‘The Voice’ Season 10 Spoilers: Eliminations Reveal The Top 9 Of 2016

“The Voice” continues to wind down its pool of talented artists in Season 10 following Tuesday’s not-so-shocking elimination. With the number of remaining contenders in the NBC competition now in the single digits, there are no more weak links in the chain.

After some of the rockiest live performances of 2016, the viewers were forced to send one artist home, and it was a no-brainer, if everyone is being honest with themselves. According to Entertainment Weekly, the votes and iTunes charts were tabulated and host Carson Daly revealed the results.

In order from best to worst, the breakdown came out to be: Alisan Porter, Adam Wakefield, Shalyah Fearing, Hannah Huston, Mary Sarah, Bryan Bautista, Laith Al-Saadi and Paxton Ingram. This left previous coach save contestants Nick Hagelin and Daniel Passino in the bottom two, to no one’s surprise.

Although both of them returned to the show with the confidence that propelled them this far, the show is about hard musicianship at this point, and neither of these two was ready yet. Because of their weak performances on Monday, the singers each had one last chance to fight for their right to stay in another week at least. Sadly, neither of them performed knockout covers that were worthy of “The Voice” stage.

Hagelin went first with a very basic cover of Ed Sheeran’s “Thinking Out Loud.” Obviously the live save is not a time to reinvent the wheel, so Hagelin kept it basic with a karaoke-like rendition of the popular song. While it wasn’t anything to write home about, it was technically proficient, which was more than could be said for Passino.

The artist performed Bruno Mars’ “Uptown Funk,” trying his hardest to let the upbeat number rile up the crowd and the live-save voters. As TV Line notes, it was a tragic misstep to pick one of the most popular dance songs of the decade if his style doesn’t mesh well with it. Apparently, the rest of the country agreed and when the show returned from its commercial break, the results were in.

Passino, after returning from home in the live playoffs, finally had to bid a second and final farewell to “The Voice” stage as Hagelin edged him out to move on to the next round and perform again Monday. Fortunately, it wasn’t all bad news for Passino. After going home with nothing previously, he built up his confidence as an artist with his extra time, which he believes will help him moving forward.

“This competition has taught me to surround myself with good people,” Passino said. “I think that’s what [coach] Pharrell [Williams] has tried to drill into me… Whatever happens is what’s meant to happen.”

“The Voice” Season 10 continues with the top nine performances next Monday at 8 p.m. EDT on NBC.