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The Voice finale recap: Craig Wayne Boyd wins it all – Metro US

The Voice finale recap: Craig Wayne Boyd wins it all

The Voice finale recap: Craig Wayne Boyd wins it all
Tyler Golden, NBC

And at long last, the big winner is crowned! Your new “Voice” winner is Craig Wayne Boyd coached by Blake Shelton. But how did it all go down? Read on.

We open with everyone coming in for a quick cover of Bastille’s “Pompeii.” The four finalists sound a tiny bit off-key? We’ll put that down to nerves/maybe some flawed earpieces. Carson Daly is very excited about all the various people who are performing tonight.

Time to check in with the judges! Good advice from Pharrell , who tells everyone to plan for the next day and to plan on using this as a platform, rather than a final step.

Blake Shelton is “nervous as crap” about his contestant winning. He doesn’t seem too optimistic about Craig Wayne Boyd’s chances. Hard to say if that’s because Adam Levine somehow picked three out of the final four contestants, or if he’s worried about a country singer winning this thing. Boyd sings “Keep your hands to yourself” by the Georgia Satellites and brings back three ladies to sing with him. Danica Shirey, Sugar Joans and Taylor Brashears all came back to help him out. Annnnd we’re out to commercial again, as Carson reminds us again of all the famous people stopping by any time now.

Hozier is the first big name performer. He sounds good! Very earnest, as is his way. Does Hozier ever smile? Just kidding, he smiled cutely at the end.

Chris Jamison gets his big solo moment, which he uses to sing “Dedication to my Ex” by Lloyd. Lots of sexy lady dancers! One of them looks a little like Troian Bellisario (Spencer from “Pretty Little Liars”), so let’s pretend she got jealous of Janel Parrish’s recent stint on “Dancing with the Stars” and is moonlighting. Chris brings back Luke Wade, Ricky Manning, Ryan Sill, and Taylor Phelan, who he says he brought back because he had “movements on stage that were so captivating.” That is probably the best compliment ever in the world?

Matt McAndrew votes for performing with Fall Out Boy. Due to the scheduling, it seems like Matt got to perform with Fall Out Boy instead of eliminated Voice contestants. Fedora count for the night: two (so far).

Next we have a clip segment of all the weird things Pharrell says, which makes it sound a bit like they think he’s not a good coach?

Five of the lady contestants (Jean Kelley, DaNica Shirey, Sugar Joans, Bryana Salaz, Mia Pfirrman) come back and sing “Bang Bang,” which seems like an acknowledgment that there should have been at least one girl finalist. They have sparkly gold microphones, which I hope they get to take home at the end of the night.

Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars perform “Uptown Funk.” Bruno Mars is wearing gold hair curlers? With the sunglasses and leather coat, he looks uncannily like Michael Jackson. Everyone in his band has a hat, so we’re just going to call it a night on counting fedoras. Mark Ronson, meanwhile, looks like he went missing from the set of “Risky Business.”

Watching the heavily-tattooed Matt McAndrew sing “Oh Christmas Tree” is its own reward. Apparently all of those boys sang Christmas songs “for the fans.” You are not one of those fans, though, so you just have to watch it in clip show version. Carson opens some giant boxes to reveal they each get to take home a Nissan. He’s like Oprah! Oh, and it’s also a PSA about texting and driving.

Craig Wayne Boyd gets to follow up the free car giveaway by performing with Lynyrd Skynyrd. Everything about Craig is older than the other performers, including his music choices, but also in that he wanted to use the new car to transport his son. I assume Lynyrd Skynyrd were all huge fans of this show before appearing on it!

Meghan Trainor stops by to sing something that is not “All About That Bass.” It is called “Lips Are Moving,” and if you forgot that, the mouths flashing all over the screens and on the stage might remind you. There’s also an open mouth hanging over the stage. It looks vaguely disgusted? Like if you saw someone puke on the train, that’s what your mouth would do in surprise. Maybe they shouldn’t have immediately muted Meghan Trainor so we could hear her say thank you to the crowd? Another highlight is a quick glimpse of Jennifer Hudson backstage looking super pissed about something. But she’ll be performing next with Damien, so presumably she’ll pull it together. Her hair looks awesome, so she’s got that going for her.

Adam Levine’s clip segment makes me wish he and Taylor Swift had a reality series together made up of Taylor singing “Rent” snippets to him.

Damien and J. Hud sing her Grammy-nominated “It’s Your World.” It’s maybe just a tiny bit out of his range, but this serves as a reminder that Jennifer Hudson is a rock star. Does anyone remember that she was once an “American Idol” contestant? Damien looks very happy to be performing with her, and because of her heels, appears to be six inches shorter than her. All kinds of cute!

Everyone thinks Gwen is some form of cat, is the big takeaway from her clip segment.

Ed Sheeran has just the nicest voice. This is not breaking news. He sings “Thinking Out Loud,” and it’s just so pleasant. There’s some kind of scrolling lyric board going on behind him, presumably so the crowd can karaoke along if they can read cursive. Who are we kidding, no one can read cursive anymore. He closes with a very British “Thank you very much. Nice one.”

Matt McAndrew’s eliminated “Voice” singing companions are Taylor Phelan , Mia Pfirrman , Taylor John Williams and Sugar Joans . They do “Go Your Own Way” by Fleetwood Mac, and don’t bother doing much crazy choreographer, unlike the other finalist showcases. It kind of does seem just like some friends doing karaoke together, but in the sesnse that it actually makes them seem like they’re having fun together, rather than teaming up because they have to.

Damien calls back Anita Antoinette, Elyjuh Rene and Danica Shirey to sing the Diana Ross classic “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.” Elyjuh’s Christmas sweater game is ON POINT. They are all very sparkly and do some fun paired off singing from within the crowd.

Chris Jamison picks Jessie J as his famous singing buddy. Her shirt looks like it’s moving, somehow. They do “Masterpiece” together, which works well as a duet, and Jessie gives him a very gracious “Chris, take it away,” for the climax of the song.

Blake Shelton’s clip segment is a supercut of him edited to be rapping “Can’t Touch This.” That was much more entertaining than all the vague cat metaphors for Gwen Stefani.

We don’t get to see his reaction, because the judges were too busy changing into their formal gear for a four person version of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”

And then we’re at the big moment. Fourth place goes to Damien, third place to Chris Jamison, second to Matt McAndrew, and first to Craig Wayne Boyd.

What did you think of the big finale?