Previous national final artists
🇸🇪 Omar Rudberg – “Careless”
Omar Rudberg is, these days, perhaps most known for his role in Netflix series ‘Young Royals’, but he is a three time Melodifestivalen participant, and a criminally underrated one at that! Rudberg performed “Moving Like That” in Mello heat 1 in 2022, which failed to make it out of the deltävling. He had previously debuted solo in 2019 with “Om om och om igen” and before that had appeared as part of boyband FO&O, alongside Felix Sandman and Oscar Enestad, with the track “Gotta Thing About You” in 2017.
His new single “Careless” sees Omar both rapping and singing. The track is a sexy summer dance bop, the type of which we’ve come to know and love from Rudberg in recent years, such as recent songs “siren” and “Girlfriend”. It’s the kind of music you can clearly picture Omar performing live in his sets in the near future. Is it time for Omar to finally make his comeback to Mello? Or better still, can we manifest an FO&O reunion at Melodifestivalen sometime soon?
🇳🇴 Atle Pettersen – “Noe ekte”
Atle Pettersen has been relatively quiet since his appearance at Melodi Grand Prix 2023 with “Masterpiece”, with only a handful of releases. His newest single “Noe ekte” (Something real) is a an electro-indie-rock track, bearing similarities in sound to bands such as The 1975 or Foals. This track is completely in Norwegian and feels like the start of a different era for Atle compared to “Masterpiece”.
🇸🇪 Emil Henrohn – “Carlifornia Dreamin'”
2023 Melodifestivalen entrant Emil Henrohn has released new single “Carlifornia Dreamin'”, a reimagining of the 1966 The Mamas & The Papas hit. The release sees Henrohn reinvent the song into a big vocal ballad, almost Bond theme-esque. Certainly different to his Mello entry “Mera mera mera”. Not sure this will immediately be a eurofan favourite, but there’s definitely an audience for it somewhere!
🇪🇸 Sofia Coll – “és un parany”
Benidormfest 2024 fan favourite “Here to Stay” by Sofia Coll was truly a moment in time, and the Spanish artist is back with a new single! “és un parany”, which translates to “it’s a trap” is sung completely in Spanish, and follows up on Sofia Coll’s previous release “SexyDisfuncional” from earlier this year. The track is a eurosummer vibe and fans of “Here to Stay” should give this a listen to see a slightly softer side of Sofia.
🇸🇪 Sannex – “Varför känns det dÃ¥ rätt”
Mello 2021 saw Sannex compete in the 4th Deltävling, but fail to make the final. The dansband have had many releases since the early 1990s, and have built up quite the fanbase within Sweden. The new single “Varför känns det dÃ¥ rätt” is classic dansband energy, with a slight country twist. Fans of Swedish music may very well enjoy this newest release.
🇺🇦 YAKTAK – “поцілуй”
Ukrainian hip-hop / pop singer-songwriter YAKTAK releases his new single, “поцілуй” (kiss). The young performer made a name for himself in the extended Eurovision universe when he entered Vidbir 2024 with the track “Lalala”. YAKTAK would ultimately finish in 4th place in the national final, behind only Mélovin (Eurovision 2018), Ziferblat (Eurovision 2025) and alyona alyona & Jerry Heil (Eurovision 2024). “поцілуй” has similarities with his Vidbir entry, but feels more mature and polished and less in the hip-hop vein than “Lalala”. Could we see a return to Vidbir for YAKTAK sometime soon? I sure hope so.
Honourable mentions / tenuous links
🇺🇸 Grant Knoche – “ALL ME”
Grant Knoche started life in the music and entertainment industry as a performer in the group Kids Bop Kids, but his recent music couldn’t be further from the family friendly covers they were famous for. In 2022, the world was gifted the first, and so far only, edition of the American Song Contest. Knoche placed 4th in the final of the Contest for Texas with the song “Mr. Independent”. He has since performed at various Eurovision pre-parties and events in recent years, and has released a string of singles and full length albums. His most recent single is a collaboration with singer Ella Collier, and it is a sexy guitar-pop song.
🇺🇸 Madonna – “CONFESSIONS II”
Okay. So Madonna is not a Eurovision artist. But it has been 7 years since her last album “Madame X”, and during the worldwide promo tour for that album, she took a trip to the Eurovision stage to perform the interval act during the 2019 Grand Final in Tel Aviv. And for that infamous performance, and the fact she has a brand new album, she’s being included on this list. Deal with it.
“CONFESSIONS II” features collaborations with Martin Garrix, Sabrina Carpenter, Stromae and Madonna’s own daughter, Lola Leon, and there are strong rumours of a Kylie Minogue feature on the deluxe edition due to be released later in the year. This new project is a followup up to her 2005 worldwide famous album “Confessions on a Dance Floor”. Madonna performed on the Eurovision stage. It counts.
What do you think about this week’s new music round-up from the Eurovision universe? Let us know your thoughts on social media, and if we have missed any Eurovision universe releases! Don’t forget to follow ‘That Eurovision Site’ on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, Bluesky, and ZOOP for all things Eurovision!
News Sources: ThatEurovisionSite / Spotify / Instagram
Image Credits: Daniel Žižka – ÄŒT, Delta Goodrem – Carlotta Moye, KAJ – Erik Ã…hman, Sarah Bonnici – Lorella Castillo, Søren Torpegaard Lund – Miguel Martin, Sanna Nielsen – Eva Edsjö