February is upon us and Estonia’s national selection for Eurovision is approaching faster than a backing dancer in heat. So the Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — continues reviewing the songs competing in Eesti Laul 2017. Next up is Angeelia with “We Ride With Our Flow”. Did we want to ride along with her? Read on to find out!
Angeelia – “We Ride With Our Flow”
“We Ride With Our Flow” reviews
William: Such a mysterious and gripping opening! And that makes the mess that follows all the more disappointing. This is disjointed, confusing and inconsistent, as if producer and songwriter wanted to go for everything…. resulting in a whole lot of nothing. She has a lovely voice and there are some nice ideas here. But throwing all the ingredients into the sink inevitably results in something a bit off.
Score: 5/10
Mikhail: The song begins beautifully, drawing you straight into its mysterious universe. These three minutes take the listener on a journey and you never know when the next turning point will come. It creates a paradise in your mind and it does not let you step away. Simply charming.
Score: 8.5/10
Robyn: Oh, that old feeling, the moment when you realise that while this is a great song, it would be lousy for Eurovision. I love “We Ride With Our Flow” as a piece of music. It’s dreamy, cool and so intriguing. But it’s not engaging enough to be a Eurovision entry. There’s a lot going on, but only in very subtle ways. A successful Eurovision entry needs to be more full-on, more forthright. But regardless of Eurovision, Angeelia has still given us a good song.
Score: 7/10
Matt: This song has a tribal feel about it and has some darkness but it’s like a flat soda — it has no pop. I was expecting this one to wow me but I’m not on board — this might not qualify to the final.
Score: 6/10
Antranig: Talk about an endless plateau. I want a song to take me on an adventure, yet this song never gets out of first gear. If you are after hills and valleys, this will give you nothing more than a few speed bumps. On the flip side, Angeelia has a very gripping voice and I want to hear more — but preferably more of something else.
Score: 3/10
Chris: I’m going to take you on my journey with this song in 30 second intervals. Those first 30 seconds? Interesting, dark, I want to see where it all goes. A minute in: the song needs to do something. When we reach 90 seconds in, I’m bored. Such amazing promise with a strong singer in Angeelia — yet the song completely loses its way. Why that piano appears, I have no idea. Maybe the staging will be incredible and save this.
Score: 5/10
Natalie: Angeelia has a lot of self-assurance in her delivery of this song, and it’s great to see as her voice really is so beautiful and suits the song well. The production is also very well put together and it’s clear there is a lot of intelligence and poise behind it. But ultimately it’s too disjointed. I’d like this to do well, but feel more could’ve been done to string it all together.
Score: 7/10
Zakaria: I got distracted by so many things around me while listening to this song, so I had to listen to it again and now I understand why: it fails to catch my attention. The song is certainly interesting. But it’s too plain and doesn’t evolve from where it starts. In other words, not Eurovision-friendly as it needs to be engaging and striking enough to get the viewers to vote.
Score: 5/10
In our Eesti Laul Wiwi Jury, we have 20 jurors but only room for 8 reviews. The rest of our scores can be found below:
Anthony: 5/10
Bernardo: 8/10
Dayana: 7.5/10
Edd: 2/10
Forrest: 3/10
Jason: 6.5/10
Josh: 4.5/10
Kristin: 6/10
Luis: 7/10
Patrick: 5.5/10
Sami: 5/10
Steinunn: 8/10
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 2 and a high of 8.
I find this song very nice and interesting! I wish it to win the whole Estonian selection.
@Zebb: Yes I agree with you too 🙂 When you wrote “two Choruses,” I began to really think about the structure of this song. Here goes my musical analysis… [feel free to laugh] The first Verse (V1) consists of two repeated phrases alternating between F-sharp Major and E Major. Then we get a descending phrase that sounds like a Chorus (“we ride with our, ou-our, ou-our, flow-oh-oh-ohhh”), except that this phrase then leads into a second Verse. So it’s a Small Bridge, technically (SB1). The second Verse (V2) is similar to V1 but with an added background beat. This leads… Read more »
I’m sighing so far, because I see little place for this type of music in ESC. Moreover, semi-final 2 has got two pre-leaders so far and I’m also rooting for Verona for some reason. Still, diversity is often a key, so I feel this can be a dark-horse. Personally it’s my favourite and I agree with most of what Purple Mask have said about it. Also I feel that ‘chorus’ isn’t enough for me and it’s all about that. She dissolves in the sound there – it’s smart, but it reduces potential when she repeats same notes all over the… Read more »
Erm..you said ‘The low of a 2 and the high of an 8’..but Mikhail gave it an 8.5?
I take my opinion back, this is a song you need to get used to. I hated it, but now I like it.
The intro is beautiful and the girl has an also beautiful voice. The song seems to start well but at the end I’m lost. I can’t listen to a particular pattern. It’s like a mess. Not a fan.
Too weird. It’s “Three Minutes to Earth” except it never gets there. It gets kudos for trying something creative, but it’s just too inaccessible for Eurovision.
At first I didn’t pay attention to this song, but now that I listen to it another time I like it. I can understand what you say about being plain, but her voice and the music bring inner peace to me, mostly at the start when the melody is slower, so I don’t need more. Overall, I feel this song very captivating. Maybe it won’t get the attention of the viewers in three minutes amongst other 40 songs, but I think the juries would like it.
8’5/10
I really like this one. It’s so unique, filled with rich harmonies, beat-skipping, changes in arrangements (even in the middle of the song) and Angeelia’s beautiful multi-layered voice. This song takes Mick Pedaja and NOEB’s influence and transforms it into a more complex crystalline jewel. There’s no doubt that this is my personal favourite in Eesti Laul this year, and there’s no doubt that it will go over some other people’s heads – that’s really unfortunate. I’d love it to do well, but realistically it might not qualify for the final, and that makes me sad for this wonderful song.
BEST SONG ALONG with KERLI in eesti laul this year ,i was expecting for u wiwi guys to underrated since some of you have an awful taste in music lol sorry not sorry lol
She was the biggest disappointment for me. Fantastic graphics, divine looks… and then that trash excuse for a song. It sounds like some preteen stoner’s first GarageBand work. Not a chance at qualifying for the Laul final, anyway.
Best song of Eesti Laul 2017, very underrated.. just like Mick Pedaja last year