Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Season 4 of The Voice begins Monday night at 8 p.m. on NBC. Check back for live blogs during each show and for bios of the contestants who land a spot in the competition.

Meanwhile, it’s time to catch up with some familiar faces from Season 3 who have new music, including Nelly’s Echo of Team Christina.

Before The Voice: Nelly’s Echo is Nelson Emokpae, 35 at the time of his Voice audition, a native of Nigeria and a resident of Baltimore, Md. He told The Voice that he, his mother and three brothers fled to the U.S. from Nigeria because of political unrest when he was a teenager and that he found comfort in uplifting music. As for the stage name: “Nelly is me. Echo is the audience appreciation of the performance,” he told Voice host Carson Daly. Prior to the show, he released an EP named “Live, Love ‘N Laugh” in 2007 and a full-length CD “Secrets to a Happy Life” in 2009.

On The Voice: His audition of “Ain’t No Sunshine” prompted Christina and Adam to spin their chairs. His rationale for picking Christina was simple. He had already decided that whoever turned around first was the coach he would go with. He lost in the second round of the competition when he was paired with vocal powerhouse De’Borah and that were asked to sing “Message in a Bottle.”

Since The Voice: Nelly released two new songs in January, “I Love You” and “Go to Sleep.” They’re available on iTunes. He followed up with a video for the latter song later in the month. He’s now in the middle of the 54-date “I Love You” tour, with a stop Sunday in Winston-Salem, N.C. He played a show in Stroudsburg, Pa., over the weekend.

Keeping up with Nelly’s Echo: Here are the links for his Facebook page and YouTube channel. On Twitter, he’s simply @NellysEcho. You’ll find his website here.

Nelly’s Echo, “Go to Sleep”

Nelly’s Echo, snippet of “I Love You”