ABC
Get excited, Bachelor fans. The Bachelorette may be postponed, but the franchise managed to get the spinoff Listen to Your Heart wrapped before the whole world shut down, so now we have six weeks of Bachelor-y goodness to tide us over while we await word of how The Bachelorette will proceed.
On night one of Listen to Your Heart, 12 men and eight women enter the new mansion — the show is filmed in Los Angeles, but not at the usual Bachelor manse — and try to find love while also trying to find a partner with whom they can make beautiful music.
If you need a rundown of the rules and how this is all going to work, check out our post about the Listen to Your Heart format here.
Follow along here with our live recap, but be warned of spoilers. All times Eastern.
8:00 — Some jaunty, vaguely country music twangs us into the intro from host Chris Harrison. He once again reiterates how much everyone loves A Star is Born and how that inspired this show. Um, did the Bachelor producers watch that movie all the way to the end? Because all the versions of that movie end very tragically.
In the season preview montage, Trevor Holmes even says, “It’s like a real-life A Star Is Born.” Dude. You better hope not.
8:10 — Intro montage. Standouts include a girl named Bri Stauss, who was engaged a year and a half ago. If you want more details on that, check out our profile of Bri. Then there’s Trevor, a former American Idol contestant who is shirtless and petting his dog in his montage, so that’s quite the “you’re supposed to love this guy” edit.
8:15 — We get our first bar of “Listen to Your Heart” from Jamie Gabrielle, who arrives at the mansion first. No criticism here, I love Roxette. Shortly after she arrives, Ryan Neal gets there and he’s instantly attracted to Jamie. He’s ready to flirt with her all night long. But soon more people arrive and Ryan’s plans are sunk. In quick succession, we meet Matt Ranaudo, Savannah McKinley, Mel Taevin, and Gabe Baker before Ryan and Jamie sneak off to have some alone time.
Side note: Matt doesn’t know who Chris Harrison is, so he’s dead to me. “Chris Hansen”?! GTFO of here with that.
8:22 — Ryan and Jamie seem to hit it off, but she wants to keep her options open until she’s scoped out the whole cast, which is just smart strategy. Cue Trevor’s arrival and Jamie’s eyes turning into little cartoon hearts. They start talking about their mutual love of Nashville and clearly, Ryan is yesterday’s news.
8:27 — The editing on this show is on-point so far. They get a girl talking about dating a guy with a guitar and cut to a guy with a guitar. They get Jamie talking about not wanting to date any douchebags and they cut to Michael Todd arriving. Luckily, Savannah doesn’t seem to be falling for his gross lines when he immediately starts hitting on her in a really aggressive way. Take the hint, Michael Todd! You’re being a creep!
8:31 — It’s interesting to watch the cocktail party in this situation because since nobody knows how the show works, it’s not really competitive the way the first night on The Bachelor/ette is. It’s much more chill. But cue Chris Harrison to give them the lowdown. He explains how this show will work similarly to how Bachelor in Paradise works, at least at first. There are 12 men there but only eight women there in the premiere. By the time they get to the first rose ceremony, four men will not get roses and they will be going home.
8:38 — They men and women go off to find their bedrooms and Julia Rae expresses her delight that the women have the power this week since they get to choose which men stay. It is nice that the women get to go first. Each group also sits around and talks about the other contestants. Sheridan Reed totally has his eye on Julia, but he’s intimidated about how good-looking all of the other guys are. Aww, buck up, Sheridan! Many of the women seem to think you’re adorable.
8:42 — Back at the party, Sheridan makes a beeline for Julia so he can get some facetime with her before the other guys who like her get their turn. She tells him about how she was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis before she was born and as an adult, she founded a non-profit to raise awareness and money for cystic fibrosis research — here’s some more information on that if you’re curious. But she quickly gets stolen by Brandon Mills and they start making out like right away. Awww, poor Sheridan.
8:50 — Matt and Rudi hit the hot tub and she confesses he’s the only one she likes so far. But then in the interest of time being so short, Matt asks her if she’ll judge him based on kissing and she declines as politely and congenially as she can. Yeah, dude, don’t jump the gun. You’ll lose that rose she might have been considering giving to you. How is it that so many of these guys need to be told, “Don’t be creepy”?
It’s not The Bachelor without a little hot tub action 😉 #TheBachelorLTYH #ListenToYourHeart
Meanwhile, Michael Todd tries to get Bri to go to the hot tub with him and she practically leaves a Bri-shaped hole in the wall getting away from him.
8:55 — But guess who isn’t afraid to judge based on kissing? Jamie. She makes out with both Ryan and Trevor. Now, the trick here is the show figuring out how to keep them both here because that would be maximum drama. Can Jamie convince one of the other women to keep one of them since she only has one rose to give out?
9:05 — The first date card arrives and it’s for Ryan, which means he gets to choose who he takes on a date. He obviously chooses Jamie. Their date takes them to Capitol Studios where they work with a Grammy-nominated producer on recording “Gravity.” Ryan is super pumped because he “idolizes” John Mayer, which… hmmm. OK. But Jamie is less confident because she’s more pop-country and the song doesn’t sit in a great spot for her range. Ryan rolls with it, though, and they take the song up a few steps. Jamie acts like Ryan just moved heaven and earth for her, though, which — who hurt you, girl?
9:10 — Some of the girls sit around and talk about who is going to get their rose. Julia thinks Sheridan, Bri thinks Chris Watson, and Rudi thinks Matt and she regrets that she didn’t kiss him the night before. But before she can spend more time with him, he gets a date card and asks Mel on the date instead of Rudi after quickly chatting with them both. Rudi looks pissed and hurt. Ruh roh. Yeah, that’s not great.
9:15 — Ryan and Jamie make a run at “Gravity” and it’s lovely. Jamie’s country-ish flavor really works on the song, I actually like it better than Matt’s Mayer-esque sound. In another spot of great editing, the show cuts in a shot of Trevor looking sad and alone while Jamie talks about having such a connection with Ryan over footage of them singing. After the recording session, they get to watch the sunset from the roof of the Capitol Records building in Los Angeles and they make out again.
9:22 — Jamie and Ryan get back from their date and everybody is pretty jealous of what they got to do, but none more so than Trevor, though he’s obviously more jealous of Ryan getting alone time with Jamie. Meanwhile, Bri and Chris may be the next great couple in the house. They’ve really hit it off, though in a more lowkey way.
9:24 — Rudi talks to Savannah and Bekah Purifoy about how Matt basically told her she was going on the date with him, then he chose Mel. That’s not exactly what happened. She did see him go off and talk with Mel and we didn’t see him say to her, “I want to take you on the date.” But she’s still right to be irritated. Why would he talk to them both? Why not just pick someone? It wasn’t the nicest way to invite someone on a date.
9:25 — Speaking of the date, Matt and Mel get to go to a Plain White Ts concert in a yard, while back at the mansion, Rudi sings a sad song and Chris accompanies her on the piano. I cannot say enough about how much I love the editing so far.
9:30</b — It's the next day now and time for the cocktail party and rose ceremony. Rudi is at a loss because she no longer wants to give her rose to Matt. She has made no bones about her feelings to the other women, so eventually, it gets back to Matt that Rudi is unhappy with him and has been telling everyone what he did.
9:34 — Julia is hitting it off with “super All-American, gigantic, bald, ripped” Josh Hester, much to Sheridan’s consternation. He spies them making out and he decides to make a last-ditch effort for Julia’s rose by playing an original song for her that he hopes she’ll help him finish. When he starts singing, it’s obvious that he’s talented, but his voice is not the kind I generally like, so if I were Julia, that would make the decision for me. But maybe she’s super into Sheridan’s voice. This is a very baller move and Julia rewards him with a kiss.
9:35 — Back at the party, Mel and Gabe are connecting, with Matt lamenting that he and Mel didn’t have a great connection on their date. OH! It would be SO FUNNY if he ditched Rudi for Mel and then lost them both! That’s kind of what you get, dude.
9:37 — Matt pulls Rudi aside and she gives him what-for about how things went down. He tells her she misinterpreted what happened and he is obviously scrambling because he knows he’s in serious trouble about getting a rose this week. I mean, even if he didn’t say “I want to take you on the date” — which we don’t know for sure either way because there’s no footage, but he certainly could have — he tried to kiss Rudi the first night, she said no, he chose someone else for the date and now he comes crawling back to Rudi because he doesn’t think he’s getting Mel’s rose. You know that if Matt thought he was getting Mel’s rose, he wouldn’t be talking to Rudi anymore.
As Rudi tells him why he was a jerk, Matt says, “This feels like a lot,” and she’s like, “I don’t honestly care that much if it feels like a lot to you right now.” YES! Send this guy home, ladies!
Back with the guys, Matt says it was like he just went 10 rounds with Mike Tyson in his prime. Oh, really? REALLY? And he’s the one complaining about her bad-mouthing him around the house?! Well, if you hadn’t behaved the way you did, there wouldn’t be anything to bad-mouth you about, dude. Also, this might be the way they keep both Ryan and Trevor around — Rudi keeps whichever one Jamie doesn’t.
9:45</b — It's time for Jamie to make a decision. She tells Ryan that they have a connection, but then Trevor makes his final pitch by telling her he just wants to spend time with her and he plays her "Slow Dancing in a Burning Room" by John Mayer. What is with the John Mayer stuff? I hope they got the rights to other people's music too. But anyway, that melts Jamie's heart and they make out some more. Gotta say, she definitely has been on-screen chemistry with Trevor. They are on FIRE when they kiss.
In a talking-head interview, she cries about how she doesn’t know what to do. Oh man, they gotta figure out a way to keep both of these guys so that the tables can be turned next week when the women out-number the men.
9:50 — Rose ceremony time. Savannah gives her rose to Brandon. Mel gives her rose to Gabe (ha!). Bekah gives her rose to Danny Padilla. Bri gives her rose to Chris. Cheyenne Arnell gives her rose to Matt. Hmm. That might be some production influence.
9:57 — Julia gives her rose to Sheridan. Jamie gives her rose to Trevor, which Ryan is pretty surprised about. But yeah, this is how they keep Ryan there — Rudi gives her rose to Ryan. Maximum drama!
Were you surprised by who got the roses?? 🌹 #TheBachelorLTYH #ListenToYourHeart
That means the guys going home are Jack Mason, Josh, Michael Todd, and Russell Johnson, most of whom we barely saw in the premiere episode.
9:58 — Next week on Listen to Your Heart, the remaining three girls show up. It turns out that Natascha Bessez knows Trevor because she’s friends with his ex-girlfriend and she wants to talk about his history of cheating. Drama!
10:00 — The end tag is another amazing bit of editing where they intercut Savannah’s recounting of Michael Todd trying to kiss her to the women with Michael Todd’s recounting of it to the men. Yeah, no big shock he didn’t get a rose.
The Bachelor: Listen to Your Heart airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC.
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