Less than ten hours following the press conference announcing the eight finalists for Vidbir 2022, Ukraine’s Eurovision 2022 selection, Suspilne has announced that it had to disqualify LAUD. This follows the discovery that his songwriter had published the song online in 2018. Barleben will replace him.
LAUD planned to enter the selection with “Head Under Water”, written by Dutch singer-songwriter Daniël Boting. Boting uploaded a live acoustic version of the song onto YouTube in July 2018. Although the video of the song only had a few hundred views, that was enough for LAUD to get disqualified in the selection.
LAUD disqualified from Vidbir 2022, replaced by Barleben
Suspilne announced the news through its Instagram page, writing:
“The organisation committee of the national selection for Eurovision has taken the decision on the termination of the participation of LAUD in the selection, as it was revealed that the submitted song – Head Under Water – was published in 2018, directly against the rules.”
“The organisation committee of the national selection conducted additional research, in which it was confirmed that the song Head Under Water was published by its author Daniël Boting on his personal YouTube channel in 2018.”
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LAUD rose to fame through his earlier participations in Vidbir. In 2022, he planned to enter with the song “Head Under Water”, which he released as one of the tracks on his debut album DUAL last year.
Barleben, a soul singer from the Zhytomyr Oblast, took LAUD’s place. Oleksandr Barleben gave up his job in Ukraine’s SBU to become a singer and a public persona in general. Later he auditioned for both X Factor and Holos krainy, but did not make it far in either competition. He is set to sing “Hear My Words”.
What do you think about this development? How do you feel after Suspilne disqualified LAUD? Let us know in the comments down below!
Still, Ukraine’s participants show immense creativity on the Eurovision stage.
Didn’t Duncan Laurence break the same rule and he still got to participate?
He uploaded a demo of “Arcade” in an online sharing site, for which Anouk was able to hear it and recommended him to have it submitted to the broadcaster. It was, as it is a demo, a completely unfinished piece of work. The difference here, especially in this case, “Head Over Water” already has a finished production and a filmed MV of it has already been uploaded publicly on the songwriter’s personal YouTube channel. That’s a huge contrast to the performance of an earlier live version of “Arcade” that was recorded by someone not connected to him while performing to… Read more »
Ilse de Lange*
Not Anouk.
Thanks for the correction. I was fresh off reading the recent news about Duncan’s recent TV gig that got canceled following an expose BTS and Anouk was in the same season as him as coaches (if I recall).
A friendly reminder that as of 2021, Ukraine is the only country to have never been eliminated in a semi final, and undoubtedly has one of the best win to participation ratios with 2 wins for 17 participations.
I just genuinely hope to see any Ukrainian representative in Turin this May. Y’all know what I mean.
Hahaha, oh well
To be honest, his song was not that great anyway.
Guess his new favorite show is Dead to Me…
And How to Get Away with Murder.
If only he was Jamala…
Vidbir is turning out to be a disappointing mess this year. All the better entries ended up being disqualified or just not included, which is sad. I feel bad for LAUD.
Still, I think it’d be crazy to say Ukraine can go NQ this year, but it’d suck if that happens.
Guys, I was drunk, sorry 🙁
Seriously… What a lo lousy selection this is turning out to be… Or maybe they are just making it dead easy for Roxolana to win this as every other song that could take up the battle for the victory isnt included or get disqualified. ERIA, LAUD and ANTSY were all better than what is in this final yet…
Tbh Eria’s song was overtly repetitive
With Roxolanas entry , this is one of the songs for me that I would love to hear it live and not judge it beforehand.
do not forget about Alina Pash. She is very popular in Ukraine
Not only in Ukraine, as a German guy with 0 knowledge of the Ukrainian language, I have to admit that I have all of her songs in my playlists. Anyone that heard ‘Witch’ has to admit that she is one of the best and creative singers out there rn.
I feel bad for Laud but I hope the replacement song is better than his.
Barleben is a joke! 🙁
LAUD more like FRAUD !
This made me laugh. 🙂
There’s some bangers in the Moldovan selection. Where’s the article about this? 🙂
It’ll probably come up soon maybe later today or tomorrow
Have you heard the songs? There are some quality entries. Moldova is doing its homework.
I watched a recap of all the songs on YouTube. I’m kind of surprised. It Seems a little better than Romania’s lineup. There are a couple songs that stand out to me that I would like to listen to in full.
All of them are in full on the broadcaster’s website and a few are on YouTube. Already added to my never ending Eurovision playlist. 🙂
And exactly what I thought. 3-5 of these could eat all 46 from Romania for breakfast.
The little brother is surpassing the big brother
Perfectly said. 🙂
Cyprus-Greece realness
România Mea is better than pretty any song at any national final this year
You mean “Malere”?
no,lele was the best song and i think malere (also at first a no qualifier like lele!) is a little bit better too but i have this song on place 3. 🙂
btw.i see romania mea as the big favorite in romania if they want a winnersong with a balkan soul because malere is maybe a little bit too strange for the average taste.
yeah – katy rain with the song “lele” is in.
🙂
MissCatyLove is coming to slay /s
Eh, always some mess in ukraine :/
It’s not an Ukrainian selection without at least one thing going wrong
I don’t know who to be mad at in the situation. The broadcaster for not doing their research properly Or the songwriter stupid enough to send a song he had already uploaded years ago For the selection?
Blame it on the broadcaster and the artist. The songwriter, probably, didn’t intend for ESC and just sold to whoever wanted to buy. It’s LAUD’s job to know the rules of contest he’s participating in.