FRANCE 2024

 

In quite a surprise, France has already announced their entry for ESC 2024: Slimane, with his song "Mon amour" [My love]. Let's take a listen:


About the Artist

Slimane Nebchi, a 34-year-old of Algerian descent from the Paris suburbs, has emerged as one of France's biggest music stars. He won Season 5 of the French edition of The Voice in 2016, and he's released 4 albums since - all went to #1 on the French and Belgian charts. This is a slam-dunk get by France Télévisions, in line with Israel's Noa Kirel last year.

Song Analysis

Well, that's France, alright. It's a ballad, but a more modern-sounding one (more "Tout l'univers" than "Voilà"). We'll see if this ends up being the staging in Malmö, but if so - this is basically just Voilà's staging, which everyone loved.

Lyrically: nothing too crazy here. Slimane's saying that he loves this person, will do anything for her, but she clearly doesn't feel the same and he wants her to come back. Paris gets name-dropped.

France's History


Five-time winners of the contest, France haven't taken the crown since 1977. Recent results have been mostly middling (lots of finishes in the teens and twenties) with the exception of Barbara Pravi, who was runner-up in Rotterdam."Évidemment" and "Fulenn" were fan favorites, though, and it's fair to say France is riding quite a bit of momentum post-Covid.


In my personal rankings, France is 33rd of 48 countries since 2000 - second-worst among the Big Five. Lots of mediocrity, and very little worthwhile before "Sognu". Recent years have been pretty solid, though, especially 2021, where “Voilà” is narrowly my #1.

Prognosis

It's the best ESC entry I've heard this year! But really, this is awesome. He clearly can sing it live. People are going to be hyping this up as a potential winner, and while it's obviously too early to say that...I'm not sure they're wrong.

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