It’s all change in Malta for 2019. Out goes the traditional final, with the traditional faces, and in comes X Factor Malta to select their entrant. In the first Maltese season it was (almost) all fresh faces. Don’t worry, there were still a Borg or Calleja or two, and Ira Losco provided a Eurovision link in the judging panel but otherwise stalwarts like Deborah C were denied their one guaranteed gig a year.
As it wasn’t selecting the song, I didn’t tune in so I’m afraid I can’t tell you whether the show was interrupted every three minutes by an advert for Hamilton Travel. It seems to have worked though, as the result is this, and it’s really very good indeed.
X Factor winner Michaela Pace has been handed a song from the Symphonix International camp, they of recent Bulgarian and Austrian success, and behind Azerbaijan’s 2019 entry too. It’s bright, fresh and very catchy. The dropped chorus took me by surprise the first-time round, but I’m used to it now, and if they can create any of the colourful excitement of the video on the Tel Aviv stage this could be in for a very good result indeed.
There’s an amusing 4-way mash-up of this with the Swiss and Cypriot entries, spliced with last year’s ‘Fuego’ designed to suggest they’re pretty much the same song. Well, if it works, why change it. For me this is the kind of current sound I enjoy appearing at Eurovision; it’s dragging the Contest forward, and some delegations (cough United Kingdom) could do well to follow its lead.
Monty’s score: Douze Points!