Austria: PÆNDA – Limits

Shi: I’ll confess that I’d only heard Austria twice before writing this review, and all I could remember from it was “you-ou-ou-ou-ou” – except every time I tried to sing it, it came out as Sweden 2013 instead.

Other things I do remember about it, actually: it’s very mellow; I thought she sounded very good live at the Netherlands pre-party; and she has blue hair.

Listening to “Limits” again now, I’m realizing that, while I generally actually like this quite a bit because it puts me in a relaxed and calm mood, my inability to remember any of it afterwards will be its main problem. It’s always tough doing a quiet and atmospheric song at Eurovision – the combination of all the elements needs to work extremely well so as not to disappear in the line-up between all the songs that have something more immediate about them, whether visually or musically. And more often than not, that doesn’t happen.

I do appreciate the risk-taking though, and the fact that Austria is sending something very different from what they did last year instead of trying to replay it. But let’s just say that they won’t be featuring in the split screen during the last part of the voting this time.

Felix: My addition to this review was pænding for a while. But I like this! Austria expænds its Eurovision bouquet with an angelic, meditative song that, with the right staging, could surprise some. What other entry would fans of this kind of music spænd their euros on? What’s the Æ though…?

Martin: I’m very fond of this one too, and I’m a little surprised the producers haven’t thrown it to the wolves with an early spot in the running order. Maybe they know something we don’t about how it’s going to come across live, though qualification still feels like a stretch.

video and title image source: eurovision.tv