NBC’s ‘The Voice’ rankings: Billy Gilman, We McDonald, Sundance Head lead top 12
The top 12 contestants on “The Voice” are for the first time going to be competing directly against one another starting on Monday, and for the most part, this means one thing above all else to us: A chance to see where all of these singers stack up against one another. We can say all we want things about Alicia Keys’ team being the best or Adam Levine making some strange choices aside from Billy Gilman, but none of that really matters. All that does are the votes at the end of the show.
If you look below, you can get our quick take now on some of the projections that we have for these contestants! We don’t have too much to go on in terms of results, but we can chart these with a criteria that includes performance quality, screen time, the popularity of similar singers before, and also the popularity of the coach working with them.
12. Sa’Rayah (Team Alicia) – We do think that she’s a very solid singer, but at the same time she’s not who we would have selected if we were in Alicia’s shoes. Instead, our choice would’ve been to select here someone in Kylie Rothfield who had a chance to bring a variety of different genres to the show. Sa’Rayah may be forgotten in the midst of some similar acts.
11. Josh Gallagher (Team Adam) – Our sentiment is the same here about Josh, even if the public actually saved him before Josh needed to. On this past episode, he was competing mostly against other team members. When he’s up against so many other male singers, especially doing country, will he really stand out?
10. Courtney Harrell (Team Blake) – Talent-wise, she should be higher on this list. There are two things we worry about: Whether or not her coach will pick the right songs for her, and whether or not she is going to get a chance to have a coach who knows the right songs to pick for her. Sure, Blake’s worked with non-country singers before, but it’s been a while since he’s had great success in her genre of music.
9. Christian Cuevas (Team Alicia) – As we said, we thought going into the lives that Alicia had a stacked team. We worry about some of the choices that were made there, though, and we also wonder about Christian’s ability to pick some current song choices that will really play well with the audience at home.
8. Darby Walker (Team Miley) – We never would’ve imagined that Darby would need her coach’s help before being safe in the Life Playoffs; maybe we overrated her. The reality is that she’s someone people are either going to love or hate, and while that probably will help her for the first week or two, after that she could have some trouble.
7. Brendan Fletcher (Team Adam) – Brendan is another major enigma at the moment for us, given that he needed Adam’s help to stay around in the competition, and yet he is one of the only two artists on the show with any iTunes traction last week. The latter is a promising sign, so we’ll see what happens next.
6. Ali Caldwell (Team Miley) – A very good singer, but one we worry about in terms of getting the attention and focus she deserves. We’re not altogether sure that she’s had that over the course of the competition to date.
5. Aaron Gibson (Team Miley) – In general, Miley’s problem is that we assumed going into the live shows that Darby was her slam-dunk; we weren’t quite sure about anyone else. Aaron does have the potential to be a finalist on this season, but for him it’s going to be about song choice and innovation. Otherwise, he could just blend in.
4. Austin Allsup (Team Blake) – Country singers on Team Blake always have an edge. We figure it’s even more so when there are some people out there at least reasonably familiar with them. We can easily envision Austin in the finale; we just hope that he really pushes himself and does some surprising songs between now and then.
3. Sundance Head (Team Blake) – The one reason we rank Sundance slightly ahead of Austin is because he’s already got some reality TV experience and a comfort level there. Even if you don’t know him from “American Idol,” he’s so easily recognizable that this is going to be something that works in his favor.
2. We McDonald (Team Alicia) – Probably the most talented singer in the entire competition, and someone who’s got a unique name, personality, style, and plenty of airtime to boot. People will remember her, and if she delivers on what we know she’s capable of, it’s easy to envision a path now where she makes it all the way to the end of the show.
1. Billy Gilman (Team Adam) – As good as We may be, we’d be complete idiots to go against the one guy with the biggest fan following already out there. Not only that, but he also charted better on iTunes than anyone out there, and has a very strong voice in his own right. It’d be silly to coin anyone else the favorite for now.
Who do you think is in the best spot now? Be sure to share in the poll below!
Want to get some other news right now on “The Voice”? Then be sure to head over to the link here! Hopefully, we’ll be back at some point tomorrow to hand down some song spoilers. (Photo: NBC.)