Time’s ticking for Belarusian success

Shoving a Belarusian violinist on stage in Eurovision has proven to be very successful in the past. We figure Yuri Navrotsky aka Uzari made a smart move teaming up with “The First Violin of Belarus” according to their bio on Eurovision.tv, more commonly known as Maimuna. We always thought that to be Alexander Rybak, but perhaps he has retired.

Being the female part of this duo, Maimuna looks strikingly beautiful and will of course look gorgeous in a fab diva frock. Have you seen an unattractive violinist, like ever? Neither have we. And while we regret not taking violin lessons when we were kids, we also ponder upon the violinist being the Belarusians’ only asset this year or if they actually have a relatively decent song.

And what about Uzari, will he have sufficient stage charisma to fit into the equation? For the time being we see a fit young lad, with a questionable fashion sense when it comes to ear accessories, an avid appreciation of going for a run in rough weather conditions and a strained relationship towards the concept of time. There are certainly many things going on in dictatorships around the world we struggle to understand.

Having moved past the mindboggling promo video and after a few listens without visual distractions we have come to terms with the fact that this might very well be one of the sharpest efforts Belarus has produced over a decade of Eurovision participations. We hope they resist the urge of dragging the overly obvious time glass on stage and perhaps hire a couple of the currently unemployed Ukrainian stage designers to help them create a visually compelling number without snakes, but with lots of pyro and smoke. It’s the kinda song that needs a dynamic, coherent presentation focusing on the strong points, in this case the ravishing violinist and the drive of the song once it shifts into gear, and covering up its weaknesses like Uzari’s poor English pronunciation and the fact that the song starts running on empty at some point and don’t really build up to what’s probably the intended, but missing climax.

We are certain Belarus will qualify for the third time in a row, and we wouldn’t mind them injecting some badly needed energy into the final running order.