Contestants you disliked at first but grew on you afterwards.

[allistr]

Talk about it.

[Discovolcano]

Shawn Sounds

Ian Flanagan 

Desz

Megan Danielle 

[ikwonic]

I disliked Abby Cates on the show (apart from her KO which I really enjoyed), but I'm a huge fan of her after listening to all her music off the show. I get that TPTB bussed her and gave her a shitty edit with a short-clipped audition to favor the other teen girls (Kennedy, Reagan, Chevel, Sarah, and I guess Lynnea too), but I personally wish that Abby had been pimped as a frontrunner that season instead. 

 

And honestly, given the weirdly high concentration of teen females that season, I genuinely think I would've preferred to see the ones that got cut early on (Abby Cates, Claire DeJean, Mercedes Ferreira-Dias, Lela, and Emily Hough) go farther than Kennedy, Reagan, Chevel, Sarah, and Lynnea.

 

Edited February 22, 2022 by ikwonic

[Sachin Jain]

Paris Winningham

[TeamAudra]

On 2/21/2022 at 9:14 PM, ikwonic said:

I disliked Abby Cates on the show (apart from her KO which I really enjoyed), but I'm a huge fan of her after listening to all her music off the show. I get that TPTB bussed her and gave her a shitty edit with a short-clipped audition to favor the other teen girls (Kennedy, Reagan, Chevel, Sarah, and I guess Lynnea too), but I personally wish that Abby had been pimped as a frontrunner that season instead. 

 

And honestly, given the weirdly high concentration of teen females that season, I genuinely think I would've preferred to see the ones that got cut early on (Abby Cates, Claire DeJean, Mercedes Ferreira-Dias, Lela, and Emily Hough) go farther than Kennedy, Reagan, Chevel, Sarah, and Lynnea.

 

I mentioned this numerous times during the season…Abby had literally hundreds of singing videos posted online, yet none of them were live performances. We all saw what happened the first time they went live, and here we are 3+ years later, and people are still in denial. 

[ikwonic]

4 hours ago, TeamAudra said:

I mentioned this numerous times during the season…Abby had literally hundreds of singing videos posted online, yet none of them were live performances. We all saw what happened the first time they went live, and here we are 3+ years later, and people are still in denial. 

She also has numerous live performances out there too that are fine? Judging someone's entire live singing ability on one live performance to a terrible bus-worthy song in the first week of the live rounds of The Voice, performing in front of millions of people across the globe seems a bit harsh. Next to Me wasn't even that bad either, she tried to do too much with a one dimensional song and it ended up messy, but she had good moments in there. Anyways, Abby must clearly be a good performer live, considering Kelly invited her on her live tour with her...

Edited February 23, 2022 by ikwonic

[thevoiceisthetop]

2 hours ago, ikwonic said:

She also has numerous live performances out there too that are fine? Judging someone's entire live singing ability on one live performance to a terrible bus-worthy song in the first week of the live rounds of The Voice, performing in front of millions of people across the globe seems a bit harsh. Next to Me wasn't even that bad either, she tried to do too much with a one dimensional song and it ended up messy, but she had good moments in there. Anyways, Abby must clearly be a good performer live, considering Kelly invited her on her live tour with her...

Plus I think I heard Abby say once that wasn't the version she wanted to do with the instrumental. I think she wanted to slow it down more i think

[Anybody354]

Katie Rae. When I first heard her audition, I thought she was just okay. But then I heard her battle, and was like damn! Over time, I’ve come to appreciate her audition.

 

I also wasn’t wild on Lana’s audition or battle, but after her knockout, I began to like her earlier performances more. Her tone sounds like honey.

 

Finally, Christine Cain. Must people here disliked her audition or felt neutrally about it. At first, I thought her audition was mediocre, but I have grown to like it a lot. Her lows, “crackles” in her voice (as John said), and overall tone are really cool. She only had a few “meh” or mediocre parts when she went for high notes, but I really like her audition nonetheless.

[TeamAudra]

1 hour ago, thevoiceisthetop said:

Plus I think I heard Abby say once that wasn't the version she wanted to do with the instrumental. I think she wanted to slow it down more i think

That is pretty standard. They don’t generally get to choose the arrangement, and it usually only gets brought up when a convenient excuse is needed for a contestant’s elimination. 

[Gustavo527]

Abby Cates showed a lot of potential during her time on the show, but it was clear, after her playoffs performance, that she lacked experience singing live on stage

 

Now, with that said, i'm sure she has improved with time, and her knockout will always remain iconic no matter what 

[Gustavo527]

2 hours ago, TeamAudra said:

That is pretty standard. They don’t generally get to choose the arrangement, and it usually only gets brought up when a convenient excuse is needed for a contestant’s elimination. 

Holly Henry comes to my mind 

[Bouli]

Chevel Shepherd is my biggest. IDK what happened with that one lol, I think I was just so jaded that season because of all of the DeAndre/RobeGate drama. I was also rooting for Kennedy and Kirk. The first moment I started to change was at "Broken Hearts" during the finale, but funnily enough, what really got me to like her was when I heard her singing "God Bless America" at some NASCAR event. I don't even follow NASCAR lol, someone here linked it to me. Her voice was so powerful, that it made me go back to all of her other performances. That girl is extremely gifted, and she managed to be extremely consistent in a heck of a season... and I don't know what took me so long to realize just how good she was.

 

Paris Winningham is another one. I didn't like his audition much at all. Didn't like him until "Tennessee Whiskey." Very similarly to Jershika Maple, who I only started to like after "Inseparable." They weren't ever my favorites or snowflakes that season, but I didn't like them until those performances.

[TeamAudra]

14 hours ago, Bouli said:

Chevel Shepherd is my biggest. IDK what happened with that one lol, I think I was just so jaded that season because of all of the DeAndre/RobeGate drama. I was also rooting for Kennedy and Kirk. The first moment I started to change was at "Broken Hearts" during the finale, but funnily enough, what really got me to like her was when I heard her singing "God Bless America" at some NASCAR event. I don't even follow NASCAR lol, someone here linked it to me. Her voice was so powerful, that it made me go back to all of her other performances. That girl is extremely gifted, and she managed to be extremely consistent in a heck of a season... and I don't know what took me so long to realize just how good she was.

 

Paris Winningham is another one. I didn't like his audition much at all. Didn't like him until "Tennessee Whiskey." Very similarly to Jershika Maple, who I only started to like after "Inseparable." They weren't ever my favorites or snowflakes that season, but I didn't like them until those performances.

*Indy 500 

 

What struck me about that performance was with 300K+ people, live on TV, the Memorial Day ceremonies happening all

around her on the track, and she didn’t seem the slightest bit nervous. That was a far more intimidating venue than The Voice stage with a few cameras. 

[Misirlou]

21 hours ago, Gustavo527 said:

Holly Henry comes to my mind 

The thing is, apart from the performance not going well, she got defeated by a very controversial contestant, so that must have been a double whammy for many. I wonder what it was like on IDF at that time lol.

 

[Gmm99]

Hailey Mia for me. I admit, it wasn't a fan of her until the Top 11 with her piano version of "Elastic Heart" by Sia. She made massive improvements over the course of her time on The Voice -- even if I disliked the songs she covered in the finale.

[Bouli]

On 2/24/2022 at 11:35 PM, Gmm99 said:

Hailey Mia for me. I admit, it wasn't a fan of her until the Top 11 with her piano version of "Elastic Heart" by Sia. She made massive improvements over the course of her time on The Voice -- even if I disliked the songs she covered in the finale.

 

Speaking of hearts... I didn't dislike Hailey Mia at any point (because I even liked her audition), but the performance that made me love her was "Jar of Hearts," her Top 20 Instant Save song.

 

Not only was that performance exquisitely beautiful and emotional, and not only did I think she had the best Instant Save performance that night... but I was FLOORED at how good she was in quite possibly THE MOST nerve-wracking moment. Like, that 13-year-old had her breakout performance when she was on the brink of elimination.