A very happy and surprised artist in Belgium last weekend...
Gustaph will be going to Eurovision as the main singer in May!
So we have now heard our third confirmed entry for Liverpool - "Because Of You" was the winning song at Eurosong 2023. Gustaph gave us a superb performance on the night and often that can go contrary to the fandom's thoughts on who is going to win:
As far as Let Me Be The One fan favourite of the Belgian 7 was concerned, it was a split between Loredana and Chérine:
I had Ms. Mroue as my pick of the Eurosong selection (although I was one of the few that had Gustaph as high as second):
But it only matters what the Belgian jurors and televoters thought and as often happens at National Finals, Gustaph being third with the juries and second with the public was enough to see him through...
The top four there were split into two - deep and thoughtful tracks from The Starlings and gala dragot, as against the happy tunes from Chérine and our Belgian winner.
Gustaph had the fun, the brightness, the energy and pure joy that had enough of the jurors probably putting him in 2nd or 3rd and lots of televoters believing that his show was the best on the night. We forget that, like Tom Dice of The Starlings, Gustaph has been to Eurovision before as backing vocalist and vocal coach for SENNEK and Geike of Hooverphonic - that experience will come in handy, what with rehearsals, interviews and live shows coming up in Liverpool. The other plus is his 'family' as he has put it in interviews after the show - the most obvious assistance to him has been Monique Harcum, who was also involved with both 2018 and 2021 entries, being the fourth person around Geike singing "The Wrong Place" in Rotterdam.
Such a small gap between all four will have melted down to small factors - the juries obviously didn't like "Rollercoaster" by The Starlings, "T'inquiète" by gala was probably seen as too dark by the public and perhaps the psychedelic figures on stage for "Ça m'ennuie pas" were perhaps too trippy for some voters!
Gustaph had the fun, the brightness, the energy and pure joy that had enough of the jurors probably putting him in 2nd or 3rd and lots of televoters believing that his show was the best on the night. We forget that, like Tom Dice of The Starlings, Gustaph has been to Eurovision before as backing vocalist and vocal coach for SENNEK and Geike of Hooverphonic - that experience will come in handy, what with rehearsals, interviews and live shows coming up in Liverpool. The other plus is his 'family' as he has put it in interviews after the show - the most obvious assistance to him has been Monique Harcum, who was also involved with both 2018 and 2021 entries, being the fourth person around Geike singing "The Wrong Place" in Rotterdam.
Personally I have no quarrel at all with "Because Of You" getting to Liverpool and I think that its uplifting mood and Gustaph& Co will take this to the 100% televote perfectly and positively, bringing yet another qualification for Belgium in May. Not a Eurovision winner in my eyes but I can imagine that if this is drawn 'first half', we will all have to make sure we are in our places to see him kick off the show on 13th May. I have this top of the 3 entries that we have so far for Eurovision 2023 - I'm confident that "Because Of You" will be high up by the time we have heard #37. He kicked off this week's show:
And it is obviously top of the playlist too...
"Because Of You" - Gustaph
"You Lift Me Up" - Loredana
"Tu t'en iras" - La Zarra
"Sammumaton" - Bess
"Easy To Believe" - Pam Rabbit
"Melodies Of Hope" - Patty Gurdy
"Ashes To Ashes" (Acoustic Version) - Anna Bergendahl
"Gone" - Noa Kirel
"Rise Like A Phoenix" - SENNEK
"Disko" (Karaoke Version) - LPS
"Drøm d bort" - Sandra Lyng
"Ekko inni meg" - JONE ft Silke
"Prohibition" - Swing'it
"Waist" - Ella A
"Fuego" - Alejandro Fuentes
"Turn Off My Heart" - Bjørn Olav Edvardsen
"Love You In A Dream" - Elsie Bay
"Tuju" - Meelik
"So Good (At What You Do)" - m els
"Üks Samm Korraga" - MIA
"Bad Philosophy" - ELYSA
"Kurbuse Matused" - Robin Juhkental
"Tokimeki" (Radio Edit) - Neon Letters & Maiko
Third on the playlist is an artist who I had never heard of before the French delegation announced her as being the internal selection for Eurovision 2023 - La Zarra:
There is a big advantage that the Big 5 plus Ukraine have this year - they KNOW that professional jurors will be judging them, unlike the other 31 nations who have to first go through the vagaries of the 100% televote SFs. That means that the professionalism, vocal perfection and song composition will matter more (at least in my opinion) for the direct finalists, rather than what we might get for those fighting it out in the SFs, a good old crowd pleaser!
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Having heard some of her material and seen her sing live online, I think that France are back on safe ground with La Zarra - someone who is visually pleasing, who connects with the camera and who will please those Francophiles with whatever she presents. I expect her and her nation to be back in contention where they were with Barbara Pravi - as for one of the other Big 5 nations, song number 6 on this week's show would see Germany out of the bottom 5 and into the top ten at least, if my ear for appealing songs for jurors are still working. Meet Patty Gurdy...
ESC Kompakt is an excellent source of information about all things German for Eurovision and they think (like me) that this entry should be placed directly in the National Final. Patty is charismatic, sings wonderfully and obviously has the bonus of playing a traditional folk instrument from Central Europe to add to the mix. It is not often that I play a potential entry for a selection process but "Melodies Of Hope" has become such an earworm that it had to be done. Fingers crossed that she makes it to "Unser Lied für Liverpool" on March 3rd.
Listen in to show 233 next Tuesday to find out how
John Lennon and Måneskin could be connected...