WORTH A LOOK?: ****1/2

The UK returns to the Junior Eurovision Song Contest after a 16-year absence this month and we’re back with a banger because 13-year-old Freya Skye’s song is an absolute bop.

• Read on for reasons including how Skye has serious competition in JESC 11 December 2022

Written by Jack Hawitt, Amber Van Day and Deepend, Lose My Head is so uptempo, fun and professional that it could represent the UK at Liverpool in May 2023 when it’s finished competing in Yerevan, Armenia on the 11 December as the 20th annual contest tees up next year’s bigger festivities.

We’ve heard 9 of the other 15 songs competing at the Karen Demirchyan Sports and Concerts Complex and there’s plenty of decent competition for Skye however.

We’re particularly enjoying the similarly uptempo La Festa by Luna for the Netherlands and Malta’s Diamonds In The Skies by Gaia Gambuzza and 60s-inspired Oh maman by Lissandro for France.

Solas by Sophie Lennon for Ireland has some well-known Eurovision writers in Jonas Gladnikoff and Niall Mooney, is in Gaelic and to these ears sounds a little like Celine Dion’s Titanic theme My Heart Will Go On.

We saw the 1st JESC on ITV back in 2003 and haven’t caught much of it since but Skye’s participation is certainly raising our hopes that the UK might be on for a rather good showing with Lose My Head later this month.

Love how Skye sings: ‘I got 20 seconds until I lose it’ just before the chorus kicks in and the Children In Need performance gives us hope that live this could work almost as well as it does in in its recorded incarnation.

Amazing that the UK has struggled at Eurovision for almost a quarter of a century but with Sam Ryder’s SPACEMAN and now this appears to be out of this world.

If we were organising Eurovision we’d be lobbying for Cian Ducrot and Ella Henderson to represent us with the follow up to arguably this year’s best song. But that’s another matter. Good luck to Freya and this absolute banger.

• Main picture via Facebook courtesy Junior Eurovision Song Contest Tickets
• Have you seen a Junior Eurovision before and what did you think of it? Let us know what you thought in the comments below
• Enjoyed this review? Follow monstagigz on Twitter @NeilDurham, email neildurham3@gmail.com and check us out on Instagram and Facebook