The moment has arrived: Iveta Mukuchyan has finally debuted “LoveWave” her song for Eurovision 2016. The grand reveal, which comes after months of intense speculation, does not disappoint. In fact, we’re ready to cast off our life jackets and ride her wave…
Musically this is soulful and dramatic. Iveta works her smokey vocals to great effect, giving us a contemporary sound with flashes of rock goddess. The first 50 seconds are among the edgiest, most de-constructed 50 seconds we’ve heard at Eurovision. The intro ends with a supersonic swell that leads into Iveta dropping it raw and without reserve. She almost sounds like Michael Jackson and, at times, Tina Turner.
The abstract music video sees Iveta play opposite Swedish top model Ben Dahlhaus, who has been dubbed “Sweden’s Brad Pitt.” It’s built around emotions rather than specific actions, and the non-scripted scenario was meant to help Iveta and Ben explore and reveal their inner thoughts and feelings. It worked, because we really feel the heat. The micro shots, which almost look scientific and medical, are, in the words of her team, “used to ‘picture’ the chemistry behind these feelings that spread through the whole body.”
The video is a co-production between Armenia’s AMPTV and Germany’s BLACKSHEEP communications.
Watch: Iveta Mukuchyan — “LoveWave”
As we found out last month, the song has been composed by Lilith Navasardyan and Levon Navasardyan, the team behind MIKA’s “Love” at Junior Eurovision 2015. Iveta wrote the lyrics alongside Stephanie Crutchfield and you can really feel the personal edge to what she is singing. Along with her big reveal, Iveta explained why she chose the subject matter:
I wanted to sing about a feeling we all know and crave for. A feeling that creates and destroys, empowers and weakens, rips and completes. A feeling out of space and time, that is unpredictable as an ocean and as powerful as a wave. A feeling that is worth fighting for…Love.
Now that we have the “LoveWave” video, Iveta’s Stockholm package is coming into sharper focus. Last week came the news that Iveta will be looking fierce in dresses from the Armenian fashion house Kivera Naynomis throughout her time at Eurovision. (The fashion house also provided her costumes for the video). After last year’s global experience with Genealogy, Armenia are keeping it close to home in 2016.
“LoveWave”: Our first reaction
What do you think about “LoveWave”? Is this the song that will take Armenia back to the top ten, or could it even be their first winning entry? Let us know in the comments section below and on our Twitter and Facebook pages.
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also out of the eurovision participants, she’s the prettiest out of them all.
So many haters here, bleh!
This song is so powerful and different, so modern. Alot better than most of the trash songs this year from the other countries, which are too boring, simple and typical. Armenia is my number 1 this year so far.
She looks like a dude!
Is she a trans woman?
I have waited a lot for Iveta´s song to in the end I defrauded
This is where Lana Del Rey meets Aminata and the Anatolian/Eastern flute sounds of Azerbaijan 2012.
Very clever entry, but no Eurovision winner.
Poland, Ukraine, and probably Russia, and even France have better chances..
Top 10 is obviously already secured of course, plus a very possible top 5 televoting placing.
It’s not the best, but it’s a lot better than Iceland’s and Norways pop songs. I do hate most of the pop music.
very amazing song
well.this is definetly a new level for Eurovision.Well done Armenia…this is great ,and Iveta will be in top 10 for sure.
At last something really different! 12 points from me (10 to Austria, 8 to Ukraine, or the other way round).
Oh dear, Armenian fans are quite like those from Spain… Go on, can’t wait for this lady to fail drastically in Stockholm. After then, all the names you see on here will automatically disappear, vanished like a f*** in the air
People LOOK BACK TO EUROVISION WINNERS’ SONGS.
FOR EXAMPLES I HATE SOME OF THEM,(I won’t name that songs),,How they won?,,may be you also give you the same question.May be it’s a political contest? May be! but listening songs and understand and like it not difficult.
We cant’ say that it’s a mess. It’s a very interesting, novelty, impressive and relaxing song.
People it’s a great ,Let’s appreciate .I like Armenian song much! Good Luck!
Griffin you are so right, agree with you. Very good, she is just awesome. She is winner of ESC and winner of top model of ESC.
AMAZING ! love this song TOP 10
*used. yah I know I can grammar
Whoa! Amazing! Sure its not the trash pop song people song expected, but this has it. It has a presence, not alike Margaret that recycles a pop song algorithm uses like 1 billion times. No shade to Margaret, just pissed off at people who are being so ignorant to this song.
@Felix – thanks. It just dawned on me that that ‘supersonic swell’ effect was also featured to a lesser degree on Anguun’s ‘Echo’ (You and I) from 2012, but ‘LoveWave’ is breaking all the rules of songwriting in an epic and majestic scale.
I’m addicted to this song.It’s so different .After listening this year’s entries THIS one gave me chills/goosebumps .
Let’s wait for live version
@ron
Belgium and Latvia both had songs that were avant garde (for Eurovision standards) but they were still well written, catchy pop songs. Loic even made it to the top of the Itunes list in my country. This song lacks that quality, can you remember a single melody line after you’ve listened to it?
It’s a grower. I love it atm.
@Erin nice review))
Dreadful. Pretentious garbage. Hope Armenia will get stuck in semis.
Armenia certainly holds nothing back and spares no expense to capture everyone’s imagination with the grand release of their Eurovision entry clip. No one can ignore Iveta’s versatility and the way she belts out the song, nor can anyone deny that the ‘narration’ at the song’s exposition and the dramatic change of pace which is achieved through this amazing ‘surge’ that engulfs you without any warning has a cinematic quality that we haven’t seen before and it would be fascinating to see how it translates on a live stage. Iveta transforms from siren to lioness and her voice showcases so… Read more »
I don t see Armenia in TOP 5 with this song. Thanks to huge diaspora and ex soviet countries they will go to final and in final in TOP 10 from 7 to 10 place.
LOL what a mess. 1) Where’s the hook? 2) What is it with many female singers and struggling to enunciate their words?
Griffin, why don’t you shut up and go back to your socialist contempt?!
Classy, unusual, and this is too good for Eurovision.
For those all haters, just shut up and go back listening Dana International’s songs
OK now, except from their diaspora, who the heck will vote for this when you have so many other relevant songs on offer?
You can’t even take a note of this song like one was supposed to take (and took) a note from Aminata’s awesome staging last year. But Aminata HAD a song. Iveta, no.
You can add a good staging, but that staging wont save this song from its misery. I doubt the judges will also like this en masse. It requires too much patience and energy to be finished listening.
Sorry.. but I could see this flopping like Melanie Rene’ Shine & Emmy’s Boom Boom.
Edgy and beautiful, but weak overall. Iveta Mukuchyan will never be trusted and for me, AMPTV is sending a horrible singer with a song that is very cringy. The selection of Douwe Bob, Serhat, Barei, Justs, and Iveta Mukuchyan made my conclusion: Anyone who is lying and failing to repudiate their participation can never win the Eurovision Song Contest!
Don’t like it at all.
That was a mess.
The first minute or so is really bad and the ooo ooo ooo’s are annoying. I do not know what they were going for with this….
Armenia should have missed out on the final last year. Chances are, they will not get the benefit of the doubt again.
The first minute or so is truly a mess that needs to be cleaned up asap, the rest of the song sounds very good and leaves you wanting more. I believe Iveta is a good singer, but her vocals here didn’t match the style of the song at all.
Unlike most songs, the studio version may be disappointing, but it’s really going to come alive on stage. They probably have some killer staging in mind.
It’s so different! I am in love. This could go really far with the right staging!
Armenia’s entry this year is better than Norway, tbh. Not bad for an internally-selected act and song. They can actually win this and I won’t go against a Yerevan 2017.
the buildup at 0:35 is so unexpected
i love itttttttt
@ct-greece Iveta wrote this song lol and she talented alright.
A M A Z I N G ! its verry good ! love love love Iveta
Aminata infused song, another dark “contemporary” tune for this year, but at least it has some character. Can we please get our FUN songs of 2016 already?
It’s…. interesting. I think it might be a grower, I feel like I have to listen it a few times to fully appreciate it, but my first impression is just that… it’s.. interesting, not necessarily good or bad.
I think they wanted to do something risky and different, but I don’t know how effective this experiment will be.
However, as a supporter of a more wide variety in sounds, rhythms and styles in Eurovision, I appreciate this song so different from the rest!
Oh MY GOD What was that? She is just Goddes? I love her, i love her song, I love everything what she does. I just find my winner, she is my winner. Love you)))
* correction: I meant bagpipes, not windpipes. Sorry for the mistake.
@ Ron
Yes that’s where the problem lies. People want to imitate what Belgium and Latvia did, but they were actually talented artists who wrote their own song. Nothing like this.
@Robyn Gallagher – I actually thought the jury would love it. This sort of reminds me of Belgium, Latvia 2015 where both songs were unusual, creative and artistic and they both did really well with the juries. I feel like this definitely falls in that field and will have a lot of jury appeal….I may be wrong though.
Well, first of all it’s an interesting effort, and they should have credits for doing something a bit unusual. I don’t know if the sounds are really up my alley, but maybe I just have to get used to it. But I am tired of all these “diva stagings”.
Well, after all the hype, here it is. As has been pointed out the audio mix is very bad (it soundss like she is singing from inside a cave) so you can not easily judge it (I struggle to hear what she says). Plus I am sure they have first built an elaborate show and then wrote a song to suit the show, not the other way around. Anyway, it sounds really messy but in the end it’s just a (not very good) Anastacia song with some windpipes and a lot of grating oooh-ooh-ooohs thrown in (perhaps not as grating… Read more »
This is like Aminata and Jamala had a lovechild here, and this is the result!
I really like the melody and how left-of-field this is, however… What is she saying? What is she talking about?
I feel like if people don’t understand the lyrics, this song would be a lot more alienating than originally intended.
I’m disappointed, was expecting much better from Armenia. It is different but personally, I don’t like her voice. It will still qualify though.
It is actually really funny because in her interviews posted on the Eurovision official Youtube channel her accent in English is pretty decent. Also her English skills. But well, what a song can do to you… 😀
This is EPIC, I think I’ve never heard something like this song and that’s what I love the most about this. The traditional elements are also there and work so well…
I think Iveta needs to work on her diction cause sometimes I struggle to understand what she’s saying.
Though it’s most likely not a winner, I imagine this getting a lot of attention in Stockholm, a top 10 is very likely
Is there a native English speaker who can understand what she sings?!
I truely love it, un My Top 5, with Spain, Norway, Iceland And Hungary