Shakira & Usher to Bring More 'Competition' to 'The Voice'

(Bauer Griffin, Getty)Here's the latest in music as 2013 gets under way: Some new insight into The Voice's new coaches, Jay-Z is scoring The Great Gatsby, there were some great musical performances last night, and Kanye is apparently making a sequel to this year's Cruel Summer called Cruel Winter.Rolling Stone went to a blind audition to see how things are working out with the replacements for Cee Lo Green and Christina Aguilera. Apparently Usher and Shakira are bringing a new level of competition to the show. Quoth Rolling Stone:

When we spoke to Usher at iHeart Radio in Las Vegas in September he promised to promote a competitive edge, but he isnt the only one bringing that attitude. At the audition we saw some friendly competition between Usher and Shakira over one contestant, and when Usher bested Levine for another vocalist at the audition, he playfully taunted his fellow judge.

The new coaches will be joined by incumbents Adam Levine and Blake Shelton, who are also both competition fans. "I would say the competitiveness is up," said show creator Mark Burnett. "We've replaced Cee Lo with somebody that's just that much more aggressive. And Christina was always competitive, [but] now you've got four that are just killers up here."Shakira also confirmed it: "There's a lot of competitiveness."So in summary, season four of The Voice will have more competition, which is a good direction to take a singing competition show.Highlights from NYE Live PerformancesLast night's NYE musical performances were pretty awesome. Taylor Swift probably stole the night, despite her voice cracking a few times.

Taylor Swift

Psy and MC Hammer do "Gangnam Style" and "2 Legit 2 Quit"Justin Bieber and Big Sean do "As Long as You Love Me"Cassadee Pope does "Stand"Carly Rae Jepsen does "Call Me Maybe" and "This Kiss"Neon Trees does "Everybody Talks"Jay-Z to Score The Great GatsbyIs it just us or does it seem like The Great Gatsby has been in production forever? The movie was supposed to come out this Christmas but they've just now confirmed that Jay-Z and Jeymes Samuel of The Bullitts will be scoring the remake of the classic. Australian director Baz Luhrmann reportedly blasted Jay-Z tunes on the set as a way to loosen up the cast and crew and perhaps distract them from the fact they're still working on one of the most anticipated movies of the decade and they better not screw it up.

"O! n my firs! t day he had Jay-Z pumped up full, and we did the entire scene with, you know, Jay-Z in our ear on full blast while acting, and it was just so liberating," Isla Fischer told MTV.

Suppose it's not a huge surprise since Luhrmann used "No Church in the Wild," a Jay-Z / Kanye collaboration, in the second Gatsby trailer. Check it out:

Gatsby stars Fisher, Leonardo DiCaprio, Carey Mulligan, Tobey Maguire and Joel Edgerton and was supposed to come out this past Christmas, but the new release date is May 10, 2010.Kanye Making Follow-up to Cruel SummerMalik Yusef, a songwriter and music producer signed to Kanye West's G.O.O.D. Music label, tweeted this pic with the caption: "after he BLESSED the land with some truth,We was up WORKING on that NEW!!!!!#cruelwinter #goodmusic #grammyfamily #Chicago." And with that many hashtags, one of which is "#cruelwinter," it's safe to assum! e a seque! l is in the works.

Cruel Summer didn't do so great relative to Kanye West albums, but it was no stinker, either. "Mercy" and "Clique" are both solid tracks and "Cold," "New God Flow," and "Don't Like" all got some radio play but it's been suggested that, due to the staggered releases of these singles, by the time the album came out for purchase, there wasn't much left on it that we hadn't already heard.

Regardless, we'll take a follow-up to Cruel Summer however it's served.

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