The Voice 28: Cajun Singer Dustin Dale Gaspard’s Bilingual Version of “Bring It On Home to Me” Wows
Week 3 of the Blind Auditions for The Voice Season 28 kicked off on Monday night with the penultimate audition episode. After a bit of a slower week last week, this episode was full of gems. The contestants really brought it vocally, including the opener of the episode, 4-chair turn, Dustin Dale Gaspard.
Dustin, a 33-year-old from a small Cajun community in Louisiana called Cow Island, says there are a ton of alligators there which are his favorite animal, He insists there are misconceptions about the animal’s viciousness. Music wise, Dustin grew up on swamp-pop which he calls “a blend of rhythm and blues, New Orleans filled-music, country western music, and cajun traditional music.” Much of the music, both featuring English and French influences, is bilingual. For the past few years, Dustin has lived in his car, and he had a van for a while where he traveled over 100,000 miles, and played music.
He starts his audition off playing a harmonica, and then gets into a bluesy rendition of the classic “Bring It On Home to Me” by Sam Cooke. After a few lines, he transitions into singing French which gets Reba McEntire, Niall Horan and Snoop Dogg to quickly turn. Towards the end, Michael Bublé joins in on the fun.
With his interesting tone, Dustin makes the song sound fresh, even if it is one of those songs that never gets old. This side of the singer seemed to be more of a blend of the blues and cajun styles, but I’m intrigued to see if he will tackle country western at some point.
“You could sing ‘Baa Baa Black Sheep’ and it would sound good”
Niall says, “there’s nothing better than hearing proper, unique, full-of-character voice when you’re facing away.” He tells him, “You could sing ‘Baa Baa Black Sheep’ and it would sound good.” Reba remarks, “You’re different, you’re unusual, you’re refreshing, and you can sing and play.” Michael begins his comments in French. He believes that America wants “authenticity” and Dustin brought that. Snoop reveals that he has family in Mississippi and Louisiana adding, “The music you are making, it touched my heart because I got uncles that chase alligators.” He then sings a bit of “Bring It On Home to Me” leading to a pitch by changing some of the lyrics, in an attempt to win Dustin over.
Dustin chooses Team Niall continuing a strong streak of the coach winning over 4 chair turns, and making his team insanely talented.
Tonight’s show was extremely strong, and Dustin wasn’t the only one to win over the coaches for a 4-chair turn with another language. Team Buble’s Teo Ramdel sang in Spanish with a Luis Miguel cover winning over the coaches featuring a classic sounding voice. A few other standouts included young singers, including Team Reba’s 14 year-old Vinya Chhabra who brought a rock edge to auditions with “Ironic,” and another displaying the storytelling voice of Team Niall’s Ava Nat on “I Love You, I’m Sorry.”
