Earlier today, the Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — gathered in Valletta to discuss the contestants participating in Malta Eurovision Song Contest 2016 (MESC). First up is Lawrence Gray with his entry “You’re Beautiful”. Are we flattered that he thinks we’re gorgeous — or just a little creeped out? Read on to find out…

LAWRENCE GRAY – “YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL”

“YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL” REVIEWS

Bernardo: This just feels very old fashioned to me. He has a good voice, but this just isn’t a good song, nor is it Eurovision material. Yes, you’re beautiful, but not when I’m listening to this. One of the worst entries this year.

Score: 3/10

Deban: A stifled falsetto trying to belt a power vibrato may work for pantomime, but it doesn’t take flight here. For a start, many of the lyrics sound muffled. Also, Lawrence Gray’s bleach blonde hair and plucked eyebrows do not offer a compelling argument for the narrative he’s singing about. Who’s beautiful? His mirrored image or the chick he’ll never lay?

Score: 5/10

Josh: Lawrence’s promotional picture in the video above makes him look like a Maltese Sam Smith. Unfortunately he doesn’t have the musicality to match. “You’re Beautiful” is very dated and also quite dull. I can’t even get halfway before almost falling asleep. I can’t see this making it past the semi-final.

Score: 2.5/10

Ramadan: Just listening to this song is making me sleepy. The song is so old-fashioned and takes forever to build up. At the two-minute mark, I’d rather not continue. This song is definitely not for Eurovision.

Score: 2/10

Robyn: “You’re Beautiful” has such a tired, old-fashioned sound. Lawrence has an affected way of singing, which makes the lyrics difficult to understand at times. Perhaps that’s a good thing — the actual lyrics have lines that sound like direct quotes from a psychologist’s report: “Even as a child, you showed those special traits”.

Score: 2/10

William: “Phantom of the Opera” meets 1980s easy listening — and I am beyond bored. This lacks energy and drive for the first two minutes, so much so that I worry producers injected Lawrence with tranquilizers ahead of the recording session. The drums in the bridge provide some much-needed drama. It’s just a shame it takes so long to get there. PS That opening line is creepy…

Score: 2.5/10

The Malta Wiwi Jury consists of 18 jurors, but we only have room for six reviews. The remaining twelve scores are below.

Anthony: 4/10

Antranig: 0/10

Cristian: 1/10

Denise: 1/10

George: 6.5/10

Luis: 3/10

Maria: 3.5/10

Mario: 6/10

Patrick: 5/10

Renske: 5.5/10

Rezo: 1/10

Zakaria: 0.5/10

The highest and lowest scores are dropped prior to calculating the average score. This is to remove outliers and reduce potential bias. We have removed a low of 0 and a high of 6.5.

WIWI JURY SCORE: 2.97/10

FOR OUR LIST OF MESC 2016 RANKINGS, CLICK HERE

FOR MORE MALTA EUROVISION NEWS, CLICK HERE

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Zack
Zack
8 years ago

OMG @Robyn, you are becoming one of my favorites on Wiwi! Call ’em out! 😀

Sg
Sg
8 years ago

i really like this song and Lawrence intrepratation is impeccable and was very surprised to read some of these comments posted by the jury on top. Whats wrong in having a tenor voice cause the jury were trying to ridicule his voice cause it was similar to the Phantom? Did they already forgot Il volo’s success last year? And his image? What did these jury say when they saw a man dressed as a women with a beard? Was it not about the voice? Good luck Lawrence, we are waiting for your live performance eagerly.

Joyce
Joyce
8 years ago

I agree with Toni that such words to comment on the singer and song from these unproffesional jury are out of taste and highly irregular. One always has the right not to like the song or the singer but for pete’s sake tackle the argument and not the person. I personally heard all the songs and i really like Lawrence entry this year as there are a lot of the same style of songs and this is different and i truly beleive when Lawrence steps up that stage to sing ‘live’ he will shine from the many inexpierinced singers there… Read more »

Toni
Toni
8 years ago

Im a huge fan of Lawrence Grays voice and his tenor voice is very similar to Il Volo who came 2 nd in last years final so to just lash out irresponsable words about his hair and trying to make fun out of him personally is not a proffesional construcive critisism but DESTRUCTIVE critisism which you so called jury should be ashamed and wiwibloggs should ban you from spitting out venom about artists which i beleive should be treated with respect and no wonder his song made you fall asleep as you are musically Dead!! Shame on you haha

Rita
Rita
8 years ago

Eh…I have it as my number for Malta as of right now (I’m not done listening to all of them). I didn’t think it was bad, quite the contrary, but Brooke’s Golden is a close second as of right now too. We will see…

steve
steve
8 years ago

I personally love this, but then I am suck in the 80’s when it comes to Eurovision and struggle to believe it has moved on!

Steven
Steven
8 years ago

I was disappointed after he had a strong enough song last year, but this is possibly in the bottom 5 this year. Extremely uninteresting when you weigh it up against the competition

Ben Rafter
Ben Rafter
8 years ago

I like the lyrics but the song is so dated and if this went to Eurovision he wouldn’t fair well.

PP
PP
8 years ago

His last year song was so much better than this song.

DenizNL
DenizNL
8 years ago

Yeah I don’t like it either.