Soo pleased to have received the most 18s of BJSC 103, as well as of course finishing in 5th place. Deandria aren't so hopelessly floppy after all x

 

Thank you to everyone who voted to give me a birthday hit! Now comes the lifelong debate of whether or not to enter the next contest :thinking: Part of me would like to keep up the streak and this was such an enjoyable contest for us but I guess I will have to think about it and see if we can find something which could keep up our streak! Let's face it, it would be nice to finally get more than two qualifiers in a row... Currently we stand at one, after 'Moonland' flopped back in 101 and we didn't enter 102. :angel:

 

Notably, Desbuanda finally became a recipient of the Deandrian 18, after it was recently noted and discussed that we had given them 15 points on 5 separate occasions. 'Ebony' was a gorgeous song and we were sad to see it place quite low down.

 

But congrats New Lexico, who didn't receive any points from us THIS contest, but not too long ago were our recipients for our 18 twice in a row with two absolutely fab entries: 'Bricks' and 'SDIMS', both of which we still listen to on occasion.

BJSC 104

 

 

you ain't ready.

 

yeah I don't know what much to comment on this entry right now. I do consider it one of my more out there ones, but it has these beautiful wailing vocals and striking instrumentation that makes me sit up and try to gauge it. A fun ~swag~ video to go with it, also in black & white, just like my previous entry 'Malarone'.

Is this Bulgarian/Macedonia?!

Is this Bulgarian/Macedonia?!

He was born in Bosnia and Herzegovina but has connections to Serbia, i.e. I think he's based there now.

He was born in Bosnia and Herzegovina but has connections to Serbia, i.e. I think he's based there now.

 

interesting choice as expected from Deandria :wub:

interesting choice as expected from Deandria :wub:

aw thank you :wub: I just love his voice and the instrumentation in the song!

BJSC 105

 

I wish that I was just a cloud

 

 

For the 105th edition, we've gone for something that has probably been described as IDM, which stands for, ahem, "intelligent dance music". I personally described the entry as a "piece of art which encapsulates how the human race experiences music" and I still stand by this. I love the song but I also love the video, which features Binta from a recent season of America's Next Top Model. Totes didn't send it for that reason of course, I mean I didn't even recognize her until it was pointed out in the YouTube comments. A hypnotizing creation you could say, this piece made its way into my heart and I hope it does the same to some of you here :heart:

Really gorgeous entry x Hope it does well for ya!

Really gorgeous entry x Hope it does well for ya!

Thank you, I'm glad you agree with me B-)

clearly I watch ANTM too much, I recognized Binta immediately :P her lipstick shade tho!

clearly I watch ANTM too much, I recognized Binta immediately :P her lipstick shade tho!

haha ur less of a flop watcher than me then. I love the video, it really is like some headphones advert tho like Leww said on plug! And the song is soo chill, just drift away with it...

 

(away from Binta, I hope you like the song but I'm not expecting much :kink:)

I'm gonna do something I've had in the back of my head for a while and I find it interesting so bear with me. I'm a bit of a sucker for periodically mulling about my country's "sound" (if it has such a thing) and how the different entries are "connected" to each other or what "family" they are part of. My taste is versatile and so are my entries and so it's hard to pin them down to a specific sound sometimes (not that I find this important). I've done quick overviews before but in this post I'm gonna try to just consider the entries since my return in 2015 and see what kinds of things my mind can conjure up in terms of this.

 

For one thing, I do look at Deandria's "career" in this contest as one that definitely feels separated into two sides - pre-2015 and post-2015. Partly because I took such a long break in between and partly because I feel as though in this second era I've been putting a bit more thought into my entries and more often discovering new stuff specifically for the contest, going YouTube hunting or whatever, as opposed to sending something I've known for a while which I tended to do more often in the first era, pre-2015.

 

The synthy electronic pop sound (for want of a better way of putting it)

BJSC 80 / Ms. Henrik - Slow Dancing

BJSC 81 / Allie X - Sanctuary

BJSC 88 / Maya's Moving Castle - When You Wish Upon the Stars

BJSC 98 / AaRON - Blouson Noir

BJSC 103 / Linea Aspera - Malarone

 

I feel like these entries follow on nicely from my debut entry back in BJSC 11, Ladytron's 'Destroy Everything You Touch' which fared really well. These sort of entries take some of the poppier leanings of my taste, infuse them with my electronic side and out comes a delicious mix of catchy melodies and electrifying synths. It may seem weird putting 'Sanctuary' and 'Malarone' together as they are really so different but I'm trying my best here :') I do feel like they have something in common and can be seen as being part of the same extended family.

 

The alternative r&b / hip-hop flavoured sound

BJSC 78 / LOLAWOLF - Calm Down

BJSC 82 / Poison Ivory - Alchemy

BJSC 83 / Ecca Vandal - Father Hu$$la

BJSC 84 / Anna and the Barbies - Álmatlan

BJSC 100 / Alvia Islandia - Sugar Complex (dare I put this here? I feel like it sort of fits in the same family)

 

I seemed to go all out with this kind of sound after I had been oh so obsessed with 'Calm Down' and soon after that sent 3 entries in a row that were quite edgy in their raw, r&b / hip-hop / grime (?) offerings - talking of course about 'Alchemy', 'Father Hu$$la' and 'Álmatlan'. I don't listen to a huge amount of hip-hop or even alt. r&b but I do enjoy some of the more underground hip-hop stylings and I love artists like FKA twigs, Kelela and others who sorta flirt with sounds of a similar vein.

 

The sweet, light indie-ish sound

BJSC 85 / Tzlil - Oh My Love

BJSC 87 / NOËP - Move

BJSC 101 / Ine Hoem - Moonland

 

These entries all make me feel good in their own way and they have a somewhat airier quality than some of my other entries. All of them are also DNQs :kink: So we may not be the best-performing when it comes to this sorta sound (Au Revoir Simone - Dark Halls from "era 1" comes to mind also!) but sometimes it's nice to send tracks like these.

 

The alternative rock / experimental indie-ish sound

BJSC 86 / Blackbriar - Until Eternity

BJSC 91 / Holy Two - Undercover Girls

BJSC 96 / world's end girlfriend - Les Enfants Du Paradis

 

Yes, sometimes we can rock out too. There are some more examples of this kinda thing in spin-offs but in the "2nd era" of the regular contest, I've picked out these for this category, despite all three still being very different from each other. 'Until Eternity' was a full-on anthemic rock tune, 'Undercover Girls' was an indie-tinged rock song / rock-tinged indie song with r&b flavours I felt (could've nearly gone into the 2nd category), and 'Les Enfants du Paradis' was... well, 'Les Enfants du Paradis'. :heart:

 

The almost instrumental but with hints of vocals sound

BJSC 90 / Vogel - Hologram

BJSC 93 / Fakear - Ankara

BJSC 99 / Solarstone and Giuseppe Ottaviani - Falcons

BJSC 105 / Lusine - Just a Cloud

 

I like to flirt with instrumentals lately! Funnily enough, 'Les Enfants...' in the above category is probably my only total instrumental in the main contest but these four stand out as having something similar in common - they are grounded in instrumentation, atmosphere and feeling but do have pieces of vocals. 'Hologram' with its synthy energetic sound doesn't quite fit into the first category, 'Ankara' is also a little more unique in its style when compared to a lot of my entries (and has a fair bit of vocals, it's just hard to make them out as words haha), 'Falcons' is a lovely trance tune with some euphoric 'aah ooh ooh aah' vocals and my current entry 'Just a Cloud' basically repeats the same lines over and over to entice the listener into an almost hypnotic state, backed by some electronic atmosphere.

 

 

 

You may have noticed I omitted some of my entries even from the 2nd era and that's because, while all lovely in their own way, I feel like those tunes don't quite fit in anywhere here :o I'd love to read others' versions of something similar about their own country!

[/late] I kind of did the same thing as that back in 2016 when I made some SoundCloud recaps to celebrate 70 BJSC entries (including the spinoffs), maybe I should do an update to that some time soon :thinking:

 

Lusine was another fab entry btw, very reminiscent of early James Blake as I mentioned on plug, thank god it didn't quite come near last as it was near the start. x

[/late] I kind of did the same thing as that back in 2016 when I made some SoundCloud recaps to celebrate 70 BJSC entries (including the spinoffs), maybe I should do an update to that some time soon :thinking:

 

Lusine was another fab entry btw, very reminiscent of early James Blake as I mentioned on plug, thank god it didn't quite come near last as it was near the start. x

Oh cool, have you a link to it? (I assume it was a post)

 

Thanks, it didn't make me think of James Blake myself but I can see how the connection is there. It was overpredicted by everyone I think :P

https://soundcloud.com/persephonia/sets/per70a

 

^ linky x

 

29th is probably about what I would have predicted for this I think, if I ever bothered doing the predictas! Not too disastrous ~

A shame that this didn't do a lil better but hooray that it made the final at least *.* I get the James Blake comparisons, because it actually reminds me of his recent song 'If The Car Beside You Moves Ahead' with the choppy electronic vibes. This was dreamy anyway, thank you for making me appreciate it more than when I initially found it months ago, it was one of the few songs that I moved up in my ranks during my final listen :heart:

Yesss, thanks Jade :wub: I can't remember if I've chosen to listen to that new JB song yet OOPS (and it's been out for a while!), I better get on it! :arrr:

 

Thanks Bré for the link, I'm listening through now but it's killing me what the piano instrumental in the Indie section is??? It sounds like Port Blue - Up Ship! but that wasn't even a Persentry!!

 

oh wait you just put it as the intro to all of the sections, geesh, where is my head xx

Edited May 29, 20187 yr by Q.

Lmao that's just there to stop them being immediately taken down for copyright - Iz used to use that clip in all of his uploads to SoundCloud as well, it predates 'Up Ship!' actually being entered to BJSC which makes it a bit confusing in retrospect :P

You must check it out :o Btw 'alternative r&b / hip-hop flavoured sound' and 'The almost instrumental but with hints of vocals sound' are my faves, the songs in those sections range from great to flawless. Might have to try doing that when I hit 50 entries or something haha. From witchy songs to synthtastic stuff to foreign pop bops :kink:

You must check it out :o Btw 'alternative r&b / hip-hop flavoured sound' and 'The almost instrumental but with hints of vocals sound' are my faves, the songs in those sections range from great to flawless. Might have to try doing that when I hit 50 entries or something haha. From witchy songs to synthtastic stuff to foreign pop bops :kink:

I will do! I might've had one quick listen of it a couple of months ago but that won't cut it as I can't remember the song if so! :P And thanks for that comment, was fun to find out someone's favourite section(s) from my musings! I suppose 'Hologram' and 'Ankara' were 2nd and 1st in your EOYs respectively for their years of entry so that section being one of your faves doesn't surprise. I'll have to have a think about which one is my own favourite haha. And yep, that would be cool if you did that, I'd read it!