Nick “does” 2025 – Netherlands (The)

NETHERLANDS (The) – C’est La Vie – Claude

When I was about 12, I wrote a short essay/poem about a rollercoaster for English class at school, at one point explaining in considerable depth that it went “up and down and round and round and round”. Mr Setchell, my lovely but honest English teacher, dragged my effort through the dirt and had special opprobrium for that line – it was repetitive, it was dull, and worst of all it was lazy. I’ll be honest. While the criticism stung, Mr Setchell wasn’t wrong on any count and I never* did anything like that again.

You will understand then that I’ve instinctively and automatically taken a bit of a dislike to the songwriting for this one. It’s repetitive. It’s dull. Worst of all, it’s lazy. So can we actually salvage anything from the complete train wreck of the lyrics?

To be fair, it’s not a complete lost cause. Claude’s got a gorgeous voice on him, and I think he’s going to be able to give it a strong charismatic performance. Melodically there’s an almost itchy familiarity to it – come on brain, what is it that this is like? Is it Not A Sinner Nor A Saint? Too Late For Love? A Monster Like Me? All of the above? Something else entirely? It never quite stays in focus for long enough to pin it down.

In contrast to Italy where solving that musical jigsaw brings me joy, here it serves only to unsettle me, and I would really need to create a full musical balance sheet to fathom out whether the song’s assets outweigh the liabilities. But on the face of it… I don’t think they do.

In spite of being well favoured by fans and bookies alike, this won’t feature on my personal shortlist.

* Rarely**

** Quite frequently***

*** OK, it’s practically a trademark.

Nick’s score: 5