The live shows on The Voice began Monday amid a Los Angeles heatwave that knocked out the air conditioning in the studio. That meant Carson Daly beginning to sweat immediately, joking about Blake Shelton’s hair while his own was going haywire.
Less than 18 minutes into the two hour show, Daly doffed his coat and rolled up his sleeves. At 35 minutes in, Usher was stripping down to his T-shirt.
Daly said that if it got hot enough in the studio, the lights would automatically shut off. Gotta love live TV.
But the AC finally kicked in before the first hour was up and mostly, the 12 singers on stage seemed the least ruffled throughout the ordeal.
Their performances brought universal praise from all of the judges and viewers were left to wonder why exactly they had advanced some of them. While the show prides itself on blind auditions, at least some of the choices made since then seems to have been based on younger cuter contestants. Does anybody remember the scarred and tattooed contestants this show used to feature?
Given the chance to sing anything, it was surprising that one third of the selections were from either Michael Jackson or Martina McBride, but there you have it.
The singer named Vedo, on Usher’s team, began the show with “Rock with You”; near the end, Kris Thomas of Shakira’s team sang “I’ll Be There,” all of this while Prince Michael Jackson, the King of Pop’s son, was making his TV acting debut on the series finale of “90210” on another channel.
No such symmetry for McBride — her songs are just good for the strident female country singers in the competition, and there are a lot of them. Holly Tucker sang “A Broken Wing” and Amber Carrington, on Adam Levine’s team, sang “I’m Gonna Love You Through It” to close the show.
Of the other strong young female singers, Blake gave Danielle Bradbery a Carrie Underwood song, “Wasted,” that she dispatched well enough that Shakira called her “a 16 year old Margaret Thatcher,” though nobody seemed to know what she was referring to.
Just two contestants will be dropped in Tuesday’s results show; voters could choose from any number of shaky performances.
Among the misfires, Garrett Gardner, on Shakira’s team, tried to rock up the Backstreet Boys’ anthem “I Want It That Way,” but, armed with an electric guitar he only used half the time, only got as hard-edged as Rick Springfield in the rendition, falling short of both rock and in transcending boy band pop realms.
Sarah Simmons, who sees herself as an indie artist of some sort, tried on Brandi Carlile’s “The Story,” but thrashed it to within an inch of its life by its end (still, tin-eared judges cheered).
The Swon Brothers earned points for picking a George Jones song in tribute to the icon who recently died. But their acoustic version of “Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes” was a little too wispy to be effective. (And who wants duos on The Voice anyway? Get rid of these dudes).
Shakira advised that Sasha Allen’s version of Heart’s “Alone” was a little too theatrical, but she brought the Broadway anyway in her misguided performance.
Performing for Usher’s team, Josiah Hawley’s take on The Script’s “The Man Who Can’t Be Moved” wasn’t much of a Script-revision; it was pretty true to the original and was pretty solid.
But Michelle Chamuel’s version of Robyn’s “Call Your Girlfriend” was generic enough to erase her memorable take on “True Colours” last week for Usher’s team.
Everyone assumes Judith Hill is the singer to beat this season on The Voice, mostly because, as the final stage duet partner for Michael Jackson, she’s already been fairly well established as a professional singer before she even got on the show. But her solo piano rendition of Carole King’s “You’ve Got a Friend” Monday was ho-hum enough to help level the field with the others.
Barring any further voting scandals such as the one that broke out last week, it looks like it will be a long march to the finals.
To distract from the elimination Tuesday there will be performances from just about everybody who served as mentors earlier in the season — Lady Antebellum as well as Robin Thicke performing with T.I and Pharrell.