Idol Chatter & Voice Views

The Voice — with the help of voters — picks eight more contestants to advance this week.

Tonight, we hear from the members of Team Cee Lo and Team Adam.

Three from each team will be voted into the next rounds. One of the three remaining contestants will be saved by their judge.

Last week, voters got it mostly right, advancing RaeLynn, Jermaine Paul and Erin Willett from Team Blake and Jesse Campbell, Lindsey Pavao and Chris Mann from Team Christina.

The judges’ saves went to Jordis Unga on Team Blake and Ashley De La Rosa from Team Christina, somehow eliminating Charlotte Sometimes, who I thought turned in one of last week’s best performances.

Like last week, I’ll be grading each performance as it occurs tonight. The link attached to each singer’s name will take you to a profile and pre-Voice performances for that artist.

Team Adam

Katrina Parker:  Insurance worker Katrina kicks off tonight’s show with the Smashing Pumpkins’ “Tonight, Tonight.”  She’s not all that much of a novice, having released a 6-track EP in 2005.  I wasn’t thrilled with the first performance of the night.  Her voice was sometimes lost in the background music.  It didn’t offer her lots of opportunities to show off her range.  And you could tell from the critiques that the other judges weren’t thrilled with it either.  Well, except her own mentor.  Perhaps she needed to borrow some of Sera Hill’s or Lindsey Pavao’s backup singers from last week to add a little excitement. Grade: C+

Tony Lucca:  Here’s the veteran from the Micky Mouse Club, who’s become a singer-songwriter with a long list of CDs and EPs to his credit.  He’ll sing “In Your Eyes” from Peter Gabriel.  I would have rather heard him sing one of his own songs.  But pouring emotion into his music isn’t a problem for Tony, and he did it again with that performance.  Christina thinks there are better singers in the competition, and she might be right.  But, four songs in, I thought that was the best performance so far tonight.  Oh, Christina thinks Tony’s too one-dimensional, too.  Yikes, where’s that Micky Mouse love?  Grade: B-

Kim Yarbrough:  She’s the 50-year-old who has worked all sorts of odd jobs, and also worked as a model, actress and singer.  She’ll try Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep.”  Brave choice.  But  if anyone among the dozen singers we’ll hear tonight is up to the Adele challenge, it’s Kim.  Cee Lo didn’t love the song choice and makes a good point.  How do you come off as original or amazing when you’re singing a song so well known and so current?  Kim did an adequate job with the song, and an adequate job of Adele is an accomplishment, but it’s not exactly the impression you want to leave on a show like this.  Grade: C.

Mathai:  The gal whose family history tells us she should be a nursing student will sing John Legend’s “Ordinary People.”  Mathai looks lovely in green.  Another youngster not the least bit intimidated by The Voice stage.  Unique tone to her voice and she didn’t exactly play it safe with her vocal choices.  Christina calls it a “little loungey.”  Adam says that was the intent, to show off Mathai’s voice.  Grade: C+

Karla Davis:  This gal’s a good country singer.  But she’s decided to sing “Airplanes” for her first voting performance.  She calls the song a risk. What it was is a mistake.  She sang the parts that were supposed to be rapped.  But those parts of the song came out more like a rushed whisper. Her voice just wasn’t strong enough to carry that song.  Adam says she was a “huge surprise” but also admits there were problems with the performance.  Gee, you think?  Grade: D+

Pip:   The guy with the plaid pants and suspenders will perform “When You Were Young.”  He says he wants to be more of a rock singer.  So tonight, we have flame red pants with a leather jacket.  OK, that started out fairly well, but when Pip started dancing around, his vocals got lost in the music.  And if you’re going to be a rock singer, there needs to be more grit and rawness in your voice.  Sorry, but I’m not buying the guy in a bow tie as a big bad rocker.  Juliet Simms could kick his butt all over the stage.  Grade: C-

Team Cee Lo

Cheesa:  She’s the gal who moved from Hawaii to L.A. so she and her brother could pursue music careers, even though it meant financial harships for the family.  She’ll sing “Don’t Leave Me This Way.”  Cheesa started that song off with a great tone to her voice, but once the chorus kicked in, it seemed like she was shouting as much as singing.  That said, she showed a heck of a lot more energy than Katrina, who kicked off the night.  Not the slightest bit of performance night jitters either.  Grade: C

James Massone:  The guy from the Boston area who worked in his dad’s body shop will sing “Don’t Know Why.”   Oh, look, he’s singing on a bench, by a streetlight with his name on the street sign.  Oh, no.  I hope this song is a really bad match  for James’ voice.  Otherwise, I’m struggling to understand what James is doing in this competition.  That was just plain bad, with pitch problems and squeakiness all over the place.  Cee Lo seems to think James will be a hit with the ladies.  Because of his voice?  Isn’t that what the show’s supposed to be about?  Grade: D.

Juliet Simms:  This gal has rocked it out with Automatic Loveletter.  She’ll sing “Roxanne” by The Police.  Wow, finally someone changed up a song.  Nice, raw performance from beginning to end.  The opening grabbed your attention and Juliet stomped and stalked her way around the stage while rocking the song home.  She took a Police song I don’t particularly like and made me like it.  Six performances in, that’s my new favorite of the night.  Grade:  B+

Tony Vincent:  The former Broadway star — and former pop singer — will sing “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.”  Not Queen?  In truth, this song is more in keeping with the music he sang pre-Broadway than the Queen tunes he wound up singing in Vegas.  My biggest complaint is that he’s giving us a standard, safe version of the song that isn’t showing off the vocal power we heard when he performed in the blind audition.  Grade: C

Erin Martin:  She’s the gal who played Egyptian princess warrior in her blind audition, and bizarre costumes aren’t a problem for the former model.   Oh, and look at this, she’ll sing “Walk Like an Egyptian.”  Love the staging.  Absolutely tons of fun.  That said, I think Christina’s critique is spot on.  The vocal could have been stronger.  And that said, I hope Erin makes it through.  When it comes to unique voices, I think she has one of the more distinct on the show.  But on that performance, there were times her voice was lost in the background music.  Grade: C+

Jamar Rogers:  Look at this, the former Idol contestant gets the pimp spot on The Voice.  And it looks like he’s changed up his hairstyle for his big performance.  He’ll perform “Are You Gonna Go My Way.”   OK, Jamar looks a heck of a lot more like a rocker than Pip did.  And I like the guitarists on stilts.  But he’s another singer whose vocals are getting lost.  Except for that big glory note at the end.  Nice performance; OK vocal.  Wish I could have heard more Jamar and less guitar.  Grade: C+

Wow, all in all, just a so-so night for The Voice.

I’ll be back in a few with a recap.