The Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — is in Romania, listening to the 12 semi-finalists of Selectia Nationala 2016. They’re now turning their attention to last year’s third place finisher Ovidiu Anton. He’s on his fifth attempt to win the Romanian contest with “Moment of Silence”. Will our jury be silenced by the song or will they give Ovidiu the silent treatment? Let’s find out!
Ovidiu Anton – “Moment of Silence”
Ovidiu Anton – “Moment Of Silence” reviews
Antranig: Ovidiu’s vocals are impeccable and “Moment of Silence” has a composition that is nothing short of epic. The verses are a lot better than the chorus, but the product feels complete. When you consider the mediocrity of most of this national selection, this really stands out and would have no problem maintaining Romania’s perfect qualification record.
Score: 8.5/10
Bogdan: Unquestionably Ovidiu’s best effort to date to win Selectia Nationala, “Moment of Silence” is a majestic call to arms against the establishment in the aftermath of tragedy. It’s a somber tone for Eurovision, but these are the times we live in. Ovidiu doesn’t want to ignore them and I for one applaud him for that.
Score: 8.5/10
Deban: Stuff happens, I get that! However, artistic interpretation of social and political issues shouldn’t be excused from quality control. The “fight for the truth” refrain is so overblown, it almost sounds like a caricature. Context is also important. If “Moment of Silence” was a fringe theatre number, I’d appreciate Ovidiu’s efforts – but no, this is fighting for a spot at the world’s biggest music stage. It’s just not good enough.
Score: 4/10
Luis: “Moment of silence”. Even the title is dramatic. How big, how anthemic and how trascendental this song sounds! It’s apotheotic, all paired with Ovidiu’s rich and intense vocals. And now, let me break this climax: I’m not feeling it. In all its magnificence, this song is too excessive for my liking. I fail to connect with it.
Score: 5/10
Robyn: I wasn’t going to describe this as a guilty pleasure, but no – it’s just a pleasure. “Moment of Silence” is packed full of drama, a cross between a stirring song from a musical and a bold metal anthem. Ovidiu puts everything into his vocals, and even the guitar solo fits perfectly. The relentless energy delivers great emotional heft.
Score: 8/10
William: It’s like an opera singer just joined Metallica — and I’m not sure I can deal with it. His darkest night is clearly very dark, but I think he should see a therapist rather than getting so OTT in this song. Opera could work for him, but pop? No. PS: This is Romania, not Albania, please ditch the electric guitar.
Score: 4.5/10
In the Romanian Wiwi Jury we have 12 Jurors, but only space for 6 reviews. The remaining scores are below:
Dayana: 4/10
Denise: 5/10
Edd: 5.5/10
Patrick: 5/10
Ramadan: 4/10
Sami: 6/10
The highest and lowest scores are removed before calculating the final score. We have dropped a low of 4 and a high of 8.5.
Wiwi Jury Score: 5.55/10
The semi-final of Selectia Nationala 2016 will take place on 4 March in Baia Mare. An expert jury will select four songs to advance to the final, while televoters will save two more acts. The winner will be chosen by 100% televote on 6 March.
Do you agree with Wiwi Jury? What do you think about “Moment of Silence”? By the way, don’t forget you can vote for it in our Romania 2016 poll!
For our list of Romania 2016 rankings, click here
For more Eurovision Romania news, click here
Photo: Facebook
Amazing, much better that the stupid and basic nai nai
This is a beautiful song, best of Romania. I am not surprised that you do’nt feel the strong message of this song because you do’nt live as we live here. Mihai’s song is more older and cheaper than this. What is the message of Mihai’s song?He talks about aliens wtf. Sorry but Ovidiu is the best and he will win!
This is a great song! I hope it wins.
William, what does this have to do with opera singing??? This is a powerful rock ballad, period. Are Klaus Meine or Jaes Hatfield opera singers?lol
This man can sing, this doesn t mean that he wants to combine opera or pop with this rock song.
Its not that there isn’t a place for Rock or Metal at Eurovision it’s just that much harder going in with those genres. You have to be amazing like Finland 2006 or Turkey 2010.
This however is just cheap, like a cross between Belarus 2009 and Lithuania 2008.
Wiwi jury has ranked Iceland entry so high last year and it even didn’t qualify.
However i agree with them with this song, it’s sounds very dated like an entry FiK
@WTF
Wtf? (You see what I did there?) Who says Spain is my favourite? I like the song, but that is mostly because of the beat and rhythm. Moment of silence is for me just too dramatic and qualitywise also pretty bad. I am open for different styles, but not what Ovidiu is trying to do.
And, once again, the wiwi jury show their absolute incompetence in ranking correctly an entry.
This is a true masterpiece! Eurovision hasn’t met symphonic rock before – specially a song that wouldn’t be misplaced in a decent Dragonforce/Rhapsody of Fire album as a ballad. Ovidiu Anton has clearly put a lot of effort in this song, and I’m confident he will win it this time.
Wiwi Jury ranked the “Nai Nai” song very high, that speaks volumes about what they think “good music” is.
@DenizNL: Unlike the Spanish entry, which is the epitome of quality music, right?
@William Adams: Yeah, cause this is exactly how Metallica sounds like… Good grief…
I am from Romania and I hope this won’t win our selection. It is too over the top and in poor taste, when it comes to the lyrics / theme. It simply does not belong on the Eurovision stage. Just, no!
@ Bogdan Honciuc: chiar crezi, pe bune, ca piesa asta pote obtine un rezultat bun la Stockholm?! Dincolo de gusturile personale (al meu si al tau).
Hey guys! This is a power ballad. If you had listened to some Metal you’d find it’s similar to some other acts like Edguy, some of the early Avantasia stuff or Pathfinder.
For me, it’s a nice song, maybe it doesn’t suit Eurovision but, it its genre it’s actually a good song. It just remembers me a little bit of this other song. >^^<
You judge
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgd_hSzutFE
Oh Robyn, you SHOULD feel guilty. =P
Please don’t be surprised when wiwijury’s favourite “Nai Nai” will be placed in bottom 3-4 songs in the national semifinal. Someone from your jury said that it should be the anthem of Romania. LOL, having no clue about Romania at its best. True that the selection this year is one of the worst in the history of Romanian participation to ESC. Year after year more singers and songwriters, in my perception, disengage from Eurovision which is not a good thing. If this continues hope we withdraw before making a fool of ourselves like UK does each year. Saying this “Moments… Read more »
That’s one of my favorites. 9/10 from me.
I agree with the wiwijury. This isn’t quality music, this is music you would find in a bad animated Disney-movie when the Villain comes. But I do think they are going to pick it.
Oh, I’ve lost the fate in jury reviews after Mikael Saari from Finland got 6/10. This is an absolute best choice for Romania and who knows, maybe they pick it.
Wiwi jury is for songs what Rotten Tomatoes is for movies; if the score is less than 3 (30% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes), then it’s the reason to worry, 3-5 (30-50%) means average, 5-6 (50-60%) means well, 6-7 (60-70%) means really good and everything above means the song is an absolute hit.
Excuse me, when Wiwibloggs Jurors are putting ‘Nai nai’ in the first place in Selectia Nationala and are giving Ovidiu’s a rating of 5.5… are we talking about music here?! Now I’m curious what grades did you give to ‘Grande Amore’ last year, I’m tempted to say that you wouldn’t have put it into the final of Eurovision. Anyway, Ovidiu will win with this in Romania and we’ll see after the grand contest in Stockholm how of ‘experts’ you are. I’m sorry, but this could me the last article from Wiwibloggs read by me, this site seems to be more… Read more »