Click the titles to watch the videos.
Representing Belgium: Hadise – Milk Chocolate Girl
When this video began I was not impressed. The style is a bit r’n’b-ish, and the chorus is very repetitive, but it quickly grew on me and by the end of the song I actually rather liked it! Hadise was a contestant on Belgium’s Idool programme but failed to reach the top 10, so she’s kind of their Sarah Whatmore, although she actually gets to release an album.
Representing Canada: Feist – Mushaboom
The song is pretty good, but it’s the video which is really ace. It begins with Feist singing along to her own song and doing various odd things in her groovy Wallace & Gromit-esque home, then the music kicks in and she flies out the window! There is dancing in the street, carousel horses which turn into real ones and much more magnificent madness. At the end she floats back to bed – was it all a dream?
Representing the UK: The Sirens – Love Hurts
This sounds more like a porn movie than a song, which is probably what they were aiming for. Still, it has grown on me a bit and is certainly an advance on their last single. Not that it will do any better, of course, and with a song like this they can hardly go on TOTP Reloaded and Smile like pop bands are supposed to.
Representing Belgium: DHT ft. Edmee – Listen To Your Heart
I’m not sure which version (Eurodance or boring ballad) they’re going with here in the UK as I’ve seen both on different music channels. My favourite is of course the dancey version but the ballad was the very surprising success in America, so they’d probably be wise to go with that. It really is the strangest success story of the year. Europop rarely ever gets a look-in in the USA, then when it does it’s a mediocre Roxette cover like this. What about Robyn or Melody Club, surely much more suited to the current US market. It’s a real mystery.