The Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — continues to rate and review the songs competing in the andra chansen round of Sweden’s Melodifestivalen 2019. Next up, we listen to Mello legend Andreas Johnson with “Army of Us”. Are we ready to fight for him? Read on to find out!
Andreas Johnson – “Army of Us”
“Army of Us” reviews
Antranig: I’m pretty sure this song has been performed at Melfest in each of the last seven years. The song is incredibly generic, the lyrics are horrendous and the staging is basic. Yet for some reason, I absolutely love it. Andreas is the wow factor here — his charisma and stage presence make this magical. His vocal range moves skilfully between high and low notes and he turns what should be an awful song into an enjoyable one.
Score: 7.5/10
Angus: The studio version took me to high heaven but the live version brought me crashing back down to earth. Andreas doesn’t look like he wants to be there, hunches over like he has cramps and at times – which is hard in a competition that allows recorded backing vocals – he didn’t sound great either. “Army Of Us” has the potential to be a big Coldplay stadium anthem, but the semi-final performance left me cold. The past two times Andreas was at Andra Chansen he didn’t survive the duels and I don’t expect that to change this year.
Score: 4.5/10
Luis: Andreas seemed to be having some problems during his performance — he looked a bit uncomfortable. That’s not a good thing, given how generic and forgettable his song is. If only he could kill the performance and give it all… But nothing really was connecting, nothing was fully working in the end. I would rather skip military service for this army he’s building.
Score: 4/10
Cinan: The live performance is much much better than the studio version. When I’ve listened to the studio version, I got really bored, but the live version made me to dance and sing along, like I was there in the audience. It’s a good song — nothing special, of course — but the live performance makes it special.
Score: 7.5/10
Florian: Andreas Johnson is an experienced performer, as one can clearly see with “Army of Us” once more. The song itself feels familiar. While that isn’t bad, I do think there could’ve been a little more creativity in the production process. He does deliver a good live performance, which is part of why the song works well enough.
Score: 5/10
Ron: Andreas Johnson is back and so is his famous sound. Nothing really new here, but his great delivery and stage presence are making it a quite nice act. This song is anthemic, it has a great production and it fits perfectly to the Melfest arena(s). “Army of Us” sounds like a well known hit we have heard before and it leaves you with a good feeling at the end.
Score: 7.5/10
In our Melodifestivalen Wiwi Jury, we have 12 jurors but only room for 6 reviews. The rest of our scores can be found below:
| Anthony: 7.5/10
Bernardo: 6/10 Deban: 6.5/10 |
Lucy: 2/10
Robyn: 6/10 Tobias: 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 2 and a high of 7.5.
Army of Us – It’s solid, but a bit outdated and not as striking. I’ll admit it’s pleasant to listen to, but I don’t see this being an impactful entry. – 6/10
Andreas always gives quality. But this won’t get through. It’s ordinary. Not exceptional.
It is an ok song. Nothing more nothing less… It is just bland.
Andreas has given us seven quality entries. He deserves respect. I think it is good enough to warrant a place in the final.
I’m never that negative about mello songs but this for me is one of the worst songs this year. It’s uplifting and the interaction with the backing singers on stage is nice but this definitely did not deserve to make AC over the likes of Tempo and I love it. He only made it because of his name not his song
4/10
I have mixed feelings here. I like the song a lot. Yeah nothing original, but still uplifting. The problem here for me is Andreas. He looks to much like an star from a past era who don’t face his age. For me, it’s a bit cringy how he looks like a singing Maradona…
Not intended to get any further. It’s just AC fodder. Gives Andreas a bit of a run-out. Next!