Czech Republic | Meet Lake Malawi From The Czech Republic

This year will mark the 64th Eurovision Song Contest. The contest will be held in Tel Aviv, Israel, and will see 41 countries compete for the honour of being Europe's best. There will be two semi finals taking place on Tuesday 14th May, and Thursday 16th May. Ten artists from each will progress to the final that will be held on Saturday 18th May 2019. A grand total of twenty six countries will compete to be Netta's successor at the competition. With just a short time until this event, Eurovoxx will bring you a series of meet the artist articles, that will introduce you to each country that will be participating. Today's instalment comes from the Czech Republic who will be represented by Lake Malawi.

Who Are Lake Malawi?

Lake Malawi are this year's Czech Republic entrants. They are an indie-pop group. The band consist of three members who all bring that something different, and unique to the trio. The band was created by lead vocalist, and front man Albert Černý back in 2013. This all came about as a result of the break up of his previous band, hence Lake Malawi came to life. The band also contains two other members, they are Jeroným Šubrt who plays the bass, and keyboards, whilst the third member of the trio is Antonín Hrabal who plays the drums. He took over from Pavel Palát who left the band in 2016. Patrick Karpentski also used to be lead guitarist before he too, left the band in 2017. Although a river in Africa, the name of the group does not descend from that. It has its origins with the song "Calgary" by Bon Ivor.

The bands debut single "Always June" came in 2014, and they were even fortunate enough to perform the song live for the BBC on the radio. The trio have been very successful on the tour scene, and have played at many festivals both in the United Kingdom, and the Czech Republic. Since 2014, "Lake Malawi" have released 12 singles, and 3 albums. All have had a varying degree of success. "Chinese Trees" was their most successful single, it came from the album, "We Are Making Love Again". The song "Paris" also made the top 100 in the Czech Republic's charts.

Check Out Lake Malawi's Eurovision Entry, "Friend Of A Friend" Below:

How Were Lake Malawi Chosen?

This year the national broadcaster carried on from the success of last year's format of Eurovision Song CZ. Although there was no televised show, the public, and an international jury were involved in selecting the countries song. 60 established Czech musicians submitted entries to the broadcaster, which were whittled down to a final 8 that were revealed on the 7th January 2019. Each had a video of their song filmed, which was then made public. It was then up to the international jury that consisted of former Eurovision artists to award points on their favourite songs. Both, "Lake Malawi" and "Barbora Mochowa" tied for first place scoring 108 points each. It was the televote however, that decided that the band would head off to Tel Aviv. They scored 10 points from the voting public, securing their Eurovision place. Jakub Ondra with the song, "Space Sushi" would come second to a "Friend Of A Friend".

Check Out Andy Reacts To "Friend Of A Friend" Below:

The Czech Republic At The Eurovision Song Contest

The Czech Republic first debuted at the Eurovision Song Contest back in 2007, when Kabát would perform the entry, "Malá dáma". the song would fail to qualify for the grand final, and place last with one point. Not the best start to the competition. They would try again a year later when Tereza Kerndlová would come 18th place in the semi final, only scoring 9 points. 2009 would see the country get its worst result as Gipsy.cz's, "Aven Romale" would come last in the semi final scoring the infamous, "Nil Point". The country would take a five year break from the contest, and would return in 2015 when Marta Jandová & Václav Noid Bárta's song. "

hope Never Dies" once again failed to qualify. This time the country had its best result where they placed 13th in their respective final, and scored 33 points. The country would continue to participate at the contest when they finally qualified in 2016 when Gabriela Gunčíková would place 25th in the final scoring 41 points with the song, "I Stand". They have made seven appearances at the contest, and only made two finals.

At the Eurovision Grand Final, the Czech Republic have awarded most of their points to Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Russia, and Sweden. Whilst they have received most of their points from Croatia, Austria, Iceland, Spain and Armenia.

Last year there was a real change of fortunes for the country when the young talent, Mikolas Josef was sent to Lisbon. His song, "Lie To Me" came third in his semi final scoring 232 points, and in the grand final he came 6th with 281 points. He had given the Czech Republic their best ever placing, and made this young performer a star. Can Lake Malawi capitalise on this success?

Do you like the song? Will it qualify? Please tell us what you think in the comments below. The whole team at Eurovoxx would like to wish Tulia a very big, "Hodně štěstí".