I can’t lie dear reader, I was distinctly under-whelmed when I saw the review video of this song. It left me very cold in an “is that it?” kind of way, very earnest and well sung and well written, but soulless, almost as though Silmane, who is a seasoned performer, suddenly forgot how to.
Contrast that with Paris and, more specifically, the Dora Semi Final that he was invited to where I finally *got* the song and so had he. He was singing live and just played with the camera and the viewer throughout the performance and did what all good singers should do – connect – and man alive did he in a way not many Eurovision performers have. He used the camera as the person he was singing to and it was bloody effective. You could almost smell the black coffee and pastries oozing through the screen.
You don’t need to be a French Woman to sing a song like this – what you need to do is what he did, Stop the backing track sing back from the microphone, and provide that Patricia Kass moment that I’ve experienced twice now.
It’s a classy excellently performed French Chanson. Perfect for the likes of me. My only issue is which version of Silmane will turn up in Malmo and that worries me – it could end up like Fulen or N’Oubliez Pas – A great song but failing in the final analysis but, if he gets this right, this trounces most songs.
