NBC’s ‘The Voice’ review: Trevin Hunte, Nicholas David rule knockouts
“The Voice” has finally declared two of the teams for the live shows, and it happened via a knockout round that was really what the battle rounds should be. It was fast-paced, and we had a nice ten performances within the span of two hours as both Cee Lo Green and Adam Levine narrowed down the field as to who will be going live. We’ll kick things off here with Adam, and then switch over to Cee Lo Green midway through.
Joselyn Rivera vs. Kayla Nevarez – Joselyn performed “Love on Top” by Beyonce, and the only why we can describe this as a little bit of a mess in that it was flat pretty much throughout. Kayla was marginally better in her performance of “Shark in the Water,” which is a little bit ironic given all of fake TwitPics of sharks floating along the streets of New Jersey (and all of our thoughts are with those dealing with the Hurricane). Adam surprisingly went with Joselyn, even though she is still a new addition to his team.
Joe Kirkland vs. Bryan Keith – In the battle of song choice, we have to give it to Bryan for having the gonads to actually sing the iconic “Everything I Do, I Do It For You.” Meanwhile, Joe picked a song in “Mean” from Taylor Swift that was not exactly challenge. Strangely, we actually preferred Joe’s performance since Bryan really couldn’t hit all of the desired notes. Even though Adam admitted that Bryan struggled with this performance, he did manage to advance.
Amanda Brown vs. Michelle Brooks Thompson – Who doesn’t love a little Grace Potter and the Nocturnals? She is one heck of a brave singer, and she’s also pretty amazing based on what we saw during the battle rounds. Meanwhile, Michelle went with a cover of “Spotlight,” and both of them were actually better than what we heard from the other four singers. Surprisingly, Adam did go against the other coaches and picked Amanda.
Loren Allred vs. Nicole Nelson – The movement that we saw that Loren was involved here, it seemed to be a given that Nicole was going to win this. But was it? In the biggest shocker of the entire night, Adam actually picked her to advance to the live shows over someone who was both a titan and a favorite to win this competition.
Melanie Martinez vs. Sam James – This fight could not be any more different between the two singers. Melanie is as quirky and unique as unique can get, whereas Sam is a little bit more middle-of-the-road, even if he sang something in “Walking in Memphis” that we have a deep personal connection to. Melanie won, and it was pretty deserved.
Team Cee Lo
Cody Belewe vs. Avery Wilson – This was a contest between two singers that really were doing everything that they could to impress the coaches, and it worked perfectly for one of them. Avery was a complete mess vocally despite his dance moves, and he forgot what this show is called. Meanwhile, Cody gave what may be the best performance of the show, and he moved on because of it.
Mackenzie Bourg vs. Daniel Rosa – This was one of those battles where the two performers really could not be any more different, but Mackenzie managed to really steal the show courtesy of one of the only kinds of covers to “Call Me Maybe” that we have not heard before. Not only was it fun, but he also sang it well.
Terisa Griffin vs. Trevin Hunte – Poor Terisa. You had to go up against one of the best performers of the entire season in Trevin, who Cee Lo clearly has a close personal connection with. However, he chose a song in “Against All Odds” that has been butchered on “American Idol” more times than we can count. This wasn’t really even close, and he is a serious frontrunner to win this whole thing.
Nicholas David vs. Mycle Wastman – We love Nicholas, and it’s for more than just his crazy facial hair. He’s just a quirky dude with a great voice. We would easily pick him over a pretty predictable singer in Mycle who looks just like everyone else on the show. This battle was pretty easy to call: Nicholas won it, and deservedly so.
Caitlin Michele vs. Diego Val – Finally, we had one heck of a rock showdown between the two rockers in the competition. We actually think that Caitlin gave one of the best covers of “Bring Me To Life” that we have heard, but she couldn’t crack the armor of one of Cee Lo’s favorites.
Who was your favorite from this week’s show, and do you think the battle rounds should really go as quickly as this show did?