Dima Bilan, Believe, and Eurovision

The Russian singer Dima Bilan won Eurovision song contest, which took place in Belgrade (Serbia) this weekend.



Eurovision is baaad. It has ambitions to be the Olympic Games of music, but really it's a contest for second-sort European pop music. Unfortunately the quality of music is so ridiculous that the whole thing looks surreal. The idea is that people watch it on TV and vote for their favorite song, but as the majority of the audience comes from Russia and Eastern Europe it was quite easy for Dima Bilan to win.

So, who is Dima Bilan then?

While I don't particularly like his songs because they are as crappy as the rest of the Russian "popsa", I respect his business talents (or his managers' talents to be more precise). While the rest of the Russian pop singers were paying huge amounts of money to appear on TV, Dima Bilan managed to get his CDs into almost every newsstand and post office in Russia. So even if you go to buy a newspaper to your local village store, you'll find only one CD there (which is a bit surprising as it's not really their core product) and this CD will most surely be Dima Bilan's. Good promotion, frequent appearances on TV, and catchy songs has made him into the main pop star in Russia. And it doesn't matter that the music and lyrics are so bad and cheesy that it's embarrassing to listen to it.

Another thing is the cause he's singing for. While the earlier stuff were primarily focused on Bilan himself, the latest hit "Believe" (the song, which won the contest) has a noble idea behind it. Dima Bilan and his friends save a child by raising a money for an operation with a video clip – you can watch the clip below. And it doesn't matter that the singing is not very pleasant and that the whole thing is a copycat of Justin Timberlake, the main thing is that it's for a good cause and it sells well.



Artist's Website: www.bilandima.ru (in English and Russian)