Global pop star Arilena Ara is logged onto Zoom from her native Albania, chatting with superstar songsmith Diane Warren, the writer of her debut U.S. single, the classically Warren-esque power ballad “Weightless.” Ara is wearing an ironic “SPOILT BRAT” T-shirt, which has caught the eye of the always irrepressibly snarky Warren, but she laughingly recalls that at one of her first early in-person meetings with Warren, “I went with a shirt that said ‘ASSHOLE.’ And she’s like, ‘Oh yeah, that’s my jam!”

“Yeah: Sold!” quips Warren.

“Well, you did tell me that we’re a lot alike,” Ara tells Warren with a grin. “That was something that stuck with me.”

When Ara and Warren first met through Warren’s good friend, veteran music executive Larry Frazin, the two didn’t just connect over R-rated humor and sassy fashion. Warren quickly recognized that, like Warren herself, Ara “had that fire” and was quite the total opposite of a spoiled brat — that Ara was a “hard worker… just hungry, wanting to make shit happen.” And Warren appreciated Ara’s “unique sound.” But then, when Ara sang “Weightless” — after Warren instructed her to “go in the studio and do whatever you want and just kill this” — it was Ara’s X Factor Albania-winning power-vocals that impressed the legendary songwriter the most.

When Warren — a Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee who is tied for having written the most No. 1 songs as a sole writer in Billboard history, and whose compositions have been recorded by greats like Celine Dion, Cher, Toni Braxton, Aerosmith, LeAnn Rimes, Heart, and Christina Aguilera — heard Ara belt “Weightless,” she immediately thought, “‘Holy shit, this girl can fucking sing!’ I write a lot of songs, and sometimes I just don’t know who they’re for. And then I hear somebody sing and I’m like, ‘Oh my God. That’s your song.’ And that’s what happened with this. And it was better than I thought it would be, too. I knew that [Ara] would sing it great, but when I heard it I was like, ‘Holy shit, this is just Celine-level — that great of a performance.”

Ara was only 14 when she won X Factor Albania in 2013, but she freely admits that auditioning for Warren in her mid-twenties was an “absolutely, absolutely” more daunting challenge. “I can’t even compare it. [Competing on reality TV] is nothing like Diane. It’s Diane, come on! That was a big test,” Ara laughs. “When I was 14 years old, I had nothing to lose. … But in this case, I had to impress her. I knew that she’d worked with so many amazing singers — like, my favorite singers of all time. And I come from Albania, and I am trying to make a single with Diane! … And if she was going to say, ‘OK, it’s good, it’s nice, you have a nice voice,’ I knew that that wasn’t going to be enough. … Diane is honest in the studio. If she likes something, she will say it. And if she doesn’t, she’ll be like, ‘Just get the hell out of my studio.’”

“I wouldn’t say it like that, but yeah, I’m pretty honest,” chuckles Warren. “Obviously I would say, ‘Please get the fuck out.’”

But that, of course, didn’t happen. “She wanted to hear [me sing] the song three times, and then she’s like, ‘Oh my God, this is fucking great,’” Ara recalls proudly.

Ara was prepared for this pivotal career moment because, as Warren notes, she’d already “done her 10,000 hours.” And as Ara notes, she’d been “well-trained to handle fame and success and being onstage.” While “Weightless” is Ara’s official American debut, she’s been a major star in Europe for over a decade, where she has judged The X Factor Albania and The Voice Albania; received Song of the Year and Best Artist awards in 10 different countries; and charted multiple top 10 hits, including two number-ones. She’s such a celebrity in Albania, in fact, that she rarely ventures out, at least not without a pair of incognito sunglasses, because she admittedly “doesn’t feel comfortable” with the attention and “just can’t do it anymore.”

But Ara stresses, “Since I love what I do so much, it’s not like I have any regrets.” So, the downsides of European fame haven’t deterred her from trying to finally break America, which has been her dream since childhood. “I just wanted to break borders and not just be [successful] in Europe. I wanted to be worldwide, for some reason,” Ara muses. “Music is not just a passion to me. It’s my whole life. It’s my whole personality. It’s who I am. It’s the only thing that I can actually do, in the best way possible. I’ve been my entire life, since I was a little kid, onstage. I haven’t actually been a normal teenager, living just like everybody else. … So, yeah, I am in my twenties, but I feel like I’ve lived, I don’t know, too many years.”

Ara was actually trying to launch her Stateside career right the before COVID-19 pandemic, when she traveled to America to work on the song she was supposed to perform while representing Albania in the 2020 Eurovision Song Contest. But then, for the first and only time in Eurovision’s 69-year history, the competition was canceled due to COVID concerns, and everything got put on hold. But Ara now believes it was “destiny” that she waited to debut in the States with Warren’s help: “I think now is the right moment. I’ve been preparing myself to do this. It’s been like five years working on this project.”

“My theory is if you’re a star anywhere, you could be a star everywhere,” asserts Diane. “You could look at [starting from scratch in America] as challenging, too. It’s like building something new.”

Going with a ballad for her debut U.S. single is an interesting choice (although a “Weightless” dance remix is dropping in August), but Ara says ballads are her “specialty,” and of course Warren, while contentedly single in her personal life, specializes in love songs. “People do all kinds of things to [my ballads] — get married, get divorced, have sex, have kids. Their funeral songs, too,” says Warren. And “Weightless” is an iconic Diane ballad “about being in love — not that I know anything about that! I love my cat,” Warren shrugs.

Warren adds, with a chuckle, that she once thought, “‘Oh, this would be a great song when all those people went [to space] with Jeff Bezos.’ And then I’m going, ‘Ohhhh, maybe it’s good that it wasn’t used…’” [Side note: When it is semi-jokingly suggested that Warren pen a song for Katy Perry to help get Perry’s career back on track, Warren answers, “I don't know if she'd want me to. But I'd do it.”]

photo courtesy of Falcon Publicity

In all seriousness, “Weightless” allowed Ara to tap into “a lot of mixed emotions, raw emotions.” She explains: “Even when I don’t write, I try to be connected with the song and to feel every word, every note, and just be totally in love in that moment with the song and to feel it personally. And it was personal. … It was going to be my first single for the U.S., and doing that with Diane meant the world to me, to be honest, that she believed in me. And she did say that: ‘I believe in you.’ It’s not easy coming from Albania, based here with my career, trying to make it to the States. And to have Diane in front of you and just believe in you and say, ‘You can make it and I’m going to help you do that’… wow.”

Several times during our Zoom conversation, Warren stresses that Ara can’t stay in Albania if she wants to capitalize on the momentum of “Weightless,” which so far has garnered a positive reception in America. “People in my world that have heard it just say, ‘What a fucking great song! Who is this?’ And that this song should be the biggest hit. I’m just hoping that it [breaks through] here,” says Warren. “That being said, you do have to be here. You do have to get here. That’s something that I think is super-important. You have to be here. You have to have boots on the ground.”

“Well, Diane promised me after we released ‘Weightless,’ she’s going to write an EP for me. She did promise me that! And that’s the reason why I’m coming to L.A. [very soon] to make this happen,” Ara declares.

“I mainly will give you songs [as opposed to co-writing], to be honest,” Warren tells Ara in her usual blunt manner, as our international Zoom summit comes to an end. “So, if you’re open to that…”

“Diane knows my potential,” Ara responds, smiling, giving the thumbs-up. “So, she can do whatever she wants. And I’ll take it.”

(Ukraine’s Jamala wins the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest. Photo: Reuters)

Long before American Idol — before Star Search, even — there was the Eurovision Song Contest. The United Nations of talent competitions, held every year since 1956, Eurovision features singers from across Europe competing over five days, with each country submitting an original song to be performed on live television. It’s one of the most-watched broadcasts in the entire world, with an average annual audience of 200 million viewers in 45 countries.

Or make that 47 countries! Yes, it took 60 years, but for the first time ever, the Eurovision Grand Final aired live in both China and (on the Logo network) in the U.S. this Saturday. America’s sweetheart, Justin Timberlake, even made an appearance. (Important side note: For some odd reason, JT’s performance of “Can’t Stop the Feeling”/”Rock Your Body” did not air on Logo. But thanks to the Interweb, we can all still see it. Justin can’t be stopped, not even by silly broadcast restrictions!)

Eurovision, which took place in Stockholm, Sweden, this year, is perhaps the only televised talent competition more over-the-top than Logo’s premier show, RuPaul’s Drag Race. It is seemingly untouched by time or taste, with contestants wearing Spandex-’n’-sequins outfits and executing variety-show dance moves that wouldn’t have been out of place during the famously career-launching 1974 Eurovision number by Sweden’s own ABBA. An actual drag queen, Austria’s “Bearded Lady” Conchita Wurst, even won Eurovision in 2014. So Eurovision and Logo were a perfect fit, Timberlake omission not withstanding.

Twenty-six countries competed at the Eurovision 2016 Grand Final, with Ukraine’s Jamala prevailing with her operatic, self-penned “1944″ — a political power ballad about ethnic cleansing and the deportation of the Crimean Tatars in the ’40s by Russia’s Joseph Stalin. The song was inspired by the harrowing real-life tale of Jamala’s great-grandmother, and also served as a critique of Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. “1944″ was certainly an unchacteristically serious moment for the usually campy Eurovision, but Jamala belted the song with pain and passion that swayed voters worldwide. (To add to the politically charged climate of this year’s Eurovision, Ukraine won over Russia’s “You Are the Only One,” which had been the odds-on favorite to win, but lost out after a last-minute reveal of the public votes.)

However, as emotional as “1944″ was, it didn’t get my vote. (Side note: Americans were actually unable to vote in Eurovision. Logo needs to fix that next year!) Below, ranked, are my personal top 10 performances of Eurovision 2016 — along with how the official, international votes panned out.

1. Dami Im, Australia
“Sound of Silence” (composers: Anthony Egizii and David Musumeci)
Official ranking: Second place

Yes, I know Australia is not part of the continent that puts the “Euro” in Eurovision. So? An exception should of course be made for this dynamite performer. (To clarify, Australia started participating in Eurovision last year, somewhat controversially.) The Season 5 X Factor Australia champ channeled circa-2008 Lady Gaga with her sculptural bubble-gown, blunt bangs, and booming vocals. All that was missing was the disco-stick, really. As for “Sound of Silence,” it clearly had nothing in common with that Simon & Garfunkel song (it’s basically the loudest song about “silence,” ever), but on Saturday, it sounded like an instant Eurovision classic.

2. Nika Kocharov & Young Georgian Lolitaz, Georgia
“Midnight Gold” (composers: Kote Kalandadze and Thomas G:son)
Official ranking: 20th place

The Least Cheesy Performance Award goes to this hard-charging hipster band. This basically seemed like the Gallagher brothers’ long-lost Georgian cousins playing a long-lost outtake from Kasabian’s first album at Glastonbury. (It’s no wonder, then, that this Anglophilic song received the allotted 12 points from England’s professional jury.) Kudos to the trippy, psychedelic production, too, which almost made it seem like the scruffy indie rockers were competing at Eurovision 1969. The colors, the colors!

3. Poli Genova, Bulgaria
“If Love Was a Crime” (composers: Borislav Milanov, Sebastian Arman, Joacim, Bo Persson, and Poli Genova)
Official ranking: Fourth place

This asymmetrically emo-haired former child star, onetime X Factor Bulgaria judge, and Eurovision 2009/2011 veteran delivered a vivacious, adorable performance that came across like a Robyn-fronted Spice Girls starring in an off-off-off-Broadway musical production of TRON. What’s not to love?

4. Sergey Lazarev, Russia
“You Are the Only One” (composers: Philipp Kirkorov, Dimitris Kontopoulos, John Ballard, and Ralph Charlie)
Official ranking: Third place

The Best Production Award goes to this seemingly Sprockets-inspired number. Lazarev (one half of the popular, double-exclamation-pointed Russian pop duo Smash!!, and a former member of a children’s group featuring members of t.A.T.u.) began by dramatically casting shapes like a visitor at a Children’s Museum shadowbox display, then he bravely climbed inside what looked like wall-sized versions of Asteroids and Q-Bert video-game consoles. This performance was a smash (!!), indeed.

5. Jamie-Lee, Germany
“Ghost” (Thomas Burchia, Anna Leyne, and Conrad Hensel)
Official ranking: 26th place

The Sanrio- and Kpop-obsessed winner of The Voice Germany Season 5 hit the stage looking like Gwen Stefani’s Harajuku Girls threw up all over her. And her cutesy performance made it seem like she’s watched Avril Lavigne’s “Hello Kitty” music video a few too many times. Despite all the awkward cultural appropriation, I thought she pulled off her performance of this Halsey-lite track nicely, but voters didn’t agree: Jamie came in dead last.

6. Hovi Star, Israel
“Made of Stars” (composer: Doron Medalie)
Official ranking: 14th place

Not the similarly titled Moby tune, “Made of Stars” is instead an empowerment-anthem power ballad, accompanied Saturday by pyro-laden production that made it seem like Star was singing his coronation song on the Israeli Idol finale. (Star actually competed on Israel’s version of Idol, Kokhav Nolad, in 2009, so this makes total sense. Pretty much every Eurovision singer this year seemed to be an Idol, Voice, X Factor, or Got Talent veteran.) The openly gay Star lived up to his surname as he served what Logo commentator Michelle Collins called “Adam Lambert realness” – a triumph after he reportedly experienced homophobic bullying by Russian border police officers last month while on tour promoting “Made of Stars.”

7. Nina Kraljic, Croatia
“Lighthouse” (composers: Andreas Grass and Nikola Paryla)
Official ranking: 23rd place

A 10th place contestant on Croatia’s Got Talent and the winner of the first season of The Voice Croatia, Miss Kraljic — the biggest pop star in her native land — gave me the instant impression that talent shows in Europe are much, much cooler than what we Yanks get on Fox and NBC. The ethereal worldbeat diva appeared in a Homogenic-era Bjork kimono that Drag Race’s own Kim Chi would probably love to borrow for Logo’s Season 8 Drag Race finale. And before the chorus, she’d already undergone a dramatic costume change, serving Madonna-at-the-1991-Oscars realness in an Old Hollywood column gown. Her vocals admittedly wavered on the massive song, but what Nina lacked in perfect pitch she made up for with impeccable show-woman-ship and fashion flair.

8. Amir, France
“J’ai cherché” (composers: Amir Haddad, Johan Errami, and Nazim Khaled)
Official ranking: Sixth place

Celine Dion, who won Eurovision 1988 (representing Switzerland), publicly endorsed this Israeli-French singer-songwriter — and that’s gotta count for something, right? A veteran of both Israel’s Kokhav Nolad and The Voice France, Amir didn’t put on the flashiest or splashiest performance, but “J’ai cherché,” which he co-wrote, was one of this year’s catchiest contenders.

9. Michal Szpak, Poland
“Color of Your Life” (composers: Kamil Varen and Andy Palmer)
Official ranking: Eighth place

The X Factor Poland rocker runner-up claimed his “style icon is Marilyn Manson.” Logo commentator Carson Kressley added, “Maybe with a little Kenny G thrown in.” I thought Michal looked a bit like Weird Al emceeing the Ringing Bros.’ circus, personally. But he belted his ballad with all the earnestness of Michael Bolton in his ponytailed prime. And that tuxedo jacket was working for Michal. Clearly the color of this guy’s life is red.

10. Iveta Mukuchyan, Armenia
“LoveWave” (composers: Iveta Mukuchyan, Stephanie Crutchfield, Lilith Navasardyan, and Levon Navasardyan)
Official ranking: Seventh place

Such eleganza! Why do I feel like if there were ever a RuPaul’s Drag Race Armenia, every queen would lip-sync for her life to “LoveWave”? Incidentally, Iveta is a veteran of both The Voice Germany and the coolest-titled talent show ever, Hay Superstar. When will Logo start broadcasting Hay Superstar Stateside, too?

HONORABLE MENTION: Minus One, Cyprus
“Alter Ego” (composers: Minus One and Thomas G:son)
Official ranking: 21st place

They didn’t have the best song in this year’s competition by a longshot. But Minus One (a former cover band fronted by The Voice France contestant Francois Micheletto) deserve a semi-honorable mention for putting several of its members in faux-iron onstage cages, like something straight out of a vintage Scorpions music video. Are we sure these guys weren’t representing Germany?

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This article originally ran on Yahoo Music.