Adam Levine Vents About How Blake Shelton “Ruined” Him on The Voice: “He’s Wounded Me”

The Voice Season 29 Coach John Legend is also feeling “scarred” by the country star.

On The Voice: Battle of Champions, Coach Adam Levine is having to re-think his strategy when it comes to one particular genre.

Levine was a Coach on the very first season of The Voice, alongside country star Blake Shelton, and for years, country Artists who made it through the Blind Auditions ended up on Shelton’s team, almost by default. No matter how hard Levine fought, country singers wanted to work with Shelton, and after Shelton left, they wanted to work with Reba McEntire or Kelsea Ballerini or any of the other country Coaches that followed.

Now though, things are a little different. Among the three current Coaches, Texas native Kelly Clarkson is the most country-ish, but she doesn’t have a monopoly on the genre. Country Artists are now in play… if only Levine remembers to turn his chair!

On the first episode of Season 29, 14-year-old AJ Robinson performed Lainey Wilson’s “Watermelon Moonshine,” and if his voice wasn’t twang-y enough, he also had a guitar and a cowboy hat. Yep, he’s a country artist, straight out of Cataula, Georgia. But only Coach John Legend turned his chair around, and Levine explained why he didn’t press his own button.

“Blake Shelton has ruined me. He wounded me deep down in my soul,” Levine said, blaming Shelton for instilling in him an automatic fear of fighting for country artists.

Legend, too, mentioned that he was “scarred from many years of trying to get a country Artist on my team…not that I’m bitter!” But all’s well that ends well, and Legend promised to help Robinson “do real well on this show.”

Adam Levine appears during The Voice Season 29 Episode 1.

Photo: Trae Patton/NBC

The Voice: Battle of Champions

The Voice Season 29 is shaking things up, premiering on Monday, February 23 at 9/8c on NBC and streaming the next day on Peacock.

Officially titled The Voice: Battle of Champions, Season 29 features the show’s first-ever three-Coach lineup, putting The Voice OGs Kelly Clarkson, Adam Levine, and John Legend back in the red chairs for an epic showdown.

The Voice Season 29 will also introduce fresh format updates such as the “Triple Turn Competition” and the “Super Steal.” You also won’t want to miss the exciting return of CeeLoo Green in a totally new role.

Blake Shelton returned to his “day job” as a country singer after The Voice

Blake Shelton appears on The Voice Episode 2217A — “Live Top 13 Performances”.

Photo: Trae Patton/NBC

When you hear “Battle of Champions,” you may immediately think of Shelton, who currently holds the record for most seasons as a Coach and most wins. But he’s a little busy being a country star!

“I did 23 seasons of the show and I enjoyed it. And by the time I got to that last season, it was time [to go],” Shelton said in an April 2024 interview with E! News. “I needed to get back to what my day job was anyway, which is, you know, being a country singer.”

And back to the studio he went. In 2025, Shelton released his 13th album, For Recreational Use Only, which features hit singles like “Texas” and “Hangin’ On” with his wife Gwen Stefani.

“It was the most important years of my life where I was a Coach on The Voice,” Shelton told E! News. “But as far as the job goes, I don’t think I’m ever ready to do that again as I sit here now.”

Good thing Levine is more than ready to pick up where he left off, if he remembers to!

Watch The Voice: Battle of Champions on Monday nights at 9/8c on NBC and the next day on Peacock.