Song 12: KAJ - "Bara bada bastu"
The final song in tonight’s line-up, and the only one not in English. It’s in a dialect of Swedish, including some Finnish lines. I wasn’t that keen on this when I watched this last night, but liked it more when I played the song again, following the lyrics. I liked it further still whilst watching this again this afternoon. I like the use of the line “Yksi kaksi kolme” before the first two instances of the chorus; this is Finnish for “One, two, three”. The chorus is very lively and catchy. I particularly like the chorus line “Bara bada bastu bastu”, which means “Simply sauna, sauna’; that’s the perfect hook for this song. The bridge could be seen as a bit repetitive, but it’s certainly unforgettable. Before the last instance of the chorus, there is a key change; which you would expect for a Eurovision song. For tonight’s performance, I’m mystified as to the significance of the trees on the background screen and the large wooden structure. After the key change, the use of green laser beams and rising jets were the perfect climax to this song. Altogether, a lively, catchy song, but considering it took me more than one viewing, whilst following the lyrics, to start liking it, casual viewers who are seeing this for the first time tonight might not like it with one viewing. That could create a problem if this wins tonight and goes to Eurovision, because plenty of people just watch the Eurovision semi-finals and Grand Final (or even just Grand Final) without previewing the songs, let alone looking at the lyrics, beforehand. Anyway, this is currently the favourite to win the televote tonight, and second favourite to win outright.