Molly Smitten-Downes to represent the UK

Although gossips announced the UK internal choice for Eurovision yesterday morning, it wasn’t until the evening that BBC confirmed that 26 years old Molly Smitten-Downes had been chosen to represent her country at the Eurovision Song Contest 2014. This way, BBC choose a pretty new artist in contrast with their last choices of well-established artists. It looks like the BBC has called for proposals and after discussion they went for Molly and her song “Children of the Universe” written and composed by herself.

Molly was soloist of the dance group STUNT. She released her first album “Fly away with me” in December 2011 and she has won several prizes both as composer and vocalist. She has also been on tour in the UK recently.

This is a totally different approach by the BBC and a clear desire to improve their results from the past. In 2009, tired of being in the bottom 5, the UK contacted Sir Andrew Lloyd-Webber to compose the UK entry, which finished 5th in Moscow. After this succesful change, they contacted Aitken & Waterman to write the song for 2010, which finished last with the second worst position of a UK entrant ever. Then the BBC went for the well known artists such as Blue (11th), Engelbert Humperdinck (25 out of 26) and Bonnie Tyler (19th). Now the BBC has internally selected both singer and song with the aim of being again on the top of the scoreboard.

Actually the song did very well after its premiere yesterday, since fans and media are generally very pleased with the choice. Molly has a strong and particular voice and a good stage presence, which can be crucial to achieving a good placing on May 10. There are four backing vocalists accompaning Molly onstage.

Listen to Children of the Universe: