On November 12th, ten acts will compete for the chance to represent Austria at the 61st Eurovision Song Contest. A professional panel is carefully selecting nine of these acts as we speak, but that leaves room for one more: the Facebook wildcard. Last week ÖRF announced that they had received 37 submissions for the wildcard spot. Whichever of these acts is rolling in the most likes on the official Facebook page will earn a place in the Wer singt für Österreich final. After a long hard listen, we have whittled down the 37 hopefuls to our top five contenders to win the wildcard selection – and it goes like this.
5. MIBLU — “Padme Amidala”
Mysterious, experimental and super dark. Singer MIBLU is also a designer – so we can expect an equally mesmerising visual performance. Judging by the success of Margaret Berger and Aminata, this entry could resurrect Austria from the bottom of the leaderboard.
https://youtu.be/p03M7j9Wqyg
4. Kevin Etheridge — “Palmtrees On Your Mind”
Now for a delightful piece of carefree ukulele-pop. Hailing from Byron Bay, Kev may have misread ‘Austrian submissions’ for ‘Australian submissions’ — but we’re not complaining. With a few tweaks to the vocal reproduction, this would bring a ray of sunshine to the Austrian national final.
3. Roxana Razaghi — “It’s You”
We are yet to hear an official studio version of this song, but the acoustic version is already very promising. Roxana provides beautiful clean vocals over a simple, sweet song – it’s Austria’s answer to Sara Bareilles.
2. Sara Koell — “Closer To The Sun”
Sara Koell – who previously wowed on The Voice of Germany — contributes an exciting self-penned song to the wildcard selection. Her spiritual R&B sound is very reminiscent of Loreen’s more recent music, and along with those killer vocals, she has real potential to slay the pack.
1. Gerry+Me — “Schön gelacht”
Whilst there are some gems in Austria’s wildcard selection, this one stands miles above the rest. It’s a melancholic, tropical house masterpiece – an immensely popular genre at the moment, and one which is only now making its way to Eurovision. German may not be the most successful language at Eurovision, but this genre was born in Central Europe, and that makes it feel so right. This could go top 5, easy peasy.
Do you agree with our choices? Comment in the box below!
could you update with the full list (doesn’t matter if it has a video next to it or not), because I cannot see the full list at the FB page.
Austria, please send Miblu!!
Sara or Gerry+me
I love Miblu!!!
It’s like Kate Bush meets Robyn and I really see it working with that pulsing beat on a big stage!
I like Sara Koell and Miblu, but I think they are outshone by the most recent successes of Loreen and Aminata. No chance this year imho.
Edds Top 5 are really good. I would have added David Siehl, the guitarrero with the hot club beat.
Gerry+Me sounds very much like the new German wave that rules the charts in Germany and Austria right now. It is unprecedented that the Top 20 consist mainly only of songs sung in German.
None of the above. Not that they’re bad songs or performances, but I think all five would struggle at Eesti Laul, never mind Eurovision itself.
I looooove “Schön Gelacht”, and I really hope it will win the national selection, cause’ that song is way better than their entries in the recent years.
Even though german is charming I hope they will have it in english if it wins!
I really really really think Gerry+Me has a powerful entry that is guaranteed top 15 in the final if not top 10 or 5, though. ORF would be unwise to choose anything else–a potential winner is sitting right in front of their noses (and I’m not saying this because I love the song, because I don’t)
In contrast to cheesecake, I love the singer’s voice in Schön gelacht, but dislike the rest of the track–it doesn’t really go anywhere?
I lovelovelovelove miblu’s song, but the fact that it’s named after a star wars character is a slight turn off (but actually, why?)
I LOVE MIBLU
“Padme Amidala”, “Closer to the Sun”, and “Schön gelacht” are all really good, too bad only one can advance to the actual final.
I’d pick Miblu from these five.
“Schön gelacht” is good since I love house, but I don’t like the singer’s voice.