Germany – Jendrik and his silver banjolele

Jendrik, Germany, First Rehearsal, Rotterdam Ahoy, 13 May 2021 — EBU / Thomas Hanses
Jendrik, Germany, First Rehearsal, Rotterdam Ahoy, 13 May 2021 — EBU / Thomas Hanses

Well, Germany is busy! There was no way Jendrik was not going to bring a madness to the stage, and here we have him, supported by three backing singers cum brass players and a woman dressed as a rubber hand giving the V sing. Jendrik’s USP is his banjolele and of course he’s playing it – and tossing it up into the air – all whilst sporting a very short sleeved bright pink jacket.

The backdrop is as chaotic as the song, of course and it features negative words written as newspaper headlines that get wiped away by the bright optimism of a blue sky. The instrumental break is played as a call and response between the musicians and rubber hand girl with the backdrop echoing the battle of positivity and negativity.

The song really comes alive in the moments it bursts out and sees Jendrik dancing. There’s real energy here, along with plenty of quirks like the tap break. In the first run just as Jendrik starts the spoken outro he starts to tell us that he’s not going to say what he’s going to say on the night, but I can’t tell you what he’s not going to say because my internet went into the worst buffer of the rehearsals yet at just that key moment.

Whether you warm to this or not will be in direct correlation to how annoying you find Jendrik. I rather think he has a certain charm and will certainly pick up votes from the Saturday Nighters™.

I do kinda hate the song, though.

Monty x

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

0 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments