You noticing a pattern with this year's Eurovision Song Contest artists? Okay, to be fair it's not much different to most years since 1956 - an attractive female soloist picked to represent their nation, in this case France. As we were all preparing to watch Germany's "Unser Song 2017" today, the French stole Deutschland's thunder by announcing their artist and song, accompanying that with a pop video, a lyrics video and a live performance! So who is this lady who looks good in a see-through effect dress?
Alma is her name (okay, stage name - her real name is Alexandra Maquet) - a singer who obviously has that certain something to have ended up being the French selection out of more than 300 submissions. All of those were hoping to follow in the footsteps of Amir in 2016 and at least emulating his 6th place in Stockholm - could this do as good a job in Kyiv?
Very stylish and beautifully shot - can you make Paris look anything but? One thing to point out, see the dancers on the buildings? There's a theme developing already, bear that in mind. On first listen, this is a superb piece of Europop, but a song that you have to work at, with lots of lyrical content being fired at the listener during the verses, whilst the chorus is simpler lyrically but the music thumps away and almost exhausts you by the end! "Requiem" is catchy and offers a lot of interesting nuances that deserve a second listen...and a third...etc. Also something to remember is the refrain of the song - in English, it is...
In French the lyrics look like this:
No wonder that French is always described as the language of love and this is why I love French in music so much! So complicated and yet so listenable. The only criticism would be with Alma's vocal style at times which could be an 'acquired taste' for some. Listening to the studio version has only drawn positives from me, which might have something to do with the fact that "Requiem" is not only the follow-up song for France to "J'ai cherché" but also for Nazim Khaled, who composed both songs. Alma is a songwriter too but Khaled appears to have been the driving force behind this part of her career, writing the material for her debut album that will be released during the Kyiv 'fortnight'.
The French have been very brave this year in that not only have they revealed the highly polished studio version and lovely Parisian video accompaniment, they have also allowed Alma to give her first live performance of this song, a couple of days before the official reveal:
I have to say that she has superb stage presence, is extremely watchable and exudes amazing confidence for a relative unknown, even in France. She connects really well with the audience and the camera - even the contemporary dancers make sense here, given the role they play in the video. She looks amazing too - yet another candidate for 'Eurovision Beauty' after May (I'm going to be so spoilt for choice this year). The obvious major difference between the studio version and this one is the vocals - given her lovely cascading locks hides her ears, it is impossible to know if she was wearing ear monitors. I would hope that the answer is no and that she couldn't really hear what she was singing as those vocals were, for a lot of the performance, pretty poor. The volume was spot on for a live performance but at times I was unsure if it was off key or whether live Alma sings in a weird tone. The main saving grace was that this was the first live showing and that the backing track / singing wasn't that great either - announcing this singer and song now has allowed three months practice, rehearsals, live performances elsewhere etc before Alma appears anywhere near the Kyiv stage. Ironically the first time we saw Amir perform last year was at the same Awards show:
It was his staging that was the problem there - at least Alma has no tutus and tambourines to worry about!
There has been spotted another connection between Amir and Alma - not just the same songwriter but also something for 'Countdown' and anagram fans:
"Kiss me
Tell me that you love me
Make me smile
In the middle of a requiem"
In French the lyrics look like this:
No wonder that French is always described as the language of love and this is why I love French in music so much! So complicated and yet so listenable. The only criticism would be with Alma's vocal style at times which could be an 'acquired taste' for some. Listening to the studio version has only drawn positives from me, which might have something to do with the fact that "Requiem" is not only the follow-up song for France to "J'ai cherché" but also for Nazim Khaled, who composed both songs. Alma is a songwriter too but Khaled appears to have been the driving force behind this part of her career, writing the material for her debut album that will be released during the Kyiv 'fortnight'.
The French have been very brave this year in that not only have they revealed the highly polished studio version and lovely Parisian video accompaniment, they have also allowed Alma to give her first live performance of this song, a couple of days before the official reveal:
I have to say that she has superb stage presence, is extremely watchable and exudes amazing confidence for a relative unknown, even in France. She connects really well with the audience and the camera - even the contemporary dancers make sense here, given the role they play in the video. She looks amazing too - yet another candidate for 'Eurovision Beauty' after May (I'm going to be so spoilt for choice this year). The obvious major difference between the studio version and this one is the vocals - given her lovely cascading locks hides her ears, it is impossible to know if she was wearing ear monitors. I would hope that the answer is no and that she couldn't really hear what she was singing as those vocals were, for a lot of the performance, pretty poor. The volume was spot on for a live performance but at times I was unsure if it was off key or whether live Alma sings in a weird tone. The main saving grace was that this was the first live showing and that the backing track / singing wasn't that great either - announcing this singer and song now has allowed three months practice, rehearsals, live performances elsewhere etc before Alma appears anywhere near the Kyiv stage. Ironically the first time we saw Amir perform last year was at the same Awards show:
It was his staging that was the problem there - at least Alma has no tutus and tambourines to worry about!
There has been spotted another connection between Amir and Alma - not just the same songwriter but also something for 'Countdown' and anagram fans:
#Eurovision 2017 French singer and song title 'Alma: Requiem' is anagram of 'Me Equal Amir' - so she's coming 6th.— Dead Good Eurovision (@DG_ESC_Pod) February 9, 2017
Spooky, eh? Alma's got 89 days to polish "Requiem" into an amazing live 'gemstone' to at least match Amir's excellent live vocals and charisma, together with "J'ai cherché"'s infectious lyrical content. If she can do that, this entry already stands out from the crowd for potentially being more pop and contemporary than some of your traditional Eurovision fayre...
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France have gone for it yet again this year, putting their artist and entry out for the Eurovision fans to listen to, watch and pick apart for twelve weeks before the big event in Ukraine. There has already been a lot of positivity about the video with the studio version of this song on social media, contrasted with a few others who have watched the live version and have mirrored my opinions on the vocals. For France's sake, I hope that we hear something like the studio audio live on stage in Kyiv...
This intriguing song and this attractive rising star deserve a good showing!