Crossing the Black Sea, heading west for Romania, Bulgaria and Moldova, three more countries I don’t know much about. Romania is familiar to me only because of Dracula. Through Dracula, I learned about Vlad Tepes, or Vlad the Impaler, who was a scary enough dude without also being a vampire.
Mandinga is representing Romania with the pop song, Zaleilah
I tried Google Translate and a Google search, but couldn’t find out what “Zaleilah” means in English. Perhaps it’s a name. Anyway, catchy tune and I’m always a sucker for a drum line. Add the bagpipes and an accordion, and I’m so in. The singer is a hot babe with a nice voice, though she sounded auto-tuned. I mean, really auto-tuned. I enjoyed this, but I’m not convinced until I see them in a live performance.
Sofi Marinova is representing Bulgaria with the dance song, Love Unlimited
After I watched this canned performance, all I could think is, “She’s got to be better than this.” And she is! I found this live performance video on YouTube.
Wow! Okay, now, this I would like on my iPod. Great voice, great performance and a fun, catchy dance tune. If she brings this to the competition, I think she has a chance.
Pasha Parfeny is representing Moldova with the pop song, Lăutar
“This trumpet makes you my girl.” Is that a double entendre? No, don’t answer that. Google Translate doesn’t do Moldovan, but I discovered, through Wikipedia, that Moldovan is similar to Romanian. In Romanian, “Lăutar” means “fiddler.” What happened to the trumpet? Anyway, this was all right. I liked the music better than the singing. Another entry where I wish the singer was performing in his native language, though I don’t know if that would have improved his voice.
Of these three countries, Bulgaria is the winner for me. How about you? Any favorites so far?
These videos are from the list of Eurovison 2012 contestants on YouTube.
Lori Writer 
Romania has also had very modern entries recently, this time I don’t believe they will go to final. Good base line and beat goes like a freight train.. or a steam train, but song is not good enough.
Bulgaria uses the formula which has been very succesful on European dancefloors (Alexandra Stan Mr Saxo beat. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mxvmK1E7GM). And I must agree the live performance is so much better that the bleached official entry. She looks hot, instead of the russian granny from the official video. OMIGO Maybe she is a he 🙂 a drag queen. I like the Bulgarian entry a lot (but not because she looks like DRAG).
Moldova no thank you. Doesn’t do it for me.
I liked Mr. Saxo Beat, though it got a bit repetitious toward the end. I know what you mean about Bulgaria. After I saw the live performance, I thought, why did they make her looks so dowdy when she’s so hot?