The Voice UK: Season 1: Top 20 - Part 2 - Perform!
07 May, 2012 4:59 PM
After the loss of Samuel and Sophie last week, it's Team Danny and Team Jessie who are under pressure to impress as one from each team goes home tonight. Both teams performed last week in the live results show so what remains to be seen is whether they can step it up and do better than some of the stand-outs from last week such as Team Tom's Ruth. Will Jessie and Danny struggle to send one from their team home or will it all become quite clear who is heading home after the results? We'll see!
Recap and videos after the JUMP ...
Toni Warne
'Proud Mary' (Tina Turner) -7.5/10 - Toni has definitely made a big impression since her first audition and her captivating story about dealing with alopecia. And although as a general rule, I'm not overly keen on sob stories, I thought that it was an appropriate sob story and was sort of necessary considering the circumstances. I really like her voice, it's powerful but also quite bluesy and this is translating a lot better to this song than I first expected. With that said, I'm a bit unsure of the outfit, I'm far from a fashion expert, well I'm not a fashion expert at all but it is a bit bizarre. Anyway, based on the voice (remember what it's all about? No, not Elvis Presley being friends with Tom Jones), she has delivered a really solid opening to the show but I can't help but fear that she may suffer the consequences of being first out. Regardless, I don't envisage Toni being out after that unless everyone else is better (which I can't see happening) as aside from a few shouty notes, that was a pretty flawless performance.
Ruth-Ann St. Luce
'Promise This' (Cheryl Cole) - 6.5/10 - I really feel for Ruth-Ann. She's had about a minute of airtime so far most of which has consisted of the other coaches saying that she's not very good. She may not have had the best Blind Audition but her Battle Round performance was pretty good actually and she's a nice girl. In particular, I really loved her X Factor audition so I hope she can regain her fantastic vocals from then. I like her tone, it's soulful and she is singing it quite well in the verse. Okay, she has a big pitch problem at one point but manages to recover from it quite well, the problems in her vocals lie with the big notes, she has problems reigning her voice in but that big note at the end is fantastic, I really wish that Jessie gave her a motown song like her X Factor audition as it seems like her strength lies with more classic songs as opposed to modern stuff like this, she's 100% better than Cheryl (insert 'It's not hard' joke followed by chortle) but I don't think Ruth-Ann will be back next week unfortunately, she had potential but I don't think 'The Voice' has done her any favours, she should definitely get some training as there's a lot of potential there. Also, is it just me or are Will's comments bizarre? He genuinely needs subtitles as he uses twenty words when one would do to basically tell her that there were pitch problems.
Vince Kidd
'Always On My Mind' (Willie Nelson/Elvis Presley) - 8.5/10 - Vince is certainly one of the most unique acts in the competition, he puts his own twist on every song he sings which I find extremely cool as it gives him a unique edge over people who do straight covers of songs. However, at the same time, I do sort of wish we could see him performing a song straight from the heart without any runs or tricks to see how good his voice is on a simple level. His diction definitely could do with improvement, I like that he's doing something different with the song but there are some slight pitch problems and I still get Deandre Brackensick vibes from him especially in the falsetto parts. Vince is definitely an exciting and different contestant and I love how unique his vocals are especially in the chorus. Overall, Vince delivers probably my favourite performance of the night so far, a real triumph considering that Vince arranged the song completely by himself.
Cassius Henry
'Paradise' (Coldplay) - 5.5/10 - This is a slightly odd choice for Cassius, I know that it's important to go overkill with urban songs for him but he needs to be singing songs that suit him and this isn't very well suited to him. His vocals are far too pitchy during the chorus in particular and he almost shouts some of the notes, it's not that bad but I just would prefer that he had performed something like his audition song rather than this as it isn't doing anything for him vocally. Cassius is a really good R & B vocalist but there's a lot more to the competition than just having a good voice despite what the slogan says, you need to be able to connect with the audience and he may sing well but for me, he does have a slight probleWm with connecting to the lyrics of the songs he sings, this did nothing for him and I think being near the end of the running order is the only thing that plays to his advantage.
Becky Hill
'Good Luck' (Basement Jaxx) - 9.5/10 - I wasn't expecting Becky to sing this nor was I expecting her to be this good, Becky hasn't been my favourite previously but she was far and away the best tonight from Team Jessie, what a really unique song choice for her. She has a raspy tone to her voice which I find really appealing and she reminds me in particular of Elise Testone from American Idol. Becky hadn't previously stood out but there's no denying that she has a lot of talent and I'm really looking forward to seeing what else she can come up with in the show, she has a very low voice for a girl which is sure to lead to some very cool performances, she's compared to Janis Joplin which is a compliment and a half and I honestly think she has a major chance of going far in the competition if she keeps up the standard and more importantly, if she ditches the long lead microphone (laugh at this joke because it's funny and that).
Max Milner
'Freefallin' (Tom Petty/John Mayer) - 8.5/10 - This is a real favourite of mine, the song is full of soul and full of energy and I really love the acoustic feel of all of Max's performance. He isn't wearing his hat for once which is a surprise, anyway, the song is a pretty good fit for his voice, the only thing that I'd say is that he doesn't sing it with the same sort of edge to his voice as he has in previous performances, it's a bit tamer than I was expecting but that's not neccessarily a terrible thing. I love the tone to his voice, it's so soulful yet there are so many other dimensions to his vocals as well, it reminds me of something you might hear the likes of David Cook strumming out to on 'American Idol'. A really great performance, my only slight fear is that because he is on second, he may not be remembered well enough and as a result, people may not vote for him, let's hope that's not the case.
Hannah Berney
'Cry Me A River mash-up' (Ella Fitzgerald/Justin Timberlake) - 8/10 - This is an interesting concept, mashing up two songs of the same name but of very different styles. She's definitely doing the swing one justice with her voice, her vocals are quite jazzy in the first half of the song but as it slides into the second song, the modern Justin Timberlake track, her edgy vocals take over and she puts a real rock slant onto the established song. I'm really enjoying this performance as well, it's one that she ought to be proud of because she definitely has the chops to pull this performance off. If I was to aim one criticism it's that I would have preferred Danny to give her just the one song, either the classic one or the modern one rather than trying to mash the two up because I'm not quite sure if that worked as well as it should have. Aside from that, a very strong performance and I would love to see her back next week as she has a great voice.
Aleks Josh
'Dream A Little Dream' (Michael Bublé) - 5.5/10 - This is very sleepy, I haven't been overly keen on Aleks in the past and this is vocally better than his previous performances but I'm not a big fan of swing music and this just strikes me as a pretty lazy choice that doesn't really have a chance of selling very much to the masses for whilst Bublé is successful, Aleks is not a touch on him and furthermore, acts who have went down this route like The X Factor's Ray Quinn and Leon Jackson have not been successful. There are still countless flat parts throughout the song, particularly on the last note so overall, I don't think I'm that impressed, it was a big improvement on his previous performances but he's still by far the weakest in his team so far so unless Bo and David really slip, I don't imagine him really meriting his place on the team with that performance regardless of the fact that I reckon he's still safe.
David Julien
'Sweet Disposition' (The Temper Trap) - 3/10 - David AKA Matt Cardle's twin brother has been quite good thus far in the competition and David has chosen a really good song choice so I'm looking forward to this. Okay, listening to this and listening to the original, he's completely off key for the falsetto, you need to be quite familiar with the original to know this but he is utterly off key during the falsetto part of the song and although he kind of redeems it during the rest of the performance, it's a bit like trying to make up what is esentially a car-crash at the start, there's no coming back from being that off in the falsetto part of the song, this is definitely the weakest vocal of the night, it was all sort of ruined by the start because that set him off on the wrong foot and I'm shocked that none of the judges really pick up on this. I have liked David previously but tonight, the umbrellas, the weird falsetto note, it's not cutting the mustard for me.
Bo Bruce
'Keep Running Up That Hill' (Kate Bush) - 10/10 - I love Bo's voice, I would buy her album today because it's so unique, she reminds me of Sinead O'Connor, mixed with Imogen Heap and Dolores O'Riordan, there are so many different aspects to her voice and she really has a marketable appeal. I love the fact that she has her own sense of style and she definitely sells herself with the emotion she pours into all the songs she sings. This is a brilliant song choice, Danny definitely chose correctly with Bo, she conveys the desperation in Kate Bush's voice from the original and for me, this is by far the performance of the night, you can see that the song means a lot to her. Bo's performance shows that you don't need to be Whitney Houston and you don't need to have dancers and fireworks to pull of a show stopping performance, all you need is a really special voice and to be able to put your own stamp on a song, Bo definitely did that, I love it.
Results
Eliminated Contestants:
Ruth-Ann St. Luce
Hannah Berney
These two exits are fully expected unfortunately, I liked Ruth-Ann and felt sorry for her but her performance was flawed, with that said, I do think that her coach didn't pick the correct songs for her voice and that her lack of positive airtime did her no favours. There's no way that she or Toni were worse than Cassius though but the early slot, the death slot for Toni was what caused this result. Similar for Team Danny, Max being second on the line-up with a less memorable performance than his audition was probably the reason for his appearance in the bottom two, it's a pity as both he and Hannah were better than David and Aleks in my humble opinion and an argument over dancers overshadowed a good performance by Hannah.
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