"Nathan Trent's "Running on Air" has an easy, earnest quality, but will it get Austria to the Eurovision finals?
Post-Conchita Austria has had a bit of a spotty record with their entries for the Eurovision Song Contest. Two years ago, their entry while they hosted managed to get the dreaded Nul Points. While they rebounded a bit last year and qualified for the final with Zoe's "Loin D'Ici" last year, they still finished in 13th place, right in the middle of the pack. Will Nathan Trent's "Running on Air" propel them any closer to another win?
https://play.spotify.com/track/1WpQu8U3quBeGnhpZn0r7N
I like this song, and for the longest time I haven't been able to put my finger on what it sounds like. And then it sort of hit me - I used to watch a LOT of VH1's morning countdown show about 10 years ago, and they LOVED stuff like this. This has tinges of Jason Mraz and (if we're going for a slightly more modern reference here) Ed Sheeran about it, but it definitely sounds like mid-2000s AOR-ish daytime drive stuff. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the ability of this to succeed is really going to be down to if the rest of Europe is super into the sound Nathan's selling here.
Another thing I don't love is that I haven't been able to find live footage of Nathan singing this song. A lot of what provides the sizzle to a Eurovision entry's steak is not just the song, but the performer's ability on stage. The video for this is great (and SUPER Austrian, what with the snow and the mountains and the lake), but I really want to know if Nathan's able to deliver this polished a performance live so that this song runs into the finals and not into a wall."