The Ukrainian hopeful brings heat to Lisbon with a burning ladder.
MELOVIN is a 21-year-old singer from Ukrainian; his name comes from a combination of the holiday Halloween and the last name of the British fashion designer Alexander McQueen. In 2015, he won the Ukrainian X Factor after multiple entries in different tv talent shows. For the 2017 Ukrainian entry he placed third, but won the national selection this year with Under The Ladder.
Under The Ladder was written by Mike Ryals and is composed by MELOVIN himself.
As the song begins, we see MELOVIN start singing the song from inside a structure. As the see-through panels move upwards, he gets pushed up by a mechanism until he is standing upright. The piano structure is pretty high above the stage and incorporates a staircase. Further in to the performance, the stairs catch fire, as MELOVIN sits down at the piano and continues to sing. The fiery stage performance has been co-created by Konstantin Tomilchenko, who also did the art direction for Ukraine's winning entry1944 by Jamala at the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest.
MELOVIN spoke to Eurovision.tv after his rehearsal: "I was a little bit nervous at the very beginning but I managed to overcome it, the rehearsal went really well. This is probably going to be the biggest audience I ever performed for, so you get that feeling while you're rehearsing and you're also nervous thinking about that. Also the sound was amazing, it's the best sound I ever experienced on stage."
About the staging he told us: "the inspiration behind the staging is actually in the lyrics of my song: 'nothing but your will sets you on fire and fire lasts forever'."
MELOVIN will perform Under The Ladder for Ukraine in the second half of the second Semi-Final of the 2018 Eurovision Song Contest on the 10th of May.
What do you think about MELOVIN's first rehearsal? Will Ukraine make it to the Grand Final? Leave your review in the comments!
