Another great song from the Eurovision Song Contest 2015. This time it cuts right through my Christmas Special 2016, purely because I want to finish my Eurovision Song Contest Special before the end of the year. Russia has recently been doing well at Eurovision, and this is definitely a song that deserved to win, and one that gets better with every listen. Russia came second with 303 points, just 62 points away from the winner. In this music video for "A Million Voices", we see very beautiful different people as well as Polina Gagarina giving the song her all, which is to be expected.
Polina Gagarina is a prolific Russian singer, she has really made a name for herself and almost won Eurovision for them. A singer like this deserves international fame, and so she continues to try. She released a new album called "9", which was interesting, to say the least. Click here to see my review on the album for CelebMix. She is currently a coach on Golos (the Russian version of The Voice), and on her team was fellow Eurovision 2015 contestant Aminata, who sang "Love Injected", before she got knocked out during the Battles. C1R was the broadcaster who chose Polina Gagarina through internal selection. The song she sang was written by Gabriel Alares, Joakim Björnberg, Katrina Noorbergen, Leonid Gutkin, and Vladimir Matetsky.
This music video is extremely basic, it coincides with a few other Eurovision music videos that haven't got a lot going on.
The shooting of the video involved 25 people of different ages and ethnicities. This really shows during the video, and explains that we are all the same regardless, we're all human.
That is the story of the song itself and it's such a beautiful song that I was hoping that the music video would do the same, but there's just isn't enough substance to it.
Polina Gagarina's performance piece is amazing as per usual. She's gorgeous and definitely camera friendly. She shines singing this song in the music video, so it's no wonder she did amazingly on the Eurovision stage. It's just a shame there isn't a much more expansive music video to relate to the song.
Back to my Eurovision Special, I'm so close to finishing off my favourites from Eurovision 2014, before having to launch into my Eurovision 2015 Special. This was Russia's Entrant in the 2014 contest and they came seventh place with 89 points. The performance on the Eurovision stage was memorable because it consisted of a seesaw. The Tolmachevy Sisters received a lot of boos after their performance, but that was mainly because they were representing Russia, and the points and placement proved that the Eurovision Song Contest has nothing to do with politics, otherwise this great sweet song would not have ranked so well. The Tolmachevy Sisters contrast in this video with a black and white filter which gives a classy look for this sweet "Shine" song.
The Tolmachevy Sisters consist of Anastasiya Tolmachevy and Maria Andreyevna Tolmachevy. This isn't the first Eurovision contest they have competed in. They previously represented Russia in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2006, where they won with their song "Vesenniy Jazz". Eight years later and they represented Russia again in the Eurovision Song Contest and came seventh. They were chosen through internal selection. The girls released an album after they won the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2006, but since the 2014 Eurovision Contest, they haven't released anything new internationally. This song was written by Philipp Kirkorov, Dimitris Kontopoulous, John Ballard, Ralph Charlie and Gerard James Borg.
This was directed by Aslan Ahmadov. It is a full-on performance piece. Contrast is used effectively in this black and white video, it helps to distinguish who is who, although we're not told ourselves. It feels classy and has an oldness quality to it.
They use the two separate colours, black and white, dramatically. They kind of separate the sisters, which can be both detrimental and helpful.
The girls are relaxed, they clearly love this song and they love to perform it. They scenes they are in adds a quality to the video, but not much else.
The performance is lacking compared to their Grand Final stage performance. It's entertaining to an extent but seems too old-fashioned, there's hardly anything new and current. The video doesn't exactly show the girls personalities, and then there's nothing to relate to the song. A clear narrative would've worked better than a lifeless performance piece. At times the sisters look lost and confused as to what to do, yet they still attempt to perform.
The viewer's winner, if it weren't for the jury this song would've won the competition. Part of my Eurovision Special. Amazing graphics in both the staging of the Grand Final as well as this music video. Sergey Lazarev had an amazing production team behind him, everything was on point, perfect for Russia to win. Yet they came a close third with 491 points. The song is what let them down, it's weak on first listen, but ever so catchy nonetheless. Sergey Lazarev is getting excited as he claims that you are the only one, his only one, in this extremely visual video that's sexy, dangerous and amazing!
Sergey Lazarev is a Russian singer, dancer, actor and TV presenter. He started his music career with Vlad Topalov in duo Smash!!. At the height of their career, they disbanded and Sergey Lazarev pursued a solo career. A total success in Russia, Sergey Lazarev has had hit after hit, music award after music award. It's unsurprising why this did so well, apart from the amazing visuals, Russia sent one of their top artists, a risk that was pulled off to perfection. Russia wanted to win this year, and hell did they do their best. Russia chose Sergey Lazarev through internal selection. The song was written by Philipp Kirkorov, Dimitris Kontopoulos, John Ballard and Ralph Charlie.
Directed by Konstantin Cherepkov this video is amazing, out of this world, surreal and definitely stands out. This is a game changer when it comes to music videos. Ultimately brilliant and completely unforgettable.
Using 3D imagery, editing and mapping, thanks to Illuminarium3000, this awesome video must've taken hours upon hours to make and edit. This is perfection personified. Produced by Irina Morozova, with 3D mapping by Yuri Pelin and Evgenia Godunova, with DP by Anastasiy Mikhailov. As well as the beautiful Vladislava Evtushenko, who is a model and was runner-up for Miss Russia 2015, and represented Russia in the Miss Universe competition, plays the love interest, I hope she appears in more videos in the future, as she's stunningly beautiful and is a great actress on the set.
The narrative works perfectly adding thunder and lighting within visuals. This easily messed with my head, the 3D imagery is beautiful and well crafted. Sergey Lazarev and Vladislava Evtushenko perform to perfection, every detail is included.
Confusing the hell out of the viewers, it's hard to imagine that all of this is imagery. Such a complicated set, yet works effectively. I love the narrative, I love the design, and I hope many more music videos use this idea over green screen, as it more than works. Catchy song, perfect vocals and an amazing visual, what more can you want?
Dina Garipova was a surprising entry, because compared to the other songs in the competition, this one was slow and a ballad, and it's hard to define yourself when this happens, and to make me enjoy it as well. Anouk may have sung "Birds" during the competition and stood out, but I didn't like the song, this one I did, hence why she's in my Eurovision Special and Anouk, who represented The Netherlands, isn't. Dina Garipova won Russian's version of The Voice called Golos. And then was selected internally to represent Russia. I think this girl has a big future ahead of her. Keep an eye on the name Dina Garipova, as I reckon she'll be on everyone's lips soon enough.
"What If" was written by Gabriel Alares, Joakim Björnberg and Leonid Gutkin. The song is very emotional and believable, it's one of those songs that lifts spirits up and really encourages people to believe in others too. The song made a big impact in Eurovision, but also across Europe. It even charted in the UK at number 161. But made bigger impacts on charts in other countries.
Russia got to 5th out of 26 countries and Dina Garipova got 174 points. France gave 6 points, Lithuania gave 7 points, Moldova also gave 7 points, Finland gave 2 points, Spain gave 6 points, Belgium gave 4 points, Estonia gave 12 points, Belarus gave 8 points, Germany gave 2 points, Armenia gave 7 points, the Netherlands gave 4 points, the UK gave 10 points, Sweden gave 5 points, Denmark gave 7 points, Iceland gave 1 point, Ukraine gave 4 points, Georgia gave 6 points, Ireland gave 10, Slovenia also gave 10 points, Croatia gave 6 points, Montenegro gave 7 points, Cyprus gave 5 points, Serbia gave 8 points, Latvia gave 12 points, Macedonia gave 6 points, Bulgaria gave 5 points and Israel gave 7 points.
The music video, at first, seems like a usual, expected performance piece. I was waiting to see amazing stage presence which she showed on the Eurovision Song Contest 2013. And just when she starts, we flit over to the audience. Annoying at first, until I realised they were all part of the story and she manages to uplifts them with her song, and makes them believe, not only in themselves, but in others as well.
There isn't much to this video, but there doesn't need to be, It's inspirational and that is all it needs to be. It's missing one thing that could've made this a little bit better. We could have seen the background of some of the audience members, what has brought them to this point? The point where they are sad and need to be uplifted by this song. I want to know more about the characters in the audience. It reminds me a bit of Papa Roach's "Last Resort" however even in that music video there was short snappy background profiles, and should've been more.
Overall a song that is catchy and makes you warm and fuzzy inside. The accompanying music video does the exact same thing, only missing out a few crucial details that should've been included. That is the only reason why I dropped a star, it could've been more, and I feel like they missed out on such an opportunity.
