Eurosong Erica to stage a spectacular
Song contest star hopes massive visual production will help her win
EUROVISION hopeful Erica-Cody said the country’s winning entry should ‘go big or go home’ and stage a spectacular backdrop to break Ireland’s recent bad run in the 68-year-old song contest.
Onstage production has become as important as the song itself among voters in the years since Ireland last won in 1996, with the notable exception of Salvador Sobral’s pared-back serenade in 2017, which won for Portugal.
And Erica believes we should be sending something that will blow the roof off the Malmo Arena in May.
‘Otherwise, what’s the point?’ she asked the Irish Mail on Sunday.
‘There’s so much that gets put into this, and you have your country behind you and you want to do them proud. And I think the only way to do it is to pull strings, try to get the dancers together,
‘We’ve had to scale it back but it will still be epic’
the vision, and just really throw the kitchen sink at it to make it as big as it can possibly be on a small budget [for the Late Late Eurosong qualification show on Friday].’
If she does make it to Malmo, the Dublin singer said her production will be ‘10 times bigger’ than on the Late Late special.
‘We’ve had to scale it back but it’s still going to be as epic as we can make it,’ she said.
Her song, Love Me Like I Do, was cowritten with fellow pop star Aimee, singer-songwriter Ruth Anne – who has written for, among others, Britney Spears, One Direction and Westlife – and songwriter-producer Richey McCourt.
‘The song was born out of an Irish Women in Harmony songwriting camp, so I think it really lives up to its [middle eight] hook of “Is mise mná, is mise grá” – I am woman, I am love.’
She has been sitting on the song, which wasn’t written specially for Eurovision, for ‘about two years’ and revealed that she has had offers from elsewhere to give the song another home.
‘After we wrote it, we knew it had some sort of potential – we knew it was a big song. And we had some big hitters from the UK and the US that were biting and being like, “Can we do a demo?” It was getting close to the point of someone else jumping on it and then the conversation of Eurovision just kept coming up.’
Erica was born in the same year Eimear Quinn last won for Ireland, which she believes could be a good omen for success.
‘I never got to see us win, so maybe it’s fate – I don’t know. I’ll just have to wait and see.’
However, the Dancing with the Stars finalist said qualifying for the final – for only the second time in 10 years – ‘would be a win in itself’.
‘I think definitely that should be on people’s minds – that if we got a qualification, that’s almost just as good as a win. Obviously we want to take the crown back [Sweden levelled our record eight wins last year] but the last time we qualified was Ryan O’Shaughnessy [in 2018] and he did an amazing job. And I’m working with the creative team that were involved in his show and we’re just throwing the kitchen sink at it and giving it the best chance possible.’
She said last year’s Irish entrants, Wild Youth, have been ‘friends for years’ and have ‘been amazing’ in their support.
‘I toured with them before they went on their Eurovision journey and it was so enjoyable. We had a great time and they were like, “If you’re ever thinking of doing Eurovision, do it. It’s a wild ride. Just enjoy it as much as you can.”’
Erica said she has ‘big plans’ for the rest of the year and appreciates the springboard Eurovision can serve as. ‘It has a bigger audience than the Super Bowl. I think anybody who’s thinking of doing it should definitely know that it’s a big beast and there’s longevity in it when you play your cards right.
‘I do have a lot of big plans for the rest of the year and I do think it would be an amazing opportunity not only to do it for myself, but to do it off the back of Ireland. It can change people’s lives really. It would obviously be a dream to get out there and to be the first black Irish woman to ever do it.’
Erica-Cody goes up against Ailsha, Bambie Thug, Isabella Kearney, JyellowL and Next In Line on the Late Late Eurosong show on Friday.
‘I never got to see us win so maybe it’s fate’