It was showtime in Iceland. During semi-final 2 of Söngvakeppnin 2023 tonight, the nation chose the next two acts to qualify for the grand final. Four acts are now a lot closer to the golden ticket to Liverpool and a chance of representing Iceland in the Eurovision Song Contest 2023.
All of tonight’s contestants were newcomers to Söngvakeppnin but veterans elsewhere. We had pop, ballads and even rock-a-billy. Variety was the key in Reykjavík tonight.
The Icelandic nation did not quite agree with our poll results by sending Kristín Sesselja and Silja Rós & Kjalar to the finals. They had other ideas and chose Sigga Ózk and Langi Seli og Skuggarnir. And not just that. Celebs and “Dómsdagsdans” got the wild card, and will be the fifth song to compete in the finals.
Did you agree with Iceland´s choice tonight? Please comment your thoughts below.
Söngvakeppnin 2023: Semi-final 2
Competing acts
Five acts are competing in tonight’s show.
- Kristín Sesselja – “Óbyggðir”
- Langi Seli og Skuggarnir -” OK”
- Silja Rós & Kjalar – “Ég styð þína braut”
- Úlfar – “Betri maður”
- Sigga Ózk – “Gleyma þér og dansa”
As in semi-final 1, all songs had to be performed in Icelandic tonight. But the qualifying acts may change the language for the final next week, should they choose to do so.
What did you think of the show? Did you agree with Iceland´s choice tonight? Please comment your thoughts below.
I think you all have to accept that Langi Seli & Skuggarnir have decent chances to win on Saturday. As it seems they’ll be the only act performing in Icelandic in the final, as they’re the only act that hasn’t recorded their song in English. Iceland is a small country where the people are very conscious about their language. So much that it may decide who they’ll vote for. That may also be one of the reasons why Systur won a somewhat surprising victory last year. Of course, if they score low among the juries their winning chances will be… Read more »
with Silja Rós & Kjalar – “Ég styð þína braut” iceland has trown away a top12 place in liverpool – the song live on stage was on the level from norways 2015 duet.
Celebs got wild carded but
A: Wildcards don’t win, they get a pity slot
B: Their live was atrocious
For the life of me I don’t understand the reasoning behind having a wildcard in a final. How can a second choice song win a final when it wasn’t good enough to get through originally. The only chance it has is if they have an incredible performance and all the others are terrible. Very unlikely. The only other reason is to fill up a gap to have five acts. Not a good enough reason I’m afraid.
Two big factors – they might swap to English for the final (which can improve a song if that’s what it was originally written in), and it might be the sort of song that does well with the jury (Iceland SFs are pure Televote, GF is split).
It’s also worth noting that (if what I’ve read is accurate), then Celebs were two (2) votes away from qualifying in SF1 anyway – given that Songvakeppnin seems to get around 30k SF votes, that 0.0067% of voters could very easily flip or be gained on.
Doomsday Dance is the one song here I really prefer in English.
I’m not wild about these picks and the other songs just felt more like what I expect from Iceland. Sigga is cute, but while I like music from the 80s that doesn’t mean I want to dig through old Star Search episodes. I hope these finalists are weak enough that Celebs can still be a contender.
Bye bye Iceland, you lose all of my support.
Silja Ros’ song was so beautiful…
Anyway, now let’s focus on Sweden & Finland.
I remember how much I was downvoted when I claimed «the OK-song» would qualify some weeks ago 😉
Oh, dear Iceland, what are you doing?
At least Celeb got the wildcard. If they can’t win, then I’m hoping for Diljá to do it.
I would throw in Sigga as my top 3 with the two artists you mentioned as the ones I want to see represent Iceland for eurovision. But overall the pickings are very slim.
Sigga’s entry is charming, but I must say it feels a lot of years behind to my ears.
Aweful results. Iceland will flop this year. By far the 2 best entries were left in the semis…
Iceland really tries to be as middle of the road as they can, ha? Silja and Kjalar were pretty good tonight. Kristin could have been more interesting on stage, but her song was still very good, and she has a good voice. I can understand Sigga, as she was kinda cute, and full-on brought that throwback pop. But OK… really? Three minutes felt like eight. Their best chance are The Celebs now IF they can pull it together in the finals. Otherwise, I do hope that most of them keep it in Icelandic.
I agree. Kristin did fine vocally, but I felt nothing towards the song in live. It’s still a decent song. Silja & Kjalar were good. I understand that Iceland doesn’t want to be known as the land of harmonies in ballads two years in a row, but I still feel like OK song should have been last.
That I agree on. Good harmonies are precious, and Iceland is good at it. I just try to understand why they didn’t vote for them more, and thought that perhaps the local voters wanted something more uptempo this time around. When you look at it, all of the ballads are left in the semis, and qualifiers are mostly uptempo, with Bragi being slower or midtempo.
The Icelandic televote is just so random. Rooting for Celebs now, at least the lead singer is chanelling some Einar Örn Benediktsson. Whatever happened to Iceland, home of the Sugarcubes?
Really? The OK song?
I swear they always pick the one song that is only in Icelandic so that there’s at least one Icelandic language song in the final in case the other qualifiers choose English.
With Iceland you can never tell. In 2018 they sent Ari Ólafsson “Our Choice”, and the next year we got Hatari “Hatrið mun sigra”. Talk about going from one end to the complete opposite. XD
Langi Seli og Skuggarnir have the type of music thats loved across the older generations especially here, they were always going to qualify
Yes, Langi Sell and Skuggarmir to the final!
“Following the announcement of tonight’s qualifiers, a fifth wildcard finalist was announced from the non-qualifying semi-finalists. It has therefore been confirmed that “Dómsdagsdans” by Celebs will be joining the line-up for next Saturday’s Grand Final.”
Yes, yes, yes!!! Celebs, revamp your staging a little and you could win! Come on! Bring Iceland back to it’s glory days!
They haven’t ever really had glory days, but 2019 and 2021 were both top 10, and last year, no one game them a hope of qualifying and they did, and got a solid result on the Saturday with a great performance. But I don’t see a song that can do very well from this lot. There’s a reason no one is talking about Iceland. Celebs would be a bit embarrassing tbh.
Celebs definitely deserved that wildcard!
they’re the only of these acts i can see sailing through to the final in liverpool… fingers crossed for a miracle!
Has the wild card ever win this selection to go to eurovision? It’s a remote chance in my opinion but we’ll see.
Really depends if they overthink their staging and make it work
Well Dilja for the win I guess. Very sad for Kristin, but the staging was the worst it could’ve been. WHO decided to give her a guitar when there’s no guitar in the chorus at all?
She was trying way, way, way too hard to be like Folklore era!Taylor swift with that setup with the guitar (no other reason I bet lol) and dress.
Iceland what ? The rock band & Celebs ?????
For the win, Dilja is the best but Sigga Ozk it’s very interesting also !
To be honest, Sigga is actually my favorite so I am happy she made it to the final. I knew celebs was going to be a wild card. I was just surprised they didn’t qualify last week.
I love the energy of Celebs but the vocals are average… And a little kitsch sorry
I am pretty happy with the wildcard. They are the ones that stand out the most.
I didnt watch the show so idk if the results reflect which performances were better but my favourite for the whole selection hasnt been selected, Kristín Sesselja (im aware there’s a wildcard but I would be inclined to think that a wildcard if selected, wont win).
Aw no, so Kristín’s completely gone. Now I dont have a favourite.
im sorry iceland what?
The duet and Kristin
I have 0/2
Kristin Sesselja to win!!!!!