The Wiwi Jury — our in-house team of music unprofessionals — continues to review the songs competing in the grand final of Sweden’s Melodifestivalen 2018. Next we look at Robert Gustafsson’s comedic character Roland and his group Rolandz with their song “Fuldans”. Did we want to shake our booties? Read on to find ou!

Rolandz – “Fuldans”

“Fuldans” reviews

Angus: “Fuldans” is pure pantomime and if you treat it as a fun three minutes it’s perfectly enjoyable. The whole point of the competition was to bring different genres into the competition and Rolandz are the only comedy act to have cleared the semi-finals, so they deserve kudos for making that leap. Like “Boogieman Blues” last year, this is sure to provide light entertainment at Friends Arena and fade from memory thereafter.

Score: 3/10

Bernardo: Fun and energetic. Fuldans brings the party this year. It will be a crowd pleaser in Sweden but I don’t think it stands a chance with international viewers. It’s good to have in the lineup, for the sake of entertainment but that’s it.

Score: 4/10

Chris: It says a lot about this year’s Melodifestivalen that even their usual jokey, old-time Swedish entry is a little subpar. Compare this to the singalong nature of Ravaillacz and you get the idea. Obviously, this is set up to appeal to a very specific section of the Swedish audience and not an international one. It serves its purpose, but it’s not hitting the high points.

Score: 4.5/10

Josh: As per every edition of Melodifestivalen, you have to have your token novelty entry and this year Rolandz is the lucky act (albeit unlucky for the rest of us). There’s nothing credible about an entry that takes the piss out of their national contest, and quite frankly I’m offended that this went DTF over Felix. Rolandz looks like a weird lovechild of Elvis Presley and Verka Sanduchka. The song is camp, cheesy and it’s hard to take it seriously. I pray that this pulls a “Boogieman Blues” this year and absolutely tanks in the final because Rolandz doesn’t deserve to be there.

Score: 1/10

Luis: Novelty acts are always welcome… as long as they are actually fun. This one is not. There’s little more to say about this: it made the final because it will probably be amusing for Swedes. Us fans can only look at these people with glittery and shiny clothes without understanding a thing and hope that someone somehow gives us those three minutes back.

Score: 2/10

William: Perhaps if I were Swedish I’d be in on the joke. But I’m not — and I’m not laughing. While I respect the lead singer for dressing up as Elvis using discarded pieces of a disco ball, I don’t respect the trainwreck of a melody, the tiresome disco throwback or the cliché dance moves that would probably make Sacha Jean-Baptiste choke on her fabulosity. This going direct to the final is a reminder that this is easily the worst Melodifestivalen I’ve ever lived through.

Score: 3/10

In our Sweden Wiwi Jury, we have 16 jurors but only room for 6 reviews. The rest of our scores can be found below:

Anthony: 1/10

Antranig: 6.5/10

Bogdan: 2/10

Cinan: 5/10

Deban: 3.5/10

Jordi: 7/10

Natalie: 1.5/10

Robyn: 7/10

Ron: 3/10

Tobias: 1/10

 

 

 

 

 

Before calculating the average score, the highest and lowest scores are dropped. This is to remove outliers and reduce potential bias. We have removed a low of 1 and a high of 7.

WIWI JURY VERDICT: 3.36/10

Read all our Melodifestivalen 2018 Wiwi Jury rankings here

Read more Melodifestivalen news here

26 Comments
Newest
Oldest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Knut Olav Halseth
Knut Olav Halseth
6 years ago

I’m from Norway and I love this act. Yes it’s a comedy act, but with lots of humour and fun. They won’t stand a chance in Lisbon and noone should worry, the international will see to that so they don’t win tonight

AngieP
AngieP
6 years ago

This is an entertaining act. But I’ll agree with William: ” Perhaps if I were Swedish I’d be in on the joke.” As a non Swedish speaker, we can’t understand what they’re talking about. We just see some people singing and dancing wearing every shiny piece of clothing they found.
3/10

gj
gj
6 years ago

The thing I appreciate about this entry is that we know what it is going for without being unnecessarily meta. It knows what it is. It doesn’t make it the theme of the song. It just does.

This is why I appreciated it and supported its place in the final. It’s the best kind of song within its philosophy.

Mattias Sollerman
Mattias Sollerman
6 years ago

Roland Bjäremyr is a tragic hero. First conceived of for the 1999 (very) dark comedy Torsk på Tallinn, he has come to epitomize much of what unites us as a people. He is naive, pragmatic and well behaved, yet stuck in a feeling of alienation towards society and its norms. Despite doing everything society expects of him, no one thanks him, and no woman wants him. In this regard he embodies our collective sense of isolation, despair, and bittersweet melancholia. His only solace in life is his love for dansband. People ask “what is the joke?” But what if there… Read more »

gj
gj
6 years ago

Wow. There you go.

LalehForWD
LalehForWD
6 years ago

@Mattias Sollerman Ha Ha, brilliant! I’m more and more leaning at we should send him to Lisbon. Absolutely rather Roland than Felix in any case.

Mattias Sollerman
Mattias Sollerman
6 years ago
Reply to  LalehForWD

It would be a victory for real music.

Eve
Eve
6 years ago

And on top of that, he’s doing moonwalk dance move, so how can you not let him go to the final, lol 😀

Martin Månsson
Martin Månsson
6 years ago
Reply to  Eve

And on top of that top. Fuldans certainly generates great amount of feelings. Not “Amar Pelos Dois”-feelings. But feelings nonetheless.

Feelings and fireworks in the same entry… Is such a thing even possible. Yes it is.

eurovision6
eurovision6
6 years ago

Bring back Thorsten Flinck and Björn Ranelid from 2012, those were much better than this

Martin Månsson
Martin Månsson
6 years ago

To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to understand Rolandz and Robert Gustafsson. The humour is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of the Swedish language and social interaction most of the jokes will go over a typical viewer’s head. There’s also Roland Järverup’s “desperately looking for a woman”-outlook, which is deftly woven into his characterization- his personality draws heavily from modern mens’ difficulties with talking to women, for instance. The fans understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of these jokes, to realize that they’re not just funny-… Read more »

Martin Månsson
Martin Månsson
6 years ago

*too

Frisian esc
Frisian esc
6 years ago

*jumps on counter* IM PICKLE ROBERT!!

Mattias Sollerman
Mattias Sollerman
6 years ago

This, but unironically.

Polyna
Polyna
6 years ago

Wiwi Jury giving something low notes just because they don’t understand it? It must be Thursday.

SpirK
SpirK
6 years ago

I actually find it catchy and sing-alongy. Genuinely deserved final place, though the direct to final was a bit more than they deserved.
7/10

Jerome
Jerome
6 years ago

This may be my 12th out of the finalists, but I can’t help but appreciate everything that they’re going for here. It is not meant to be taken seriously, and there are FAR WORSE entries in previous years that have gotten this far in the competition.

Kris
Kris
6 years ago

When a song worse than nearly all selected entries is still alive in melodifestivalen.
3/10

Alex
Alex
6 years ago

“En riktig javla schlager” was way better than this

Eve
Eve
6 years ago

I kinda wish them to reach high position, so I can read comments here 😛

Jerome
Jerome
6 years ago
Reply to  Eve

I do too, just for that reason. LOL

Ann
Ann
6 years ago

,,it’s hard to take it seriously.”
Lol, because you SHOULDN’T take it seriously! It is a JOKE. If one takes a joke seriously, then…yeah, everybody knows and was in such situations.
I agree that it can be hard to understand for foreigners, but to compare, if you’re brittish, try to imagine Mr Bean dancing and “singing” (with no words, because he doesn’t usually use them) something about his teddy bear in his Mr Bean – style, with some comedy gesture etc. It would be quite funny, wouldn’t it?
Robert Gustafsson is a fantastic comedian and I really enjoy this song.

Colin
Colin
6 years ago

I really want to see more joke acts on ESC, I really do. This year especially lacks laughter. Even funny acts are more light dance than actual pun-based humor. Songs like Pusvalanduko, Hello or Scandilove would light this up! However, so far I am really not convinced that Fuldans is that funny. Sure, the guys have fun and the song is nonsensical and messy, like a joke. But what IS the joke here? Shiny outfits? Older guys acting silly? In ESC, many singers act silly anyway, even in “regular” uptempo songs. I translated the song and lyrics aren’t particullary funny… Read more »

Ari
Ari
6 years ago
Reply to  Colin

Old dudes in shiny outfits? Sounds like the Dutch horror of 2009. But that wasn’t funny at all, it was just sad, in my opinion. So funny though, how I am all about The Netherlands in Eurovision, since the miracle of 2013. I hope they never go back to the dark times before Anouk.

Colin
Colin
6 years ago
Reply to  Ari

Yeah, that song was horendous! Much worse than Rolandz. Back then, I didn’t use number ratings, but it sits at the rock bottom of my list. Numerically speaking, probably a 1/10, maybe a 2. Anouk definitely reborn Netherlands as the quality country on ESC. Not a fan of Trintje’s song, though, but sure it was much better than the ’09 drivel.

Ari
Ari
6 years ago
Reply to  Colin

Too bad about here. Yes, her song was not that good but she could have qualified, had she simply performed it like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JO1cqzPWrVI