Love him or hate him, you always remember Milan Stankovic. Since winning the right to represent Serbia at Eurovision on March 13, the 22-year old has inspired shock and awe in equal measure. Fans praise his energy and have dubbed him the next Placido Domingo. Critics deem his voice feeble and compare him to a [...]
Every year aspiring pop stars from Armenia to Albania pull out their English language dictionaries, cast their mother tongues aside and write lyrics they hope will appeal to English-speaking audiences. Fair enough: what’s the last Romanian single you heard on the radio? Unfortunately, many end up singing in “Eurovision English”—that frequently incomprehensible dialect characterized by [...]
Let’s be honest: the Eurovision song factory produces a lot of crap. The pressure to transcend borders compels artists to take any old cliché and sing about it in English—regardless of their proficiency. The result is usually three minutes of meaningless gibberish set to an electro-pop beat. But every now and then, a Eurovision artist [...]
It reads like a farfetched screenplay. Born in Colombia, 23-year old Jurgis Didziulis journeys to Lithuania — his grandparents’ homeland — and takes refuge in the Vilnius club scene. He forms a band. He marries an Irish pop singer. He releases two albums and becomes a regular on MTV (in the Baltic Republics, anyway). In [...]
Quick: name a charismatic Belgian. If you’re struggling to answer, then you understand the dilemma of 23-year old Tom Dice. The young Belgian certainly has talent: his voice soars on his Eurovision entry Me and My Guitar. But talent alone does not a Eurovision star make. Dice lacks the arrogance, flamboyance and showmanship that characterize [...]
Slighty sweet and fleshy, the apricot works well in summer fruit salads and as a purée on pancakes. For Armenians, however, it also stirs national pride. Known by scientists as prunus armeniaca, the fruit is thought to have originated in Armenia and, over time, it became a symbol of the nation. Recommend on Facebook Share [...]