EUROVISION 2019 REVIEW: LATVIA - Carousel - That Night

Welcome to my first review of ESC 2019! I aim to publish a blog post everyday analysing every entry from this year's contest in a little more detail than Twitter allows me to.

Latvia once again stuck with their Supernova national final. This year was arguably the weakest year of Supernova so far (made even worse by Waterflower's iconic mess 'Grow' not advancing to the live shows), but the final ended up pretty strong with the inclusion of Edgars Krelis, Markus Riva and Samanta Tina and her mom jeans attitude. However, Carousel managed to wipe away the competition with their song 'That Night'.

Here are my thoughts:

What I Like: There's something undeniably charming about That Night. The song has a classy and charming aura and is the type of song I'd love to hear while in a coffee shop drinking a Cappuccino, watching the crowds walk by outside the window (stay tuned for more obscure analogies in the future lmao). I also like the charming black and white staging for this song, as it fits the classy aesthetic that they have going on and manages to create a music video effect despite being all live. Not only this, but the catchy but minimalistic refrain was clearly enough to drive the Latvian public to vote for the song, and no matter what you think of the song, you have to admit to singing that Lo-o-o-o-ove part in the hook.

What I Don't Like: Although the hook is insanely catchy, the song begins to fall apart once we get to the verses. Do you remember the verses? Yeah me neither. It's clear to see that Carousel also believe the chorus is the best part, as it is repeated several times within 3 minutes. I actually think they'd have benefited from making the song shorter than 3 minutes, as with such a minimalistic product it has the chance to lose a viewer after a shorter period of time compared to other entries, especially when it comes to Eurovision, a show in which many people expect to see such high impact numbers.

Prediction: 'That Night' is in the first half of SF2, sandwiched between many female ballads and mid-tempo numbers, many of which are more impactful. Therefore I sadly don't see a scenario where this qualifies.

Final Score: 7/10

Summary: Although there are elements to this song I consider to be forgetful, there is something charming about this song that I keep coming back to, and although it's not Eurovision competitive I can see this ageing like fine wine within the Eurovision community.

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