Adam Levine is a thinking girl’s sex symbol, and his band Maroon 5 has huge hits like the ubiquitous “Moves Like Jagger” (featuring his fellow judge from The Voice, Christina Aguilera). But it wasn’t always that way. As a kid, Levine—who plays guitar, bass, and piano in addition to singing—told Access Hollywood, “I was very uncool, had disgusting long hair and shorts down to [to my knees], cutoff shorts—I desperately wanted to be Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam really badly, and I was just a nerdy, awkward kid and I was obsessed with music.” Obsessive? Maybe. But it clearly paid off.