‘The Voice’ Shocks, ‘The Bachelorette’ Sets New Ratings Low

The Voice and The Bachelorette proved once again that Memorial Day TV programming is pretty hit-or-miss.

Of course, TV executives knew that you’re more likely to be at a barbeque or driving home from your travels than tuning in on Monday night, so they loaded the primetime airwaves with a bunch of repeats. It still wasn’t enough to save ABC’s The Bachelorette, whose season premiere set a record for lowest-rating opener.

According to The Wrap, The Bachelorette actually took second place in the ratings for Monday night, but its performance was still a pathetic 5.8 million viewers — 27 percent off last May’s premiere. A 20/20 special, “Bringing Up Baby: Royal Edition” had almost as many viewers with 5.6 million.

Before you blame Desiree, Inside TV reminded us that it’s first time that The Bachelorette ever went toe-to-toe with The Voice.

And NBC’s The Voice itself is faltering too, reporting a downward spiral of falling viewers over the last six weeks. Apparently, it was the ratings winner on Monday night only because nobody was watching anything else either.

On Memorial Day, The Voice dropped 11 percent of its viewers from the previous Monday, testing a new series low. It drew less than 11 million total viewers, with about 9.4 million in the desirable age range of 18 to 49.

When The Voice returned Tuesday night, it was ready to offer some surprises. Former front-runner Judith Hill, a former Michael Jackson backup singer who was widely regarded as the one to beat, was given the boot.

At one point in her career, Hill was expected to perform a duet in Michael Jackson’s “This Is It” tour — plans spoiled by Jackson’s untimely death.

Now she made the top eight in season four of The Voice but couldn’t get any higher.

Another Team Adam member, Sarah Simmons, also got sent home.

As NBC New York reported, the stunning results meant that Team Adam lost two of its three members after looking like an almost-certain winner:

“The Voice live playoffs have proved again that in an instant the long-presumed frontrunners can get the unceremonious boot…The stunning eliminations came just after their coach had spoken of the importance of taking artistic risks and vowed not to let his team members play it safe with their performances…”

Did you have better things to do, or did you find time to watch either The Voice or The Bachelorette?

[three attendees at Season 4 premiere of The Voice photo by Joe Seer / Shutterstock.com]