Ahead of the second heat of Finland’s Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu (UMK) 2016, the Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — will review all the competing songs. Next up is Rafaela Truda with “Rise Up”. Was the song enough to get us up and dancing? Read on to find out.
Rafaela Truda – “Rise Up”
“Rise Up” reviews
Robyn: “Rise Up” sounds heavily influenced by Ariana Grande’s “Problem”, but to her credit, Rafaela can deliver both the Ariana and the Iggy parts. It’s a decent modern pop song, but it feels like it’s playing off someone else’s old ideas from 2014. Even the “Problem” mastermind Max Martin has moved on to new styles.
Score: 6/10
Antranig: Rafaela Truda is Ariana Grande, with the pleasant exception that she is actually talented. “Rise Up” would deliver what it promises and get all of Europe on its feet and dancing along. It’s the only song in semi-final two of UMK that I would like to see at Eurovision and it would surely do better than its Greek namesake. Let’s rise up tonight!
Score: 9.5/10
Edd: Let’s be honest – if this were sung by Ariana Grande it would be a worldwide smash. It’s not a well-written melody, nor is the hook very catchy. However, the delicious saxophone completely makes up for that, and makes it stand out. The chorus could do with having a more dense production to differentiate it from the verses – but that’s nothing that some of Rafaela’s swaggy dancing can’t disguise.
Score: 8.5/10
Sam: This, simply put, is just another overkill pop number that leads nowhere. Fun to listen to, but no impact on me whatsoever.
Score: 6/10
Luis: “Rafaela Truda, ha!” Amen, goodbye to this song. I’m seriously doubting this is a parody of 2014’s music scene. Such a blatant copy of the pop world of two years ago makes this entry cringy and unnecessary in UMK. Going to Eurovision means having high standards, not mimicking them.
Score: 2/10
Sinan: YAAAAAS, I LOVE THAT! I do not care that the song is like Ariana Grande’s “Problem”. I’m loving the music video, the choreography and the rap part. I hope she will bring a great live performance.
Score: 9/10
Kristin: Rafaela completely lost me in the very first second, with that agressive introduction: “Rafela Truda! Ha!” Tacky and unnecessary. And then the song started and it was all downhill from there. Girl, are you serious?! This is old and dated, and imitating famous paintings randomly in the video, only gives it a major cringe. It’s a big, fat no from me.
Score: 2/10
Max: I have one major problem with this song, and my fellow wiwibloggers are tiptoeing around it — it’s an Ariana rip-off. Rafaela and her song have flair and energy, but there is ultimately no getting away from the fact that this is shoplifted sass. Personally, I’d rather listen to the original.
Score: 4/10
In the Finnish Wiwi Jury we have 16 jurors but only have room for 8 reviews. The remaining eight scores are below!
Maria: 5/10
Josh: 6/10
Ramadan: 5/10
Denise: 8/10
Bernardo: 6/10
Dayana: 6/10
Cristian: 6/10
Mario: 5.5/10
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 2 and a high of 9.5.
WIWI JURY SCORE: 5.93/10
FOR OUR LIST OF FINLAND 2016 RANKINGS, CLICK HERE
FOR MORE FINLAND EUROVISION NEWS, CLICK HERE
Photo: YLE
Rip off are always abundant at envision. From the Icelandic wiggles of pollapunk to the Britney Spears like performances of the 2000s. Current music trend will always dominate Eurovision. Not because the writers and performers are lazy but because people are comfortable with something familiar.
rafela might be ripping Ariana but she doing it perfectly and adding her own flair to the mix. I see this qualifying but there are other great song in the mix at umk. It’s a definite top 5
You guys would actually want this to win if it got entered in Melfest instead of UMK but after Finland not qualifying with PKN, I think Rafaela may be Finland’s saving grace back into the finals especially if they still want to wow Europe with a genre that has never been performed in Eurovision before – because lets face it, Rafaela can definitely sing and rap at the same time and still slay it. Say all you want about it being an Ariana Grande rip off but remember that Ariana is also seen as a Mariah Carey rip off so… Read more »
Plain awful.
3/10
9-10 to every possible piece of recycled pop that gets entered into this contest, well done, Antranig…
“Even the “Problem” mastermind Max Martin has moved on to new styles” … yeah by recycling Problem into Focus … in a very old familiar fashion that trademarked a lot of his 90s work … BSB, Britney … you see it’s far easier to repeat yourself than to come up with anything brand new … Apart from that, yes this too Ariana Grande’s Problem … but taking in consideration that Focus is a recycled version of Problem it would be hypocritical for Max Martin to even dare pointing this song as being a copy of his .. Problem or Focus… Read more »