Idol Chatter & Voice Views

His audition: Lupe Carroll, 26, of Bourdonnais, Ill., sang Bobby Darin’s “If I Were a Carpenter” and turned in one of night five’s best vocals. Midway through the song, Cee Lo Green turned his chair. Adam Levine, though he didn’t turn his chair, complimented Lupe for having “a compelling voice.”

Background: Lupe’s day job is delivering flowers, something he’s done for about three years. “Delivering flowers is almost like being the ice cream man coming down the street,” he told The Voice. “I don’t have the music playing out of my van, but people definitely get all smiles when they see flowers.” Lupe says he’s been singing for as long as he can remember. About once a week, he performs at a restaurant in his hometown; then he performs at a farmer’s market on Saturdays. He met his wife through music, too, when he was looking for a cellist.

On being on Team Cee Lo: “I’m incredibly excited to be on Cee Lo’s team. I feel like I’ve got a solid thing going with this guy in terms of tastes in music. I feel like whatever he throws me, he’ll have heard something in his head that was solid for that song.”

What the show didn’t show: We heard Lupe’s wonderfully unique vocals on The Voice. What we didn’t hear was the story behind the song he sang. Lupe told The Daily Journal he first heard the song while watching TV with his dad, who was a union carpenter all his life. He asked his father if he ever sang the song to his mother while they were dating, and his dad said he had. “So I learned it and fell in love with it,” Lupe said. And while he might deliver flowers part time, Lupe’s also been performing music for quite a while. On Facebook, he writes that he asked for an electric guitar for Christmas when he was 10. “I got that guitar, and I didn’t really ever put it down.” Eventually, a friend convinced him to perform at a show. “Now, I wasn’t looking to be playing gigs and all that,” Lupe writes. “I just enjoyed jamming along or with a friend or at a party here and there.” He says he was so nervous, his knee was bouncing his guitar up and down as he performed. “But it got easier. And by the end of the night, I had decided this was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.” You can hear more of Lupe’s pleasantly distinctive vocals below and on his YouTube page.

Quote: Of his blind audition, Lupe said, “I walked up on stage, and I straight-up got the giggles. Like, uh-uh, this is nuts. Pretty early on, Cee Lo turned around. That almost threw me off. But then, honestly, it was butter after that. I was like, ‘Cool, we’re in. Let’s have extra fun with the song now.'”

On iTunes: The studio version of his Voice audition song.

Keeping up with Lupe: On Twitter — @LupeMusic — Facebook — YouTube

For profiles of other Season 5 contestants, go here.

Lupe Carroll, “That Great Day” cover

Lupe Carroll, “Empty” cover