#Albina Kelmendi

[rice-crackerz]

Let's face it, not just Käärijä was robbed tonight.

[ragazza-paradiso]

what eurovision is about <3

[wardrobeoftime]

Eurovision Song Contest + Costumes

Albina Kelmendi's black, silver & red suit when performing Duje for Albania in the 2023 contest.

[yep-ishouldbesleeping]

Ok Austria and Albania passed

I REPEAT AUSTRIA AND ALBANIA PASSED

[rinaforstars]

eurovision acts name meanings bc im bored

please correct me if im wrong

solo artists !

gustaph (stef caers) : crown in a fortress

andrew lambrou : strong and brilliant

reiley (rani peterson) : joyous song sung by the son of peter

alika milova : most beautiful happiness

käärijä (jere pöyhönen) : spear holding ruler

la zarra (fatima-zahra hafdi) : captivating independent flower

iru khechanovi : citizen with strength

victor vernicos : just conqueror

diljá pétursdóttir : born in heart of her parents, feeling

luke black (luka ivanović) : light of his father, ivan

noa kirel : motion on the wall of god

marco mengoni : of mars (mengoni was found at foundations of venice)

monika linkytė : advisor

parsha parfeni : pure admiration

mia nicolai : moon for the victor of the people

dion cooper : follower of dionysus, someone who makes wooden vessels

alessendra mele : charming defender of mankind

blanka : fair

mimicat (marisa mena) : of the sea, mena is a topographic name

theodor andrei : manly gift of god

remo forrer : dweller at the waterfall from rheims

blanca paloma : white dove

mae muller : may miller (yes, literally)

brunette (elen yeremyan) : torch that the lord exalts

loreen (lorine talhaoui) : laurel plant that bares fruit

albina kelmendi : white and merciful

groups/duos !

voyager

daniel estrin : star judged by god

simone dow : listen to the dark haired [girl]

ashley doodkorte : ash meadow (couldnt find doodkorte, but i did find he is like my 4th cousin)

alex canion : defender of humanity on a footpath

scott kay : pure man with a shield

-

teya & salena

teodora spiric : gods gift on a spire

selena-maria edbauer : hesitant moon and star of the sea

-

turalturan x

tural bağmanov : to be alive with creativity

turan bağmanov : dedicated to turan (the goddess of love in etruscan mythology), or the land of tur, creativity

-

let 3

zoran prodanović : to sell till dawn

damir martinović : one who gives peace and is the son of martin

dražen baljak : emotional beloved

matej zec : the rabbit is a gift of god

-

vesna

patricie fuxová : noblewoman

bára šůstková : innocent

olesya ochepovská : girl from the forest (they mean the same thing)

markéta vedralová : pearl

tereza čepková : playful harvester

tanita yanková : giant daughter of yanko

-

lord of the lost

chris harms : bearing christ’s army

class grenayde : peoples victory

gared dirge : rules by the spear, hymn of mourning

pi stoffers : swimming pool, bearer of christ

niklas kahl : bald person of victoy

-

sudden lights

andrejs zitmanis : brave

kārlis zitmanis : strong

mārtiņš zemītis : of mars, samogitian

kārlis vārtiņš : strong giver of roses

-

wild youth

david whelan : beloved & joyful

conor odonohoe : lover of hounds whom is brown haired

callum mcadam : dove, son of adam

ed porter : prosperous guardian of the gate

-

the busker

david meilak : beloved admirer

jean borg : god is gracious in a castle

sean meachen : god is gracious, meachen is topographic

-

piqued jacks

andrea lazzeretti : manly who has help from god

francesco bini : mosest free man

tommaso oliveri : twin olive

marco sgaramella : of mars

-

joker out

bojan cvjetićanin : battle on veliki cvjetnić

jure maček : farmer cat

kris guštin : follower and servant of christ

jan peteh : god is gracious, rock

nace jordan : fire is dissipating

-

tvorchi

jeffery kenny : peace & handsome

andrii hutsuliak : manly outlaw

[eurotowne]

i think i’m gonna see oppenheimer and barbie on the same day but i’ll probably have to go solo, solo

[sunevphoria]

Can we talk about how Eurovision 2023 is just a full on "feed the sapphics" year?

Yeah yeah, you have peeps simping for Käärijä, Bojan and the other boys, BUT THIS EUROVISION ROUNDUP IS FOR THE SAPPHICS UGH!!!!!

Loreen? Hell yeah.

Alessandra? She's close to my age and likes girls, I think we'll be buddies.

The girlies from Vesna? YES, ESPECIALLY PATRICIE.

Teya and Salena? DEFINITELY.

Mae Muller? Literally Slae Muller.

Blanca Paloma? Si, mi madre.

Diljà? I feel like she could lift me rn.

Iru? YES, she's so sweet!

Brunette? She's doing good and looks good.

Monika? ABSOLUTELY.

The Kelmendi girls? Vesa, my beloved...

Mimicat? Just... Perfection.

La Zarra? Well, OBVIOUSLY (pun intended)

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2023 PRESHOW - part 2: the irrelevants

Sometimes you come across countries that try their best and still somehow, fail to make it past the stage of mediocrity. These entries aren’t going to make a splash, they merely attend the contest where they’ll likely not make much of an impact. Nothing to be offended by. That doesn’t take away they’re still kind of shit though. 💔

33. SAN MARINO Piqued Jacks - “Like an animal” Semi 2, slot #12

Another year of me not caring about San Marino. Hooray! 😐

Though let’s be honest that on this occasion I’m in the majority. 🙂 I don’t dislike PJ as much as most fans appear to do though. I think it’s  because there are days (most days) I forget San Marino are in this year’s rotation?

But when I am forced to remember San Marino are in and THIS is their entry and... has there ever been an entry this far away from the concept of “a slay”? The goat noises at the ends, jeeeesus. There probably are more inane entries out there, but not in 2023. Everything about Piqued Jacks is painfully heterosexual ranging from their nicknames to the song and its lyrics.

Speaking of the lyrics, um, yeah let’s pick apart its many issues I guess? First and foremost the narrative is that of a random straight man chasing after a woman on the dancefloor (so: IN PUBLIC) because she looked at him funny and he is failing to control his impulses to grind all of his appendages against her bodice. YIKES. 😬 

This image is then further enhanced by the..; um... colourful metaphors in which body parts are being assigned animalistic properties (SNAKE eyes, BITING tongue) and suddenly this flirty song about a hopeless normie desperately trying to get laid has taken a turn towards sinisterville. There are plenty of vibes you can go for here, but “accidentally preditorial” is not one of them. 😐

Still better than Salvaje though. 🙂

ODDS at Eurovision

No amount of divine or satantic intervention is going to prevent San Marino’s impending last place. 

This is not a question of “Will they receive enough points to qualify?”. it’s a question of “Will they receive points from anyone?” 

Qualifier tier: F Projected placement: 14th-16th (semi). 

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32. NETHERLANDS Mia Nicolai & Dion Cooper - “Burning Daylight” Semi 1, slot #14

:snore:

To be honest, when I first heard Duncan Laurence would write a song for Eurovision and it would be sung by two indie randoms who barely knew each other, I instantly assumed I’d hate the Dutch entry this year. Yeah, Arcade was good but I am SO sick of it and Duncan at this point (in a similar vein to other people having had enough Måns and KEiiNO) . Mia/Dion meanwhile were giving off Isaiah/Evie vibes. ALLL the worrying signals were there!

So it is any surprise "Burning daylight” churned out to a few stilted, horrendous messy lives that have made it abundantly clear that Mia and Dion do NOT mesh together, at all? No, of course not. 

That said, the song’s like........... fine, I guess? I don’t fucking understand why Burning Daylight had to be a duet or you know, this insipid. DE DIEPTE JUST HAPPENED, AND GOT IT ALL RIGHT. 

I did get a small snort out of AVROTROS outright admitting that they hadn’t known in advance about the juries getting nixed in the semi, and if they had they probably would have picked something else. Is that admission more painful than the preparty performances at Madrid and Amsterdam? I’ll let you decided. Moral of the story if the selection offers up a choice of MEROL, you always fucking take the MEROL. Morons.

Odds at Eurovision - Netherlands

 “GOODBYE OLD LIIIIIIIIIIIFE” -- Netherlands saying goodbye to the Success Era.  

Like, seriously. Logically, I feel like good staging and Netherlands’ excellent draw should be enough to clinch a qual on paper. In reality: We’ve all seen the footage. 

To be fair though, I was there when they flobbed in Amsterdam, and it seemed not as bad as some others (then again, ESCUnited’s Sean was standing next to me drunkedly SHRIEKING the chorus down my ear canals so i may have missed most of the essence). Alessandra was VERY bad, and Vesna weren’t too great either - too bad Vesna and Alessandra actually have competitive songs where the vocals matter less~

What is going to secure this NQ though is that the Dutch have already lost their fooken MINDS about what have been two supbar lives, and are going to drag Dion and Mia down in their negative spiral. I do feel that if the home country doesn’t support you, your press doesn’t support you and worse, if foreign media and commentators pick up on that and report it back to their audiences, you’re in for a miserable experience and a headfirst collision into a bottom of the scoreboard finish. There is a small window for Netherlands to qualify because, you know.. .Malta aren’t secure. Latvia aren’t secure. Switzerland aren’t secure. SERBIA aren’t secure, Czechia aren’t secure either. And since only five countries die (note that I am not mentioning the two obviously dead NQs)  there is a chance for NL to slip through if they fix their most pressing issues.

There is sadly little fixing can do if you’re song’s unvotable. 

Qualifier tier: D Projected placement: 10-15th (semi), 23rd-26th (Grand Final)

31. ALBANIA Albina Kelmendi & Family - “Duje” Semi 2, slot #14

A family! isn’t it CUTE!!!

I’d argue that thanks to the awkward shuffling in every live of “Duje” and the strangely sinister narrative of the music video (are they GENUINELY implying that Albina is having the hots for her own brother?! lol?!), Albania’s song is the fucking antithesis of “cute”. 🙂 “Duje” is so strange man. If you were to just listen to the track without any other input you may find it pleasant enough, I guess. The Kelmendii are just... not very gifted at performing live (Albina excepted), and ESC IS a live performance contest, soz. They’re like D-mol, but less funny and only slightly less embarrassing.

So of course Albania became the object of an irony-fueled lovefest by the fans, because “lololol so inept bless” but i’ve decided I find that particular discouse patronizing, and the entry itself off-putting. 🙂

Idk, an entire family singing a song about LOVE CONQUERING ALL, while awkwardly touching each other and exchanging meaninful creates a cult-like undercurrent that I’d rather steer away from as much as possible. 

Odds at Eurovision - Albania

Okay so semi 2 is a really fucking crapshoot in that there are 7 obvious qualifiers, and the others (not counting SM) have a shot at claiming the last 3 spots. 

Even with that information in mind, I still feel like Albania are one of the three LEAST likely countries to qualify in that semi? (after, of course, Romania and Poland). As I said before, the Kelmendi’s unironically remind me of D-Mol,and their song is a strange off-putting janky mess that even the Albanians will be reluctant to vote for. 

Albina’s only trump card is that she’s brought her family along, and this is a dicey USP when most of them aren’t particularly good at doing Eurovision things. 

Also, Albania are missing their biggest allies which are Switzerland (semi 1), Montenegro (not in), and NoMac (not in). So yeah, it will be a huge uphill battle. BUT AT LEAST LOVE WILL CONQUER EVERYTHING (when Gustaph destroys the concept of homophobia and wins the semi)

If Albania do qualify, bottom 4 in the finale seems very clear, here?

Qualifier tier: D Projected placement: 9th-15th (Semi), 21st-26th (Grand Final)

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30. IRELAND Wild Youth - “We are one” Semi 1, slot #06

A blistering 9th-to-last place for everyone’s favourite act to hate! Hooray!

I don’t know, I do think Wild Youth are strangely... overhated? Like, if you’re Ireland and you want bring a typical sound to the contest your country is known for, then why not go for a U2 B-side track? It seems really valid choice to me. how you can despise any act that DENIED Johnny Rotten’s bid for ESC is beyond me, tbh. 

But yeah, “We are one” is really fucking insipid. Musically I don’t have anything negative to say about it though? The composition is fine, if unexciting. 

Its message though is where I lost all interest - being INCLUSIVE and DIFFERENT and UNIQUE so that WE ARE ONE. It is meant to be inspirational and instead achieved the opposite effect - annoying clichémongering is not a way to go, ever in life, anywhere.  🙂

Now, I will say that I feel a bit sorry for Wild Youth because their Eurovision experience so far has been a big pile o’ misery.  Like at EIC, Connor was DENIED ENTRY to the afterparty by the security guards because he didn’t have a wristband, eventhough he showed up in the SAME outfit he had performed in earleir that night.

When the cunts yelled “NUNCA AL FINAL” at them in Barcelona, they lowered the bar even more in terms of fanbase toxicity - and even this distinction was immediately taken away from Wild Youth when the same crowd chanted “RONELA” at Piqued Jacks (the most pathetic thing i’ve seen eurofans do, aside from maybe that Andromache shell tattoo)

so um yeah. Wild Youth don’t make it higher than NL or SM specifically based on musical merit - although they, unlike Mia and Dion can at least hold a tune.

They made it this far because I feel sorry for them. 😬

Odds at Eurovision - Ireland

Yeah this is NQ. I know, you know, Wild Youth know, let’s not rub it in. Notionally there are scenarios where other countries could fuck up and crash themselves out of the Grand Final, but if I’m honest if that were to happen, it'd probably benefits the other hopeless NQ more?  

Besides, Ireland have already run their reputation into the ground through their HORRIBLE non-qualification streak; inept leadership and uninspired entries. At this point everyone expects them to be last place because that’s what we’ve been led to expect from them over the years.  I don’t think WY necessarily place dead last though. I could see the parents that tune in liking it enough to cast a vote for it, granting it a random 12th place. Qualification is too big a feat to pull off here though. Qualifier tier: F Projected placement: 12th-15th (Semi)

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And that concludes the entries that were kinda shit, but not shit enough to actively dislike hooray! In the next update I’ll talk about three songs that leave me fucking COLD.  Up next: the BORING entries. 

THE RANKING:

Part 1: The BAD entries (Switzerland / Croatia / Israel / Greece)

[mildmagician]

Albina together with the big Familja Kelmendi is representing Albania with the song ‘Duje’!🇦🇱❣️

Albina Kelmendi is known to the Albanian public by her participation in The Voice of Albania, where she finished as the runner-up of the season back in 2014. Almost 10 years later she is representing her home country together with the closest members of her family. Will the love and unity grant them a place in the Grand Final?

[anotherescsite]

Albina Kelmendi - Crouching tiger, hidden diva of Eurovision 2023

[eurovision-facts]

Eurovision Fact #400:

Albina and Familja Kelmendi, Albania's 2023 representative group, is comprised of pop star Albina, who was a finalist on The Voice of Albania, and her family.

When discussing having her two sisters Vesa and Sidorela, her brother Albin, and her mother and father Albana and Bujar oh stage with her to sing, Albina stated:

“It’s such a special feeling. I was on the stage many times before alone and it’s a wonderful feeling, but being with my family is a whole next level thing, so it’s just so powerful and so special.”

[Sources]

Albina & Familja Kelmendi, Eurovision.tv.

'A family affair from Albania: For the love of Albina & Familja Kelmendi,' Eurovision.tv.

[eurovision-brackets]

[thisismondaymood]

ESC-finale songs, and how deep they burned into my brain (this has nothing to do with liking these songs, it's only about their impact; the order goes from none to "very deep").

🇨🇭 Switzerland | Remo Forrer - Watergun

No impact

🇦🇲 Armenia | Brunette - Future Lover

No impact

🇫🇷 France | La Zarra - Évidemment

No impact

🇪🇸 Spain | Blanca Paloma - Eaea

No impact

🇮🇹 Italy | Marco Mengoni - Due Vite

No impact

🇬🇧 United Kingdom | Mae Muller - I Wrote A Song

No impact

🇦🇱 Albania | Albina & Familja Kelmendi - Duje

Less than the scratch of a fingernail

🇺🇦 Ukraine | TVORCHI - Heart of Steel

Scratch of a fingernail

🇸🇪 Sweden | Loreen - Tattoo

Not even an eighth of a bobby pin

🇵🇹 Portugal | Mimicat - Ai Coração

About the size of a tack

🇩🇪 Germany | Lord of the Lost - Blood & Glitter

The needle of a compass (writing tool)

🇮🇱 Israel | Noa Kirel - Unicorn

2 cm

🇸🇮 Slovenia | Joker Out - Carpe Diem

+/- 4 cm

🇪🇪 Estonia | Alika - Bridges

Maybe 5 cm

🇨🇾 Cyprus | Andrew Lambrou - Break A Broken Heart

6 cm

🇨🇿 Czechia | Vesna - My Sister's Crown

About the length of my pinkie

🇧🇪 Belgium | Gustaph - Because Of You

7 cm

🇲🇩 Moldova | Pasha Parfeni - Soarele şi Luna

8 cm

🇭🇷 Croatia | Let 3 - Mama ŠČ!

8 cm

🇦🇺 Australia | Voyager - Promise

Quite deep, maybe the size of 1.5 keys

🇱🇹 Lithuania | Monika Linkytė - Stay

Half of the length of an average screwdriver

🇦🇹 Austria | Teya & Salena - Who The Hell Is Edgar?

The length of my ring finger

🇳🇴 Norway | Alessandra - Queen of Kings

About 8-10 cm

🇵🇱 Poland | Blanka - Solo

Quite deep...too deep

🇷🇸 Serbia | Luke Black - Samo Mi Se Spava

Very deep, like, at least 12.5 cm

🇫🇮 Finland | Käärijä - Cha Cha Cha

Ouch! Ouch! Ouch! Insanely deep, but I'm definitely NOT mad about it.

[yep-ishouldbesleeping]

Tonight was a bit boring with all the ballads and tik tok dances so let’s just all agree that:

Georgia

Austria

Albania

Maybe Slovenia

Deserve to pass right?

I don’t care about everyone else sorry 😔✌

[arcadiaseer]

Käärijä stans and Loreen stans should stop fighting and start streaming Duje instead 🇦🇱

[aijamisespava]

Favorite Songs From Each Country! Part 32/37: Albania!

Oh my god, how are we close to the end?! Anyways, today we have Albania. And while their results are hot and cold, there is one thing that they excel at almost every single year: VOCALS! Almost every year, they send an artist with incredible vocal ability that wows me, and other Eurovision fans when they hear it. Plus, they're one of the first countries to announce their entry, giving plenty of time for revamps, but also kicks off the new Eurovision season!

Favorite Entry: Among some of my favorite vocal performances of all time is 2017's "World" by Lindita. This entry is probably Albania's most robbed entry, and I can see why. The music? Epic. The Vocals? On point. The result? Absolutely undeserved. It starts quiet, and then the build fits so perfectly which makes the song truly come to life. It brought Albania's best result in my personal ranking because of how much I love it. RANK: 14th in 2017 Semi-Final 1 (34th Overall)/PERSONAL RANK: 6th of 42 Countries

Thoughts on 2023 Entry: While being one of the first countries to announce their song can be a good thing (gives more time for a revamp and time for an entry to grow), there is a downside: other entries may come in, and then if the song doesn't resonate, it is doomed to be forgotten. And then when I write about it, I feel horrible that I put a great song so low and remember that I really need to rerank the 2023 entries. Albina Kelmendi did something that I for one haven't seen often, bring her family with her to perform "Duje" at Eurovision! The song is amazing and the revamp didn't kill the song (I had written in my diary begging for them not to revamp lmao). But somehow, it got buried under other Eurovision songs...100% my bad. And also, the vocals? Amazing as usual! Am I glad they qualified? Absolutely! Would my family be able to replicate that? Heck no (neither my dad or I sing and our music tastes are all over the place). RANK: 22nd in 2023 Grand Final/PERSONAL RANK: 30th of 37 Countries