The Best Thing Ever
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| The Best Thing Ever | |
|---|---|
| Country | Boston & Westchester, USA |
| Years active | 2003 – 2006 |
| Genres | Punk |
| Labels | HIG Records |
| Members | Noah Britton Alex Billig Jen Page |
The Best Thing Ever is a punk band formed by baritone singer/songwriter Noah Britton in the summer of 2003. The label "punk" is adequate to describe the band's influences and ethics, but the sound that they exhibited changed drastically from show to show. Ranging from 50's pop to lofi folk to pure noise, The Best Thing Ever's musical output is not easily categorized by a single genre. Add to this the fact that the band has recorded and released only fragments of their constantly fluxing catalog and it becomes clear that the actual production of music was rarely a priority for The Best Thing Ever.
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[edit] Biography
The Best Thing Ever's original lineup consisted of Noah Britton, his two closest college friends (Alex Billig and Jen Page), and an eighteen year-old soon-to-be singer/songwriter that he met over the internet (Emily Brodsky). Although the band officially consisted of four people, they played in various incarnations. Britton was the only fundamental member.
When they started out, they displayed a very clear stylistic duality. When performing with Emily, the other members harmonized to her cutesy Stephen Merritt-inspired pop songs. Without her, The Best Thing Ever took on a Half Japanese-like art-project character. The highlights of their early Emily-less performances include improvising musicals in subway stations, broadcasting two-hour band practices over their college radio station (WTBU), and playing a noise-based rendition of an Olsen Twins song at a social justice open mic. Indeed, this was a far cry from the type of work they were doing with Ms. Brodsky.
Emily landed the band big gigs opening for such acts as the Dresden Dolls, The World/Inferno Friendship Society, and The Gossip, but when she was offered a spot opening for the Magnetic Fields at NYU, she decided to leave The Best Thing Ever to make it on her own. Soon after she appeared on a K Records distributed 7" with Mirah and The Vibration.
All four original members of The Best Thing Ever played together for the last time on November 13th, 2004 at the home of Franz Nicolay. They recorded "Would You?" and "What I Want", the only two songs that all four members had composed together. The plan had been to release a post-mortem 7", but they lost interest in the idea by the time Nicolay had completed mixing the tracks.
One month after this recording session, The Best Thing Ever went on indefinite hiatus. Noah completed his studies at Boston University and spent several months unemployed living in a $300/month room in Mission Hill. Jen pursued her MA in philosophy at BU, and Alex went to London to intern for the Green Party of England and Wales and continue his studies in sociology.
In the fall of 2005, the three remaining members of The Best Thing Ever reunited in Boston to execute a new project that Noah had conceptualized while the band had been apart. With Emily officially out of the picture, The Best Thing Ever was no longer a standard contemporary pop-band. Their activities focused less on music and more on Britton's other interests: comedy, conceptual art, and psychology.
Noah's latest proposition was along the lines of their previous off-beat work, but significantly more complex. Essentially, The Best Thing Ever was to disguise themselves as a new lounge-act named Cool. They would send out fake press kits to all the local lounges in order to obtain gigs. Once they were on stage, Jen and Alex would play appealing pop harmonies, but Noah would take the mic and berate audience members for wasting their lives at crappy lounges.
Noah, Alex, and Jen spent several months trying to get Cool off the ground. "Stop Waiting for Death (You're Not Dead Yet)", the one song they finished and recorded for the project, has been featured on Said the Gramophone. Ultimately, however, Cool failed. The band members did not have the free time necessary to follow through with Noah's vision, and Boston didn't seem to have the type of dive-lounges that they were looking to play.
When Cool was abandoned, Alex became frustrated with his band-mates and started his Casio-punk solo act Never Heard of Zeppelin. Noah continued to perform solo and with Hip Hip Hooray and ROFLcopter. The Best Thing Ever, however, was far from over.
On January 27th, 2006, Noah invited Jen, Alex, and every other musician he knew, to take the stage with him at RISD and improvise parts to songs he had written in one night, exactly one year earlier. A month later, Alex and Noah opened for Plan-It-X-Records artist Paul Baribeau by playing a full set of Paul Baribeau covers. A month after that, under a pseudonym, the members of The Best Thing Ever played a set of republican hardcore songs at an anti-war benefit. They concluded their set by doing a sincere cover of Alan Jackson's "Where Were You" followed by a feedback-driven recitation of "The Royal Anthem of the Kilted Yaksmen".
On May 1st, 2006, Noah, Alex, and Jen officially revived The Best Thing Ever moniker before embarking on their most ambitious project to date, The Bathroom Tour. For twelve straight days, The Best Thing Ever invaded bathrooms across New England to perform their music for unsuspecting audiences. Though the band was often met with resistance, the tour was meant to be enjoyable for the audience. The band has used the term glamourbomb to describe their intentions.
Immediately following the completion of The Bathroom Tour, the band began another indefinite hiatus. Jen moved to South Dakota to work for Teach for America. Alex moved back home to New York, and Noah has remained in the Boston metro-area.
The Bathroom Tour DVD, which documents the events of their final tour, will be released by Noah's label, HIG Records in 2007.
[edit] Current Members
- Noah Britton, Baritone Vocals, Guitar, Percussion
- Alex Billig, Guitar, Trumpet, Irish Whistle, Feedback, Percussion
- Jen Page, Cello, Mandolin, Yelling, Rape Whistle, Harmonica, Percussion
[edit] Former Members
- Emily Brodsky, Female Vocals, Ukelele
[edit] Discography
EPs
| Year | Title | Label |
| 2004 | Would You?/What I Want 7" | HIG Records |
DVDs
| Year | Title | Label |
| 2006 | The Bathroom Tour DVD | HIG Records |
[edit] Trivia
- Jen Page appeared on American Idol Season 4: Cleveland. She dressed as a mime and mouthed the words to Aerosmith's "I Don't Want To Miss A Thing."
- Noah Britton has Aspergers Syndrome.
- Alex Billig was interviewed for the New York Times when he was 14.
