The Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — continues to rate and review the competing songs in Estonia‘s national final Eesti Laul 2019. Next up, we take a look at Kaia Tamm with “Wo sind die Katzen?” and Idol alum Kerli Kivilaan with “Cold Love”. Did we have love for either of these songs? Read on to find out!
Kaia Tamm – “Wo sind die Katzen?”
“Wo sind die Katzen?” reviews
Angus:“Wo sind die Katzen?” takes you back in time to 1989, but dodges the danger of sounding dated. It apes all the best bits of ’80s production, without being weighed down by them. Instead it is a smart, fun and alternative slice of electropop, the kind of which Eesti Laul is well known for. Some people might view it as a novelty entry, but those people would be wrong. This is a strong entry in this year’s Eesti and the string-led bridge is the icing on the cake.
Score: 8.5/10
Bernardo: Hmmm. Hmmm. Cats, yes. Hmmm. Hmmm. No to the rest. This makes “Cake to Bake” an anthem. Nothing to seriously judge here.
Score: 1/10
Jordi: This is hilariously… random. Yet, it managed to leave me speechless somehow. Leaving aside the fun fact about cats and furries – which are adorable – the song itself is very cringe. The base is poorly produced and her voice doesn’t sound natural whatsoever, plus, this is as flat as a flannel cake. A part of me really wants to enjoy this, but I ended up thanking her for her offering, and pressing next.
Score: 3/10
Luis: Finally someone doing camp properly! A common trend in this year’s national selections is that novelty acts get boring halfway through, something that luckily doesn’t happen in “Wo sind die Katzen?”. From the moment you read the title, you know where this is going. It’s entertaining, it’s harmless, and it’s slightly extra. This deserves to have a place at Eesti Laul’s final.
Score: 6/10
Oliver: My eyes were fixed upon my computer screen for the entire duration of this song trying to comprehend what on earth I was witnessing. It is crazy. It is ludicrous. It is fantastic. One might say that it just repeating a hark of a crazy cat lady for three minutes, but that is what makes it just so loveable. It’s something quirky, something bizarre and something wacky to give one a moment’s respite from all things serious
Score: 10/10
Sebastian: A sickening starting beat cannot rescue this dated, obviously joke track. And while I’m all for versatility and weirdness at Eurovision, this is bonkers – but ultimately dull. It’s the kind of crazy I can look away from, which ultimately does not match up to previous ‘bonkers’ similar entries like The Hungry Hearts or Verka Serduchka.
Score: 3/10
In our Eesti Laul Wiwi Jury, we have 18 jurors but only room for 6 reviews. The rest of our scores can be found below:
Antranig: 8/10
Barnabas: 1.5 Deban: 1.5/10 Florian: 7/10 Julian: 2/10 Lucy: 1/10 |
Lukas: 4/10
Natalie: 3/10 Pablo: 2/10 Robyn: 5.5/10 Steinunn: 8/10 William: 4/10 |
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 1 and a high of 10.
Wiwi Jury Verdict: 4.25/10
Kerli Kivilaan – “Cold Love”
“Cold Love” reviews
Angus: Fans may have hoped for another Kerli, but on the contrary “Cold Love” shows this is the Kerli we deserve and need right now. Not all “f*ck you” anthems need to throw a drink in a person’s face: hard-hitting lyrics and a killer vocal can do that work for you. Kerli holds a mirror up to whoever did her wrong, shreds their character and walks off into the sunset. And with “Cold Love”, she might walk off with a ticket to Eurovision too.
Score: 8/10
Bernardo: The first ten seconds of “Cold Love” are very promising. Kerli’s vocals are exposed with almost no instrumental, but what is supposed to build into a feel-good mid-tempo song never delivers. Not even the captivating clear vocals from Kerli make this interesting. Thank you, next.
Score: 4.5/10
Jordi: Rooted in easy-listening and light arrangements, Kerli’s “Cold Love” is pure pop, with excellence filled with an infectious looped beat that somehow manages to keep flowing all song long. What really engages here as well is her voice: unique in tone and meaningful when sung. Yet the emotion is felt behind her words. On the other hand, in terms of competitiveness, it still feels a bit bland yet slightly generic. I am nevertheless, looking forward to seeing the presentation in the big stage.
Score: 6/10
Luis: “Cold Love” has several great ingredients to form an excellent song. It’s got brilliant lyrics, a fantastic voice and an original opening. However, it needs to lose some elements which disturb the song: particularly the raw synth sounds in the end, which lower the quality of the overall production. Still, Kerli Kivilaan serves one of the best dishes in this year’s Eesti Laul low-sodium menu.
Score: 7.5/10
Oliver: Kerli’s vocals are definitely the highlight of this entry, however, for a song competition, all things have to work in order to have a solid and credible entry. The three minutes felt like forever as there was little to no variation in the instrumentation and dynamics of the song. I don’t see this grabbing many voters’ attention unless something extraordinary occurs on stage.
Score: 4/10
Sebastian: Stripped back and raw, “Cold Love” showcases the Kerli’s vocal talent in an easy, breezy lounge track. And while it’s the kind of track you want to listen to on a Sunday morning late brunch, it’s not really the kind of song you’d think to hear or see in a Eurovision stage. It’s ultimately low impact and forgettable.
Score: 5/10
In our Eesti Laul Wiwi Jury, we have 18 jurors but only room for 6 reviews. The rest of our scores can be found below:
Antranig: 5.5/10
Barnabas: 5/10 Deban: 6/10 Florian: 6/10 Julian: 3.5/10 Lucy: 8/10 |
Lukas: 6/10
Natalie: 8/10 Pablo: 3/10 Robyn: 6/10 Steinunn: 6.5/10 William: 6/10 |
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 3 and a high of 8.
Regardless of what they select in Estonia, I’ll be listening “Wo sind die Katzen” afterwards. Probably not the other songs in this selection.
“Cold love” is good, but doesn’t stand out. As for the other one, I’m not even going to comment on that. I don’t like it at all.
Did everybody catch the reference to Rockefeller Street in the music video for Wo sind die Katzen??
From hilarious to stone cold serious. This is why I love Eesti Laul – it has such a diverse selection. 🙂 I like both for different reasons. Kaia Tamm’s “Wo sind die katzen?” is how to do a novelty track really well. It can come across as an “adult stimulation” track, but I’m hoping that this is the secret point of the song. With or without that element, it is still hilarious, and brilliant. 🙂 Kerli Kivilaan’s video is perfectly delivered as a single piece to camera and, as such, should probably get a music video award nomination. However, the… Read more »
Have to admit….I kinda want to know where those cats are.
Es gibt keine Alligatoren dieses Jahr, darum bin ich für den Katzen! 😉
As “Wo sind die Katzen?” is entirely in German, it was great to read the votings of the German wiwibloggers here: One loves it, the other hates it 😀 I would say, we have very special lyrics here, which are really funny if you understand German. So I like it. But if you don’t understand German, it is indeed a problem to like it…
It would definitely be interesting to have a song like that on the Eurovision stage and after hearing it for the first time I could barely get it out of my head again… it’s memorable for sure!
“Wo sind die Katzen” is an amazing song. It is by far this years “Laika” and would definitely become an instant Euroclub classic if chosen to represent Estonia. There hasn’t been a great novelty entry for ages now and it’s about time there is one again for sure 🙂 To me it’s an 8/10 song as I find everything with it joyable. ” Cold love” is nice but forgettable…. Massive risk for Estonia not qualifying.
Wo sind die Katzen? would be perfect for Latvia, which has no good songs, but Estonia should let it rot in the semi-final since they have Slayvide puu. Cold Love is mere elevator music.
but Soovide puu is elevator new age tbh
My original notes on Kaia Tamm:
“lol”
Cold love is not memorable. Her voice is nice, but the song doesn’t leave an impact.
Wo sind die katzen was fun few listena. But it gets boring after few times. It’s repeative.
Wo sind die Katzen? – WTH is this and WTH do I like it so much? It’s cheap and repetitive, yet very amusing. I actually wouldn’t mind hearing some German katz in Tel Aviv. It’s bean a few years since we had a proper joke entry on ESC. – 7.5/10
Cold Love – It’s pleasant. Kerli’s voice is lovely and it gives us nice three minutes. It’s not really impactful, though, and some of the lyrics are a bit odd choice (What would your momma say). – 6/10