The stars, they really are just like us. Adam Levine proved it on Monday night’s (Oct. 19) The Voice when he let down his pop star armor for a moment to help his contestants Amanda Mikkel and Julia Clark feel less stressed out about their Battle showdown.
Teaming up with guest team mentor Alex Warren, Levine tried to tamp down the nerves he could sense in the two singers after tasking them with singing Elvis Presley’s “Can’t Help Falling in Love” for their Battle round.
According to EW, sensing their anxiety as the pair huddled around the piano in rehearsal to get the soaring ballad just right he shared a story about a time when he did the same thing, to disastrous results.
“Just to tell you a story about sitting around the piano that was really uncomfortable,” Levine said. “I sang ‘Surfer Girl,’ and I was doing it in font of Brian Wilson. Brian Wilson is, like, my hero. And he stared at me the whole time. It was a bright room, and I could tell he wasn’t happy. I finished it, and he didn’t have one word for me.”
The fatal flop in front of the late Beach Boys co-founder and songwriter who died last June at age 82 was devastating to Levine, who actually performed the 1963 Billboard Hot 100 No. 7 hit with a reunited Beach Boys at the 2012 Grammy Awards. “If you want to know what uncomfortable is? That was uncomfortable,” Levine assured them.
Warren also made sure the two women knew that feeling out of place on stage is part of it. “We know exactly what this is like,” the Grammy-nominated “Ordinary” singer told them. “We’ve definitely played rooms where no one wanted us there. We’ve also played rooms where people were just staring at us intently.”
As it turned out, the pair needn’t have worried, as they both nailed the moving ballad in their own unique styles. Queen Latifah assured the pair, saying, “y’all can stand wherever you want on that stage, you still gonna be beautiful,” as they appeared to be confused about where their marks were. She praised Mikkel for her choosing “challenging and unusual” songs throughout her run on the show, and gave Clark props for her vocal tone and texture, while Riley Green said they took a tricky song and made it their own.
When it came to Levine, he said the singers sang “really, really well” and did a better job “individually than as a team,” as their vocals styles never really found a way to blend. When he asked if they were nervous, Mikkel immediately said “very,” as Levine shared that he “felt a lot of nerves” coming from both of them.
“I can see how the nerves can get to you,” Levine said. “Whoever I’m gonna pick at this point, moving forward, we have got to tackle nerves. It’s a huge part of this, and this is supposed to be fun, right? And you’ve got to do your best, and part of doing your best is hopefully getting away from the nervousness that can paralyze you. But it’s hard. I get it.”
Levine ended up going with Mikkel, who will move on to Cut Week. The Voice airs every Monday at 8 p.m. ET on NBC and streams the next day on Peacock.
Watch Mikkel and Clark’s performance below.