Hello welcome to my series of quick takes designed to get you ready for Eurovision 2019. Just some quick thoughts / my take on each of the 41 songs this year. The countries are in alphabetical order so without further ado: Serbia.

Country: Serbia
Singer: Nevena Božović
Song: Kruna
Personal Score: 37 out of 41
My Prediction: Q

I was actually pretty disappointed in the Serbian National Finals as a whole even though I can’t say they choose the wrong song. Kruna is a perfectly serviceable ballad and Nevena is doing a great job making it look effortless but I haven’t looked up the lyrics of thing song and I never find myself in a rush to remember it. It’s a little too close to things we’ve gotten in the past and all of it delivered in a very standard and straight forward manner. I think the reason people are often so “down” on ballads is that Eurovision ballads have mainly not evolved alongside music for the past two decade. This song wouldn’t be shocking at 1999 Eurovision. Even if we talk about how all Eurovision upbeat songs sound the same it’s hard to throw them back into other years (for the most part) the same way that a ballad is a ballad is a ballad. That’s an unkind read to this particularly ballad but it just doesn’t give me anything to work with. There’s no hook, there was no staging, there were no (metaphorical) fireworks. You might note I put this as qualifying anyway because I know people love the ballads – there is a contingency of ballad fans out there and Serbia is the most likely to pass muster for them but at the end of the day this is going to end up low in the ranking even if it passes to the final. I hope its a wake up call too all ballad writers.