Germany - Lena - Taken By a Stranger

GERMANY

Lena - Taken By a Stranger

After storming to triumph, in a somewhat predictable victory, last year Lena has been given the honour of defending her title in her home nation at the Eurovision Song contest 2011. The ever popular singer was given her own prime time TV selection show in which she sang various songs from her repertoire and at the end of the process the song “Taken by a Stranger” was given the go ahead and will be flying the German flag in Dusseldorf this may.

In the midst of the crisis of confidence that was at the heart of debate  prior to the new voting system being introduced, it was said one of the big four countries would never win the Eurovision Crown again. Lena proved the doubters wrong last year with a track that was a genuine European pop classic that charted highly across the continent . This year she comes back with a track which is not even in the same league as “Satellite” and where it will place is unpredictable.

The host nation in recent years has tended to under perform and Lena will most likely suffer from this. Returning winners to the contest in recent years, such as Nimah Kavangh and Charlotte Perrelli, have also failed to land as highly as hoped. So Lena will have to break tradition and overcome the barriers of being the defending champion and the darling in the eye of the host nation if she is to give a performance to match her landslide win in Oslo.

The song is a mid-paced, almost dance esque pop track with a progressive beat and obvious vocal hooks. Lena does her best to add her unique vocal talent to make the song her own. The video is excellent and if given a good staging this could prove one of the most visually stylish and overall package performances of the night.  In essence though what you have is an average “album filler” track.

Lena will not be celebrating back to back victories with “Taken by a Stranger”.  There is too much counting against her as well as the fact that the song basically is not strong enough to win the contest. I forsee position in the 13^th-17^th mark for the reigning champion but regardless it is always satisfying seeing a winner return and equally one who is defending her title!