Giulia-Georgia — “Find Your Way”
I was somewhat surprised that what sounded like it would be a power ballad initially instead shifted in another direction halfway through and ended up finishing in mid-tempo banger territory. The fairly consistent way in which this song keeps building is its greatest strength. Everything else, unfortunately, is sub-par. The instruments are hazy and fuzzy for reasons I cannot begin to fathom: perhaps Giulia-Georgia’s voice wasn’t up to competing with them, or the mixing was poorly done. Having said that though, the vocals didn’t impress me either: they felt forced at times and I felt like Giulia-Georgia never really settled into the song.

Ivel — “Neverending”
This song also starts off soft and builds — in this case, with an acoustic guitar and Ivel’s mumbling. Some more instruments come in to make a satisfying soundscape, even though they overshadow the vocals. However, the reveal of this build up is a guitar solo midway which feels a bit cheesy and out of step with the rest of the track. Once that’s over, the rest of the song feels like an anti-climax: there’s not much we haven’t already heard before. Like a few of these entries, there are some good ideas and worthy moments, but in the end it’s clear that more work should have been done on the execution.