The Xtra Files: We Review the United Kingdom’s ‘Never Give Up On You’ by Lucie Jones!

Welcome to The Xtra Files, our new series which will give you an insight into what the team at escXtra think of your favourite entries into this year’s contest! Today, we review the United Kingdom.

Now that all the songs have been released, we are able to review each and every one of them. Our honest and brutal reviews will keep you entertained until the rehearsals start in May! We will also each give a score out of 10 for every entry, and create an escXtra leaderboard of the entries! You can see our preview reviews here.
Today, it is the turn of the United Kingdom’s entry, ‘Never Give Up On You’ by Lucie Jones, to be reviewed by Katarina, Luke, Nathan, Rodrigo, Sagheer, and Yassia. Let’s get started!

The Reviews

Katarina:

The revamp made me like this entry slightly less, but it’s still one of the better ballads this year. Lucie Jones is one of the few singers who can make their song sound much better live, so I am sure that, with a good staging, this can really come alive in Kyiv and have an impact on the viewers.

Luke:

Well, at least Lucie didn’t give up on this. I can’t imagine this doing too fantastically, but it’s at least a good effort. Her voice is gorgeous, it’s just a shame that this kind of song doesn’t appeal to many people; it has such a beautiful melody. The revamp was the best move that the UK have made in recent years. Unfortunately, I still really can’t see this doing well in Ukraine, no matter how much I think it’s beautiful.

Nathan:

Well, the revamp has made it better. It wasn’t difficult to improve though, was it, really?

Rodrigo:

An example of a singer being much better than the song if there is one this year. The revamp has helped the song itself, but it is still a bit underwhelming. This is the type of ballad that I would normally love but I just can’t feel as though when being written someone knew something better could be achieved but thought “meh, this will do”. Also, not sure how much good there will be for the UK around the continent, and for the first time I can easily see that good old “nobody votes for us because they all hate us” adagio of the UK translating to reality.

Sagheer:

Never Give Up On You really is a beautiful song and I am so proud that this will represent the UK at Eurovision this year. The revamp truly adds that extra oomph that was previously needed and I truly believe Lucie can bring a Top 10 finish in Kyiv.

Yassia:

Lucie definitely has strong vocals, but she is still not Adele. The song is nice, but a bit trivial and boring for me. There is nothing special or catchy about it, I would say.

Scores

When we remove the top score of 10 and the lowest score of 2, the average score for the United Kingdom is 6.00.
(Removing the top score and the lowest score helps to make the average score more reliable and less affected by outliers.)

Leaderboard

United Kingdom reaches 4th place in our leaderboard with a score of 6.00.

1. Hungary – 6.79
2. Moldova – 6.58
3. Norway – 6.33
4. United Kingdom – 6.00

Tomorrow, we will review Australia.
Do you agree with our reviews of the United Kingdom? What are your thoughts on ‘Never Give Up On You’? Let us know in the comments!