Meet Your Top 3 Finalists in BC's Best Teen Band Contest

Congratulations to High Life Scenery, the ONLINE winner of BC's Best Teen Band contest! They will get to choose their slot in the lineup for the final band showcase on May 1st!

In October 2009, Youthink and Tom Lee set out to find BC’s best teen band. Six months and two eliminations later, we present our Top 3! On May 1st, the Top 3 bands will compete live at Tom Lee Music Hall in downtown Vancouver to determine the winner (Enter for your chance to win tickets). The bands are fighting for the grand prize of a Yamaha drum kit, studio time to record a single, a photo shoot, plus much more (see bottom of page for full prize details).

Good luck to our finalists!

High Life Scenery

Hometowns: Burnaby and Vancouver

Genre: Pop/punk/rock

Influences: Paramore, Alexisonfire, VersaEmerge, Fall Out Boy

YT: How has being a part of this contest affected your band?
It has gotten our name out there and raised a lot more interest in our band. Youthink also gave us the chance to network with nine other great bands and discover other local young artists. It’s given us a lot of inspiration to continue improving and growing.

YT: What are you doing to prepare for the contest finale show?
We are doing everything we can to make the best first impression possible. Our goal is to explode onto the stage and make every minute of our four-song set count. We plan on accomplishing this by not only practicing relentlessly, but by sitting down and actually talking our set through as a band. Eighty per cent of our practices are spent jamming out our songs in a semicircle around the drum kit. For May 1st however, we plan to rehearse like we do the other 20 per cent of the time – as if we were playing a live show.

The Knots

Hometown: Coquitlam

Genre: Alt-indie rock

Influences: Led Zeppelin, Weezer, The Tragically Hip

YT: How have you enjoyed the experience of being part of BC’s Best Teen Band Contest?
It’s been exciting seeing the amount of reaction from people about the contest. We’re really glad that we were able to make it into the Top 10 and now the Top 3.

YT: What’s the most valuable thing you’ve learned from this contest so far?
When we went to the songwriting workshop, Don [McLeod of the School Alliance of Student Songwriters] told us, “If you make a mistake while practicing a song, stop and talk about it. Then play it five times.” That has helped us with our practicing.

YT: What would winning this contest mean for The Knots?
Winning would mean taking our band to the next level. It would motivate us to write more songs and keep on improving.

The Knots were featured on The Express. Check out the video >>

Split the Silence

Hometown: Kelowna

Genre: Prog-indie rock

Influences: Coldplay, Death Cab, Bob Marley, The Beatles, We Are The City

YT: What are you doing to prepare yourselves for the final showdown?
We have started to work on an arrangement for the Canadian cover song that we will be performing at the show (won’t tell you who the band is or what the song is, but it’s one of our favourites). We want to make an arrangement that is unique but does it justice.

YT: What would winning mean for Split the Silence’s future as a band?
Winning would definitely encourage us all as musicians. Win or lose, we are very happy we made it this far. Winning would make us very happy because Brendan could finally get a drum set that isn’t a nasty sounding beginner’s kit like the one he has now! Getting to work on some songwriting ideas with Shaun Verreault from Wide Mouth Mason would be amazing and a chance to record with Jay Evjen... surreal.

Prize Details

A panel of industry judges will determine the winner of BC’s Best Teen Band and the winning band will receive amazing prizes including:
-$500 in gift certificates from Tom Lee Music, a Yamaha drum kit + more
-Recording of one single by Jay Evjen (Hot Hot Heat, Incura, Motion Soundtrack) of Juicemix Productions at The Factory Studios in Vancouver
-A one-day songwriting session with Shaun Verreault of Wide Mouth Mason
-A photo shoot with photographer Adam Blasberg, art director Ben Oliver and stylist Alecia Ebbels
-A marketing consultation with White Tide Entertainment
-The title of BC’s Best Teen Band!

The Top 3 bands will and have receive(d):
-A video of the final performance @ Tom Lee Music Hall
-A media training session/copyright workshop with the editors of Youthink Magazine and Terry O’Brien of SOCAN
-Publicity in Youthink Magazine