‘The Voice’ recap: The knockouts continue to knock us out

The shift from taped to live shows on “The Voice” is approaching fast – the live playoffs start on April 11 – and that transition seemed very much on the minds of the coaches Tuesday, the second night of the knockout rounds.

“Knockouts are the perfect time to show your coach you’re tough enough to go on to the live shows and make it in the music industry,” Blake Shelton said at the outset of Tuesday’s show.

Shelton was the only coach who still had a steal to use during the knockouts, when singers are paired with other team members and each vies to earn his or her coach’s approval with a song of his or her own choosing. The other three coaches had used their steals the previous evening.

That raised the stakes for the vocalists on Team Blake. Without the safety net of a potential steal, their competition was do or die. And song choice is key. They had to choose something that would show their strengths.

“If you don’t sing the right song, that could honestly send you home,” Pharrell Williams noted.

Here’s how things played out on the second night of knockouts:

Adam Wakefield vs. Peyton Parker (Team Blake): Shelton paired these two disparate singers because, he said, they were his “storytelling artists.” Headed into the round, Wakefield, who sang Sam Cooke’s “Bring It on Home to Me,” had the advantage with Christina Aguilera at the very least. As Wakefield took the stage, she confessed to Shelton that she had a “secret crush” on the singer and found his gritty voice “sexy.” By the end, Wakefield’s tone and power had made fans of Williams and Adam Levine as well – both gave him standing ovations. Yet Levine revealed himself to be an admirer of Parker as well: “Wow, beautiful tone. Beautiful,” he murmured appreciatively as she sang the Dixie Chicks’ “Travelin’ Soldier.” Shelton echoed Levine’s compliment – calling Parker’s voice “unbelievably beautiful.” “It pumps me up to know this is the future of country music,” he said of both singers before giving the match to Wakefield. “Some things you just can’t deny,” Shelton mused of Wakefield’s musical talent. None of the other coaches had a steal to use on Parker.

Moushumi vs. Nick Hagelin (Team Pharrell): Williams explained that he’d pitted medical-student-turned-pop-singer Moushumi against ballet-dancer-turned-pop-singer Hagelin because they “both have power to work on in their performances,” whatever that meant. Neither singer turned in a perfect performance. Moushumi left all the coaches, including her own, admiring her resonant tone but thirsting for more range, a show of strength -- “another gear,” as Levine put it. Hagelin, meanwhile, interacted well with the crowd on Robin Thicke’s “Lost Without U,” but gave an uneven performance – “choppy” at the beginning, Aguilera said. Williams opted to retain the person he felt he could “help more” – Moushumi -- later calling her a “rare package.” Hagelin headed home.

Maya Smith vs. Tamar Davis (Team Christina): Both soul and R&B singers, Smith and Davis seemed like a natural match. Smith, a U.S. postal worker with a pretty smile whom Aguilera had stolen from Williams during the battle rounds, tried to show confidence on Alicia Keys’ “No One,” and mostly she did. But it was hard to imagine how she would hold her own against Davis, an experienced singer who had been a member of the group that launched Beyonce and who has performed with both Tyler Perry and Prince. Davis made Sam Smith’s “Lay Me Down” totally her own and completely magical. Levine called Davis’ performance “bonkers” and “crazy” and said she’d put herself on the map. Shelton told her she had shown her coach she was “ready for the lives.” Aguilera said Smith had “elevated it” with her performance, but gave the win to Davis, telling the veteran vocalist, “You didn’t just sing that song; you murdered that song.” Shelton opted not to use his steal on Smith, saying he was being “extra picky.”

Next week, more knockouts – and more Miley.