Which Country Has Self-Sabotage Herself This Year?

[Alaska49]

I'm curious to hear some specific points about things Armenia did wrong. I never connected with the song or the staging but have never been able to figure out what exactly turned me off.

she was alone on the stage, with obviously inadequate lighting and styling, and bad camera work. it made it impossible to connect with her. this was a song of empowerment and confidence and she didn't look empowered and confident, she looked aggressive and kind of scared. there was nothing to distract the viewer from how out of her element srbuk looked because it was just her - no dancers, no visible backing singers, no gimmicks, nothing, just some wide shots that hindered more than they helped. it didn't help that she didn't perform well and sounded pretty bad. disappointing.

 

[VirginiaVision]

she was alone on the stage, with obviously inadequate lighting and styling, and bad camera work. it made it impossible to connect with her. this was a song of empowerment and confidence and she didn't look empowered and confident, she looked aggressive and kind of scared. there was nothing to distract the viewer from how out of her element srbuk looked because it was just her - no dancers, no visible backing singers, no gimmicks, nothing, just some wide shots that hindered more than they helped. it didn't help that she didn't perform well and sounded pretty bad. disappointing.

Hhmmm... Watching it back I definitely see some of the things you've pointed out. The main thing I picked up on this time around was that Srbuk faces the camera during the angry parts of the song that allude to her ex (especially the second verse) and faces away from the camera/is in too wide a shot to tell where she's looking during most of the choruses. The wide shots come at some of the worst times, don't they?

I don't particularly agree that she was styled poorly, and her singing sounds great to my ears, so the main issues for me were probably sub-par camera work, inadequate direction, and a song that I wasn't wild about in the first place.

 

[VikingTiger]

Cyprus had a potential top 10. But vocals were not very good, and I think Tamta did not really come through the screen...
Greece had a classy song, but not very instant. And the performance was just too busy and messy - way too much going on on the stage at the same time. This song did not need all that - it took focus away from the vocals.
Belgium - drums? Hands-raising? I didnt get that... and obviously I was not the only one.