It’s only been a few days since Lindita Halimi won Festivali i Kenges 55 with her dramatic song “Botë”, earning the right to represent Albania at Eurovision 2017.
And that’s given last year’s winner Eneda Tarifa the perfect opportunity to exact revenge following Lindita’s infamous Facebook post about Eneda’s Eurovision 2016 song “Fairytale”.
For those of you who missed the drama, let’s rewind to March 2016, shortly after Eneda published the revamp of her FiK 54 winner “Fairytale”. Lindita was not impressed and took to Facebook to let the botë know.
She said: “People are tired of depressing, dramatic and shouty songs. We live in a time where we want rhythm, relaxation and happiness, to forget problems. Enough with depressing songs!! They are old-fashioned now. It seems like we always hit the replay button.”
It’s now clear Eneda was paying attention. Right after Lindita’s winning performance with her very dramatic song on Friday, Eneda updated her own Facebook status taking aim at “Botë”.
She shared this link to a news report about Lindita’s comments along with this message: “Isn’t it time to bring back last year’s status, lovely Lindita?”
We should note that Eneda is among Albania’s most beloved comedians, known for her witty repartee. She certainly has a knack for irony and comedic timing!
Olsa Toqi, the composer of “Fairytale”, had even harsher words: “Sorry, ‘Fairytale’ a depressing song? Hope that Lindita didn’t forget Albanian since she moved to the U.S, because the context of the song is hope and love”.
Ouch. We’ll have to wait and see if Lindita will respond and take the feud to another level…
Eneda Tarifa at Eurovision 2016
Eneda may not have made the final of Eurovision 2016, but she won over thousands of new fans in Stockholm. From the red carpet to the semi-final in Globen Arena, she always turned up and turned out, bringing her killer vocals and amazing personality with her. There’s a reason she’s one of Albania’s biggest stars and we learned that first hand during her promo tour. This woman has charisma.
Funnily enough, she does seem to have taken Lindita’s advice as she delivered a killer dance remix of her Eurovision tune “Fairtytale”. It may have come out in the summer, but we’re still moving to it in the winter. And we just love that wiwibloggers William and Deban have a small cameo in the video.
Eneda splices footage of her stage performance with some of her personal highlights from the contest and before. We were beyond touched that she used some of our video footage in her amazing video, including her performance at EuroClub, and our interviews with her at the London Eurovision Party, on the red carpet at Israel Calling in Tel Aviv and after her first rehearsal in Stockholm.
As for the conflict between Lindita and Eneda, we’re not taking sides. We know that powerful women carry strong words. So long as they both keep singing and entertaining, we’ll keep watching.
I actually preferred Eneda’s “Perrale” to Lindita’s “Bote” but I am confident the revamp will be better than “Fairytale” ….. That revamp was a huge downgrade to an already questionable song.
Eneda is not even close to winning this Albanian Diva duel.
Wow look like Eneda let ‘one night’s anger’ get the best of her and make her post that shade 😉
lol neither of them had/have any chance of qualifying for the final so what does it matter. I feel like the Albanian song is almost ALWAYS is one of the most forgotten songs(except for maybe 2012) after the contest. Sucks since 2006,2008,2009,and 2012 were true masterpieces.
And that’s why I love you, WIWI! YASSSSSS I love you!
Ladies, please… continue! 🙂
pettyyyyyyyyy
Music is emotion…. calling depression songs old-fashioned is dumb itself. Not gonna vote for Albania for sure xD and then once again, Rona Nishliu’s song was depressing, but ofc suus was old dated, just a song full of sh*t and Lindita’s song is of world quality……. sign
Both songs are bad. Eneda and Lindita have both been bad too.
Remember when Eneda said bad things about Conchita? .
However, I agree with them both. Old-fashioned songs, jealous and hateful people.
hunt = haunt. Lindita’s Bote isn’t the least depressing. It’s just dramatic, shouty, petite and on a pair of stilettos.
Come on, none of them is a contender for anything in Eurovision, sending same boring overdramatic things with a mediocre staging every year. Albania is at the last place with bookies now even though a singer is known, wonder why
Oh, oh…we’re in trouble…Linditty came along and she burst Tarifi’s bubble!
Unfortunately for Enada, Lindita’s words aren’t gonna hunt her come May 9 or 11 because she’s got an exceptional set of pipes, so even if her song is an exercise in vocal acrobatics and holding long notes without changing a single pitch, it’s still strong enough to easily sail through to the final (where it will likely end mid-bottom table as usual).
How hypocritical behalf of Lindita.
Colin, Eneda’s revamp was horrible. It got changed from a flowing, unique and interesting song to something so stiff, wooden and quite irritating.
The only way Eneda can win this argument is if this revamp is just as horrible.
Lindita should not respond until after ESC 2017, because anything she might say is not in her favour as long as she does not know if she will be succesful.
Eneda was in Sweden, and she needed to tell Lindita that the genre of her song is like Lindita described Fairytale, but now this must stop.
The SHADE……Christ perhaps if you were trading melodies instead of insults Albania might be doing better at the contest….you don’t see this mess in Sweden.
Bote is better than peralle so ofc it’s better then fairytale
Girl… Fairytale is better than Botë will ever be.
@Krzysztof Poland: Lindita wasn’t shouting while she was her song. Power ballads requires singers to belt out, not “shout” nor “scream”.
EUROVISIONVikiking…
You do know Dilan is also a returnee, right?
I agree with the article – Eneda does have charisma. And vocal abilities too. Too bad her song was so bad. I actually want to see Eneda representing Albania again with the better song.
OK, Lindita, now give your place in Eurovision to Dilan to save your honour. Or at least change your song to something that isn’t depressing, dramatic and shouty.
Albania should’ve chosed Dilan. The ONLY reason why Lindita won is because she is a returnee and returnees do bettter the 2nd time. Dilan could get Albania to the final even with the Albanian language.
It is interesting that Lindita criticized Eneda’s revamp and now she is doing her own. We haven’t hear what Lindita has to offer, though, so hers might be way better than Eneda’s, but with who knows.
Lindita>>>Eneda