Wiwi Jury: Ukraine’s SunSay with “Love Manifest”

Ukraine’s national selection for Eurovision 2016 will come to a glittering end on February 21. In the meantime the Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — has been listening to and reviewing all of the songs that qualified from the semi-finals. Today we turn to SunSay with his song “Love Manifest”. Are we feeling the sun and the love? Or has he just left us with a bad sunburn? Read on to find out!

SUNSAY – “LOVE MANIFEST”

“LOVE MANIFEST” REVIEWS

Mikhail: This sounds contemporary and very effective. I really like SunSay’s voice, it has some appeal in it. He is giving us a lot of energy and this energy reaches the audience. When he was performing I instantly forgot about all the previous acts in the semi-final. A great joyful entry.

Score: 8.5/10

William: He doesn’t sing — he has sex with the audience! Those vocals are so deep, resonant and enticing. It’s enough to make me slip off my chair. The first minute of this had me worried it would be bland and monotonous, but then that funky beat kicked in along with that wall of sound. This lacks the emotional depth of some of the other finalists — aka, Jamala and The Hardkiss — but SunSay is a proper performer who knows how to elevate his material.

Score: 7/10

Deban: As I turn down the volume dial, “Love Manifest” still manages to sound loud. The production elements here are good, but overall, lacking in cohesion. The “love love love is the only way” refrain grates after a while. Three minutes in, I felt like I was chanting a march song for psychotics.

Score: 3.5/10

Josh: When the semi-final of the Ukraine selection happened, it was 4am for me and I valued my sleep much more at the time. When I learned that “Love Manifest” garnered most of the votes in this semi final, I had such high expectations. Upon listening, the song does fall a little flat for me but it’s by far one of the better songs in the selection. The electro-funk sound is really nice. The gospel backing vocalists are amazing and add so much ambience to the song. It’s a decent entry!

Score: 7/10

Robyn: I love this song. I think it’s the combination of funk with modern electronic sounds that really works for me. Every time the song threatens to turn into a tired funk song (pretty much the national genre of my country), the electronica hauls it back into 2016. I love the anthemic feel to the song, like a giant musical hug. I’d be happy to see this in Stockholm.

Score: 8.5/10

Luis: That chorus is a big let-down. I’m feeling pretty much of the song, but I feel as it never takes off. It builds, builds, and builds and then there’s a topical chorus with an unnecessary falsetto. In a way, it reminds me of Justs, from Latvia’s Supernova, with the only difference that “Heartbeat” is much stronger, and hence, if both songs are selected (which is perfectly plausible if we look at the votes), the Latvian will probably outpace him.

Score: 7.5/10

Antranig: The beat in the background at the start of this song is really promising. Sadly I don’t think the rest of the song lives up to it. He can sing but the chorus is horrible and I can’t find anything truly special about the song. After watching it, I’m wondering how on earth it amassed over 50% of the televote in its semi-final.

Score: 4/10

Denise: I prefer the versus over the chorus. It’s only one sentence he keeps singing all the time. His voice is good and it seems that he’s enjoying the performance. Now we only need a way better chorus without the ‘yeah’.

Score: 6/10

“LOVE MANIFEST” SCORES

Patrick: 2/10

Sopon: 1/10

William C.: 7.5/10

The highest and lowest scores are removed before calculating the final score. We have dropped a low of 1 and a high of 8.5.

WIWI JURY VERDICT: 5.89/10

FOR OUR LIST OF UKRAINE 2016 RANKINGS, CLICK HERE

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