The rest of the top 20 took the stage tonight in an attempt to win America’s votes. There were some challenging songs, some confusing bathrobes, and too many pairs of leather pants.
Pharrell
Pharrell kicked off the second night of live performances with a live performance of his own, of his new song “Hunter.” It’s tough to say what exactly happened during this performance. There were a gaggle of beautiful women in floral leotards on a bunch of logs. Then the audience was full of dead-faced women wearing white bathrobes and aviators. It was all so weird that the only line this writer was able to make out in the song was “Duck Dynasty is cool and all, but they got nothing on a female’s call.” Not your best, Pharrell. Not your best.
Team Pharrell
Jean Kelley
Jean Kelley
Jean Kelley struggled with Pharrell’s song choice for her: Brenda Russell’s “Piano in the Dark.” She connected with the lyric, but not with the ‘80s cheesiness of it. Pharrell did some fixing and made the track a little more modern, and more to Jean’s liking. The performance itself was the most dramatic thing we’ve seen since Celine Dion’s “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now.” Jean really had the drama turned up to 11, and it overshadowed her beautiful vocals. The coaches tried their best to tiptoe nicely around telling her to tone it down.
Elyjuh Rene
Elyjuh Rene got some negative feedback from his earlier performances, about overdoing it emotionally, and seeming fake. Pharrell encouraged him, saying as long as he’s being genuine, he’ll be fine. He chose “Latch” by Disclosure ft. Sam Smith for Elyjuh’s first live performance, to encourage him to sing to himself, and embrace himself. It was without a doubt his best performance yet, because he toned down the dramatics, and turned up the vocals. Adam Levine was very nearly speechless as a result of Elyjuh’s performance, and any Voice fan knows that is no small feat.
Luke Wade
Pharrell certainly set up a huge challenge for Luke by choosing Marvin Gaye’s classic “Let’s Get It On.” Pharrell chose the song to show off Luke’s voice and give him the chance to charm America. His challenge would be to think it less, and feel it more, and Luke loves a challenge. It was not as sexy as the original, though Luke made the effort with some awkward hand kisses with the audience. It’s not the best competition performance we’ve seen of this song (*cough* Matt Giraud *cough*), but Luke really got into it at the end, especially when he continued his odd tradition of just yelling things at the end of a song.
DaNica Shirey
DaNica Shirey had a big challenge this week, performing Joni Mitchell’s “Help Me.” Her coach Pharrell, poet laureate of our time, told her “Your voice is like a hummingbird in front of a flower,” and said he chose the song because it’s “a garden of different colors.” Beautiful stuff, man. The song was crazy difficult, with a lot of key changes, but DaNica was excited to do things she’d never done before. Her performance was, of course, amazing. Her voice is absolutely flawless, and the coaches were thrilled with what DaNica and Pharrell did to the song.
Sugar Joans
The vocal challenges continued, as Pharrell chose “I Say a Little Prayer For You” by Aretha Franklin. He loves where Sugar’s voice sits when she sings soul, and she loved the opportunity to sing a song by one of her biggest influences. Well, Sugar certainly rose to the challenge, and sang the freaking crap out of it. We learned that she changed her name from Sophia Louise to Sugar, but regardless of the name she’s going by, she’s certainly making a name for herself in music.
Team Gwen
Ryan Sill
Gwen struggled to choose a song for Ryan Sill, but decided one One Republic’s “I Lived,” because the anthemic song would show a more rugged side of his sweet voice. With his perfectly-coifed hair, and perfectly-groomed eyebrows, Ryan wants that boyband life so bad he can taste it. He looked like he was dressed by Gwen herself, in what looked to be a Starfleet version of a classic boyband outfit. And what is with all the ill-fitting leather pants?! Anyway, Ryan’s vocals were on point, and he did his coach proud.
Bryana Salaz
Gwen gave Bryana Salaz the 5 Seconds of Summer hit “Amnesia,” because she wanted to peel away the layers and see what Bryana really has inside of her. The key to nailing this song would be the emotion, and making it her own. Bryana started off pretty nervous, and her shell seemed pretty tough to crack. She was all vibrato, and no soul. But as the performance progressed, Bryana got more and more emotional, and it showed in her vocals.
Anita Antoinette
Gwen chose Meghan Trainor’s body-positive anthem “All About That Bass” for her contestant and Most Adorable Person in the World, Anita Antoinette. She chose the song because it has sort of a reggae feel, without pigeonholing Anita too much. Anita was a complete natural onstage, and you’d never know she ever had a problem with stage fright. The performance had a reggae breakdown that runs the risk of pigeonholing her, if such things continue, but Adam loved it so much he demanded that he and Anita hang out sometime.
Ricky Manning
Ricky Manning had the priviledge of performing the third Sam Smith song this week: “Lay Me Down.” This performance would have to be all about delivery, which shouldn’t be too difficult for Ricky, as he’s in a long-distance relationship with his girlfriend of four years, so he could really relate to it. It’s tough to match Sam Smith’s vocals, and Ricky had some trouble in rehearsals with his falsetto. The performance had some difficult spots, but he powered through and really delivered a solid performance.
Taylor John Williams
Team Gwen’s Taylor John Williams closed out the show with Stealer’s Wheel’s “Stuck in the Middle with You.” The song’s hoppy, dance-y, style is not really Taylor’s style, so he slowed it down a half step, making it a little more swampy. He started his performance off with a little swanky walking up to the microphone, and from then on he had command of the stage. His performance was sexy and clever, which made up for his LEATHER FREAKING PANTS.
The Voice season 7’s top 12 contestants will be revealed Wednesday night at 8 p.m. on NBC.