Double the Attitude from the Emerald Isle

Ireland: Jedward - Lipstick

The newest trend in the ESC is identical twins, both Ireland and Slovakia has sent a pair to Düsseldorf and it remains to be seen if this will spread to other countries next year. Jedward, or John and Edward, is an up and coming Irish pop duo who rose to fame two years ago through their participation in the UK version of X-factor. They finished sixth, and since then they have released a cover version of Vanilla Ice’s “Under Pressure (Ice Ice Baby)” which reached number one in Ireland and two on the U.K charts along with another hit single and a studio album. Their ESC song “Lipstick” debuted in second place in the Irish charts, and although the critics haven’t been overly happy about it, Ireland has really gotten their hopes for this one.

My first reaction to this song was that I thought it sounded very familiar. I took me a while, but then I realized that “Lipstick” has basically the same beat, melody and structure as Britney Spears’ “Womanizer”. Do we smell plagiarism? Jedwards first studio album consisted only of cover songs, so if you put two and two together here this looks very suspicious. Nevertheless, John and Ed didn’t write this song themselves so I guess they’re not entirely to blame for it. And despite everything, it is a fresh and modern song with a lot of attitude. John Edward look great together on stage, their styling is impeccable and the number is very well put together. It looks very professional and this ought to be well received among the younger ESC audience.

Jedward has stage presence, and I’m sure they will put on a great show in Düsseldorf. Ireland has won the Eurovision a record number of 7 times, but the last decade has been the worst ever in Irelands ESC history – they even finished last for the first time in 2007. The old ESC giant seemed to have lost it completely, but this year things have gotten better and Jedward will surely produce the best result for Ireland in 10 years. I wouldn’t bet on this to win, but I think it stands a really good chance.