Lo genre. So expect nice up-to-date pop, but let’s see if she has anything that makes her stand out.
Our big favorite Dotter is back to Melodifestivalen as an artist after the audiences didn’t really warm up to her 2018 entry Cry. She did get to the final last year as a songwriter on Lina Hedlund‘s Victorious, though. The talk we are hearing about the song is comparisons to Sia and MARINA, so this can be right up our alley – let’s hope she brings on that kookiness!
Mendez is also back and brings Alvaro Estrella to strengthen the vocal side of things. This is promising to be a party tune, but we do hope it is more in the reggaeton vibe than Mendez’s previous schlagerified latin rhythms. Linda Bentzing is participating in Melodifestivalen for the 7th time as an artist, and that is more than anybody else! She has been known for the really authentic schlager hits, but this one is supposed to me more regular Swedish pop.
Paul Rey is looking poised to get his big breakthrough to the mainstream on the Mello stage with his mid-tempo arena pop… people are pulling out the Ed Sheeran comparisons. Paul (or it’s really Pauli) is yet another Sweden-Finnish artist and as you may know, that always means bonus points from us.
The final spot has been saved for Anna Bergendahl, 2010 Melodifestivalen winner, who crashed out in the semifinal at Eurovision back then. She got back on Swedish people’s good graces at last year’s Mello and her Ashes to Ashes went on to become a huge radio hit. We hear her song this year is a real upbeat country dance hit, and she is probably the strongest contender for that spot in the final.
So make sure to tune in on SVT 2 or online at SVT Play at 20:00 CET on Saturday the 8th of February – and be ready to repeat that for quite a few Saturdays to come!
Photos © Nina Uddin
