leklein ouch!!

Last night, the Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of musical unprofessionals — gathered in Toledo, in Castilla La-Mancha, Spain. After visiting El Alcázar and enjoying some manchego cheese, we reviewed LeKlein’s song for Objetivo Eurovisión 2017. Did she have us screaming with ecstasy? Or were we left shouting “Ouch!!” instead? Read on to find out…

LeKlein – “Ouch!!”

About LeKlein

Known for her smoky vocals and androgynous look, free-minded LeKlein kicked off her career in 2002 and has subsequently performed at all of Spain’s most iconic clubs. Having built a solid reputation in the anything-goes atmosphere of Ibiza, the Toledan artist is now trying her luck at Objetivo Eurovisión with the electronic pop song “Ouch!!” Thoughtful lyrics over modern beats, LeKlein brings a club banger with a positive message.

Wiwi Jury reviews “Ouch!”

Robyn: I generally like this song until LeKlein starts wailing “Ouch! Ouch! Ouuuuuch!”. It’s not a strong word to base a song around, especially when the delivery in “Ouch!!” sounds less like a cry of pain and more a murmur of ecstasy. LeKlein is a good singer, but even after a few listens, I’m still struggling to remember the song.

Score: 6/10

William: This electro ballad about perseverance is catchy, on-trend and well-produced. LeKlein’s smokey vocals carry power and vulnerability so well and the inclusion of horns — so often disastrous — comes off as contemporary rather than throwback. I’m still not convinced you can build a song around the rather clunky word “Ouch!” — it kind of kills the mood. But with a few teaks this could take Spain back to the Top 10 at Eurovision. There ain’t no pain when LeKlein is singing.

Score: 8/10

Edd: First the positive: There’s a catchy melody and really powerful electropop production, and great vocals, especially in the chorus. Very Sia. However, what on EARTH are those lyrics!? Especially in the second chorus, it’s as if she’s written something in Spanish, then translated it to Finnish, then translated it to Vietnamese and then to English. With such a dramatic song she needs to look more arty — think beyond “woman with spiky hair in a suit.” But this does have real potential for greatness.

Score: 7.5/10

 

Chris: I’m all for songs with bizarre English lyrics, but they need some semblance of logic. We can all joke and laugh about “oximated”, but LeKlein’s attempt is far too earnest. It genuinely feels like they ran the song through a translation machine and just went with it. It’s off-putting throughout and no matter how good a performer LeKlein is, it’s not salvageable in its current form.

Score: 5/10

Jason: I don’t get this at all, unless the overall aim of “Ouch” is to inflict actual physical pain on the listener. It is unbearable. The mild Latin beat of the verses shows some initial promise, but the noisy and annoying track, the questionable lyrics and the unbearable cries of pain overshadow the positives. In all seriousness, the average ESC viewer would welcomingly mute this after the first chorus and go make themselves another cocktail. Ouch indeed.

Score: 1/10

Luis: I really want to like this more than I do. It has slick production and the song manages to leave a good impression on me. However, there’s the Ouch. I don’t get it: the chorus could finish with “Never silence my voice” and we’d all be happy. But no, there’s the ouch, ouch, ouch. The rest of the lyrics are not much better. The message (or what I deduce she wants to get across) is completely lost. There’s no cohesion — just a wasted opportunity.

Score: 6/10

Antranig: This song is catchy and memorable — something I’d put on repeat for a day or two. On the other hand, the cries of “Ouch!” are really cheap and out of place and bring the entire song down a few notches. It’s like they ran out of lyrics to express pain and decided to say “ouch” to fill the rest of the three minutes. Overall, a very good song with a few things that need to be fixed.

Score: 7/10

Zakaria: The chorus is great…until Leklein reaches the “Ouch” part. Everything collapses. The song is nice but ordinary, but that’s definitely not enough to give Spain its first victory in ages. “Ouch” is the kind of song that you would randomly listen to on the radio while driving long-distance…largely because you don’t have good reception and it happens to be playing. This needs more of a hook to contend at Eurovision.

Score: 6/10

Our Eurocasting Wiwi Jury consists of 18 jurors from across the globe. However, we only have room for eight reviews. Here are the scores from the rest of the jurors:

Bernardo: 6/10

Cinan: 8/10

Dayana: 5/10

Deban: 6.5/10

Forrest: 5/10

Josh: 6/10

Jordi: 7/10

Jovana: 7.5/10

Patrick: 6.5/10

Ramadan: 7/10

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 1 and a high of 8.

Wiwi Jury score: 6.38/10

Read all our Spanish Wiwi Jury reviews here

Read more Spain news here

29 Comments
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Sjodni
Sjodni
7 years ago

I love the beat and I love the chorus, and I love the whole song…until she starts screaming in pain like she has been wounded in the middle of the song, and it’s causing her to forget English. I feel like she sat down and sent the original song lyrics through multiple layers of Google Translate and then went to sing it and kept getting fingers chopped off during the song. And yet she kept singing beautifully. Maybe if she hummed it it would sound more…put together? Personally, I don’t think I want to perform a heart surgery on a… Read more »

v_aus
v_aus
7 years ago

Angry looking woman with a nose-ring singing totally nonsensical lyrics then finishing the song with “ouch, ouch, ouch”. What garbage this is.

mawnck
mawnck
7 years ago

I’ll just leave this here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVFRgoQe86U

AngieP
AngieP
7 years ago

Really good voice, I get the English part. I have trouble getting the second verse though. Generally it’s a good song, but I don’t like the “ouch” part either.

Gav
Gav
7 years ago

Basically a great song. We just all here the word “ouch” right? What ever word would work?

Germans say “owwa” don’t they?

Medöner
Medöner
7 years ago

A song killed by its own chorus. That is very sad.

CharlieChan
CharlieChan
7 years ago

I think the lyrics are OK. Even though they might sound stupid we have to admit that “Now my heart awakes to the sound of silence and it beats to the sound of silence” (x2) or “Thunder and lighting it’s getting exciting” or even “We are the heroes of our time, Heroes, but we are dancing with the demons in our minds, Heroes…” are not really great lyrics and the three of them are top 3 finishes, 2 of them a win (Dami Im with the pre voting system)

Antonio
Antonio
7 years ago

Georgia 10 th and Ukraine 6th. LeKlein, don’t change the lyrics!

mad-professor
mad-professor
7 years ago

I agree with Jason – this song just isn’t good. There’s no hook, the lyrics are much worse than either Georgia’s Warrior or Tick-Tock. Leklein is good, but the song lets her down.

an esc fan
an esc fan
7 years ago

This song needs to take out the ”ouch”, like the juror Robyn says, it sounds more like ecstasy than pain. I can hear the audience laughing, and making fun of it.

Briekimchi
Briekimchi
7 years ago

I really like it.
Of all the songs competing in National Finals so far, this is probably my favourite.

Lex
Lex
7 years ago

I personally find this really amusing, not amazing. It makes me laugh especially when she starts ouch ouch oooouch… come on girl… next…

Antonio
Antonio
7 years ago

I’m Spaniard and I really like the song. If we talk about the production, this song is better than “Say Yay”. I like the lyrics because I’m not a native speaker… I think it’s original… But I understand your opinion.

EUROFAN MEXICO
7 years ago

I LOVE TO MUCH THIS SONG YA ESTOY ARTO DE SHINE STARS LOVE AND HEROES THAT ALWAYS LIKE IN EUROVISION THIS IS POETIC DIFERENT

Stephen Colville
Stephen Colville
7 years ago

Change the chorus to not say “Ouch” the awkward way it does and you have an absolutely killer song on your hands.

Purple Mask
Purple Mask
7 years ago

First the positive. I really like the artist (LeKlein) – her voice gives me Annie Lennox vibes. I also like the original concept of the song. However, the lyrics don’t work in English at all; this song badly needs a re-write. Also, some of the supporting sounds in the music video are dreadfully balanced, in my opinion. Actually, LeKlein’s YouTube channel posted an acoustic version of this song played into what sounds like a single microphone, and even THAT sounded clearer and better than the video version. For those sound mixers and producers: “Ouch” indeed. The big question is: Will… Read more »

Nick
Nick
7 years ago

The instrumentation is really great HOWEVER the lyrics are absolutely cringeworthy.
“Delve every midnight on the grass,
And share your light with all your dearest,
Must place your heart inside your child,
And let it scream with no restriction”

It sounds like she’s doing open heart surgery on her children. Seriously, if you can’t translate things correctly, don’t bother.

Nick
Nick
7 years ago

The instrumentation is really great HOWEVER the lyrics are absolutely cringeworthy.
“Delve every midnight on the grass,
And share your light with all your dearest,
Must place your heart inside your child,

EF0912
EF0912
7 years ago

For me, this has the best melody, production and singer BUT those lyrics are just terrible. I don’t mind the Ouch bit as much as most people but I do see why it annoys as much as it does. I think if she replaces the Ouch line with a new lyric – this could indeed become a contender.

8/10

CharlieChan
CharlieChan
7 years ago

I like the Ouch part 🙂 . Fpr me its an 8.5/10

(J)ESC Fanatic
(J)ESC Fanatic
7 years ago

As many wiwi reviewers have already mentioned, this is a good pop song… until the annoying “ouch!” part… Overall, it’s still a solid effort, but needs improvement if she wants to win the whole selection.

7/10

Nikos
Nikos
7 years ago

Is it just me, or have there been a LOT of articles and videos on Leklein as of late? Team Javian for me 🙂

cheesecake
cheesecake
7 years ago

The song title says it all.

Stian F
Stian F
7 years ago

Ouch has all the potential of being an amazing song. I really love the build up and the chorus is amazing. My only problem is the grammar – and some of the lyrics. It would be very very easy to change some of the Words so it makes it more sensable and bareable – which i am sure they will do also if they were to go to the final 🙂 The artist reminds me abit of Mei Feingold from Israel (2014 Eurovision) 🙂

Ayten Jamo
Ayten Jamo
7 years ago

She deserves a better song with this beautiful voice. No chance for winning the contest. But I adore androgynous figures like her.

Pablo
Pablo
7 years ago

Song with potential ruined by a hook that is… frankly, very stupid-sounding. Not to mention she doesn’t pronounce it right. It has decent instrumentals, nice brass sections, but all ruined by some off lyrics and the dumb hook. This won’t go anywhere, even if it’s likely to win the wildcard pick due to a seemingly bigger fan power.

4/10

Erasmus
Erasmus
7 years ago

Don’t like this song… That ouch is so bad., can’t even hear it, good voice like hers should be used in a better song…

Iberian
Iberian
7 years ago

I love this song. And her voice is fantastic!

BB
BB
7 years ago

I hate this song… these lyrics are horrible