Blake Shelton Jokes That He's Become a 'Softie' After Marrying Gwen Stefani

Blake Shelton might be the winningest coach in the history of The Voice, but is he starting to lose his edge?

During Monday's first night of the season 21 Battle Rounds, the country star made an uncharacteristically sweet gesture when he offered first-time coach Ariana Grande a box of tissues backstage before she had to make her first tough cuts of the season.

"After this season, you won't ever need these again," he joked. "You'll become callous like the rest of us."

"That's so sweet!" Ari said, thanking him, but like her fellow coaches, she was a bit suspicious.

"That's a nice gesture!" Kelly Clarkson agreed, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm married now," Blake answered with a shrug. "I'm a softie!"

Blake, of course, married former Voice coach Gwen Stefani back in July, in a ceremony that he joked on Late Night With Seth Meyers last week was merely a promotion for the NBC singing competition.

"Gwen and I, we agreed that if we're going to pull off the ultimate publicity stunt, which is what this relationship is, then we wanted to follow through, man, and go ahead and get married," Blake quipped. "Because you know, the next season of The Voice is coming up and we're team players for NBC."

The "God's Country" singer also joked about having The Voice host Carson Daly officiate their special day.

"The way he handled those wet T-shirt contests back in the day when he was hosting those Spring Break specials, we knew he had to be the guy for us," Blake said of Carson, the former host of MTV's Total Request Live.

As for this season of The Voice, Shelton didn't mind trash talking his fellow coaches.

"Listen, Ariana [Grande] is a super talented, very sweet human being. My feeling is, she's going to suck as a coach," he joked. "Kelly Clarkson, I think it's kind of fizzled out. I joke that NBC is nothing but Clarkson. People grow tired of it, people are sick and tired of it. And with John Legend, he's just so high all the time. I don't even know if he knows he's on TV. I just feel like this year's going to be a gimme for me, and I'm excited about it."

The Voice airs Mondays and Tuesdays at 8 p.m. PT/ET on NBC. See more from this season in the video below.

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