If you thought The Voice judges were the ones deciding when their chair spins around to a contestant they like, you may want to think again.
Guy Sebastian has revealed that it’s actually sometimes the Channel 7 producers – not the judges who choose when their chairs spin.
“You want the artist to feel like there are two coaches fighting over them, otherwise, how do you make a good segment out of that? It’s just literally, ‘oh Keith is the only one that turned, so you’re stuck with Keith,” Sebastian told Yahoo!
“So there are little things the producer will write in, stuff like, ‘If this is just a one-chair turn, maybe jump in’,” he revealed in somewhat of a bombshell revelation.
Usually, judges have a limited amount of chair turns they’re allowed to do. However, this season the judges have unlimited chair spins. As a result, more chairs are spinning and there are more battles between judges to secure their desired contestant.
“This season we’ve got unlimited chair turns so sometimes if there’s one coach that goes in for a chair turn, to make it more interesting, you may as well go in there and have a crack at pitching,” he said.
Sebastian was surprisingly candid about the input that the producers have on the show.
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“I think the producers go into it with a fair bit of thought,” Sebastian also revealed “For example, they’ll have some people that are pretty good, and then towards the end of the session when we’re a bit tired and we are desperate for a lift, they’ll put in this ‘wow’ singer.
“And I think sometimes it might look like we’re being over the top, but we’ve probably sat through some mediocrity for a little while and then there’s someone that’s like, oh my gosh.”
Sebastian also shared that the blind auditions aren’t actually 100% blind. He told the publication that the red books that he and other judges – Keith Urban, Rita Ora and Jessica Mauboy – all hold have information about the contestant performing.
“It’ll sort of just say like, what state they’re from. There’s no names, no gender or anything like that,” he said. “We never get told anything about who they are, we don’t get told the song.
“But if it’s a really random song, like one that’s some B-side Whitesnake or Radiohead or something that not everyone knows, we get told that so that we don’t think it’s an original.”
The Voice has continually been a ratings juggernaut for Channel 7, with hundreds of thousands of viewers tuning in to the show every episode since it began in 2012. This year the show has had huge success, currently drawing in over one million viewers a night.
For more on this topic follow the Film & TV Observer.
