Interview: Norwegian Eurovision Hopefuls NorthKid On Melodi Grand Prix 2022 Entry ‘Someone’

We had the pleasure of finding out a little bit more about NorthKid who are in the running to represent Norway at Eurovision through national selection programme Melodi Grand Prix. The boys enter with Someone, a lavish mid-tempo pop ballad that will feature in the final on the 19th of February 2022.

The boys shared a little bit about their formation, whether they would class themselves as a boyband, turning rejection into pop songs, and their love for Finland’s 2021 act Blind Channel.

Read the full interview below. Thanks to NorthKid and their management for organising. You can connect with the boys here: Instagram / Twitter / Facebook / Spotify

Hello! How did the band come together?

Helloo <3 We’ve been friends as long as I can remember, and we started playing together when we were like 12 or 13 years old. We started as a rock band, and dyed our hair black and felt really cool. After a while we started drifting more and more towards pop, and we decided that screw it, let’s start a new popband. At this point Bilal wasn’t a part of the group, so we texted him saying «Hey man, you can sing – we can only sing rock, do you wanna start a band?» and NorthKid was made haha. – Helge

For those that don’t know too much about Hasvik, where the band originates, how would you describe your hometown?

Hasvik is a small village basically as far north as you can go in Europe, and I guess in the world haha. It’s really cold and windy, but so beautiful there. It would be fair to call it a fishing village, since basically everyone is living off fish, including me hehe. -Bilal

How do you feel about the boyband label? Do have any particular favourite boybands or groups that have been particular inspirations to you?

Haha well, there are a lot of discussions within the band if we qualify for the term boyband. Like, we play instruments – but on our live concerts we still have choreography. So if we’re calling ourselves a band and look at the history of bands in Eurovision we don’t have to look further back than last year to find some success stories! – Vegard

I think you can kinda tell that we get a lot of influences from boybands from the early 2000s in our music. It’s got that sentimentality that can easily be compared to the likes of Westlife, Nsync or A1 <3 -Helge

We’re not a boyband lol- Sebastian

We’re definitely a boyband, just with a couple of instruments – Håkon

What spurred you into entering MGP this year?

We’ve kind of always known that at some point we were gonna be in MGP – it was just about finding the right song. When we made Someone, and heard Bilals vocals on the song we kind of knew that this is it. -Sebastian

Is there any added extra pressure working with management that have previously worked with Eurovision favourites KEiiNO and Ulrikke?

Haha, well short answer yes – long answer yes but we try to remain calm about it. We love Christoffer and he helps us a lot with everything, so we’re just extremely grateful that he wanted to be part of the team!  – Håkon

Helge has sampled the MGP experience as a writer on Tone Damli’s Hurts Sometimes, how does it feel to be stepping onto the stage with your own group now?

It’s a completely different experience to be part of it as an artist, and I absolutely love it! I get to talk to way more MGP fans and Eurovision fans, and they’re all treating me so nice! -Helge

Someone has a big emotional chorus, have you thought about how you’ll channel this into your MGP staging?

“Someone” is a super emotional song, and we want to show that in our staging. I think the most important thing for us is to just be ourselves, and show the audience watching it that we really feel the emotions of the song – and hopefully the audience can get the same feeling we did when we heard the song for the first time! – Bilal

What inspired the decision to work on, not one, but two music videos for Someone?

Well to be fair it’s actually three hehe. First a lyric video, then music video and then extended music video. We felt that this song has so many stories to be told that one just wasn’t enough. -Vegard

Have you ever had to deal with the uncomfortable question of someone asking if a song that you have written is about them? How do you handle that?

Haha yes I’ve been asked that a lot. NorthKid usually writes songs about the girls, or guys who reject us. So there’s been some people who has heard lyrics and just been like, “eehhhm this is definitely about me” haha. It’s kinda awkward when you get confronted with that, but I guess when you write a song about someone you kinda want the to hear it and feel something. So in my experience it’s always a bit awkward, but a bit pleasing at the same time haha. -Helge

Have you had the chance to think about the end goal of Eurovision yet or is the focus mainly on MGP at the moment?

We’re in it to win it! We wanna represent Norway on the big stage in Torino, and I think we got a fair shot of actually doing it! Honestly even if we’re not winning we’re probably gonna go to Torino as fans <3 -Bilal

Who are some of your favorite Eurovision entrants of recent years?

Last year we had a Eurovision party at Helges place, and played Eurovision Bingo which was really fun. One artist we all absolutely loved was Finland last year, Blind Channel. We grew up as a rock band, and dyed our hair and felt really cool. And Blind Channel just spoke to us at 13 with there hardcore rock song. -Sebastian

We cover film on the website too, so it would be great to hear a few of your favorite films.

As we’re 5 different guys in the band it’s difficult to name just one. But if I can speak for myself then “Her” with Joaquin Phoenix is so beautiful <3 Also “Captain Fantastic” and “La la land”. -Helge