Iceland 2019: All you need to know about Hatari and their entry “Hatrið mun sigra”
Iceland held its Eurovision 2019 national final , Söngvakeppnin 2019, with a total of 5 acts competing for the golden ticket to Tel Aviv. The final saw as crowned winners the group Hatari and the song Hatrið mun sigra.
A few words about Hatari
Hatari is a three member punk- techno group from Reykjavik and consists of Klemens Hannigan, Matthias Haraldsson, Einar Stefánsson. The group was formed in 2015 and released its first album in 2017. Their music combines punk and techno sounds, and they call themselves as the “anticapitalistic BDSM techno group”. Their performances cause often reactions as their apperances are adjusted to their BDSM culture while the lyrics of their songs are mostly satyrical aiming to bring down capitalism.
Their first appearance took place during the Icelandic festival Airwaves in 2016, in which it came back in 2018. In the 2018 easter the held the “death festival” Háskar. At the music event participated several acts, DJs and groups from the country’s Underground music scene. The festival received an honorable reference during the Grapevine Music Awards 2019. In December of 2018, Hatari κυκλοφόρησαν released their third single “Spillingardans” claiming a “break down” failing to stop capitalism .
The entry “Hatrið mun sigra”
Hatari’s entry Hatrið mun sigra (Hatred will prevail) is exclusively in Icelandic and the members themselves are behind the lyrics of the song. It’s an industrial – techno – punk song that totally complies with the sound of music the band is used to. Take a look at the official music video in order to understand further what they stand for:
You can see below the lyrics of the song as it is in Icelandic and their translation in English:
Icelandic lyrics
English translation
The Eurovision Story so far
The Nordic country, which debuted in Eurovision in 1986, was only absent at two editions of the contest, in 1998 and 2002, and that was due to low rankings that its entries received. It is the only country for the Scandinavic ones not to have won the contest, despite its best results in 1999 with Selma and in 2009 with Yohana, when the country finished in the 2nd place
Iceland last year was represented by Ari Ólafsson and his entry Our Choice. Unfortunately, he didn’t make it to the grand final which was the consecutive fourth time the country failed to qualify.
