“Getting off that stage, all of us were like, ‘Oh, dude, we want to do this every weekend for the rest of our lives,” thxbby’s lead singer Lauren said, still buzzing as she remembered the crowd. It wasn’t just another show; it was proof that what they were quietly and independently building could be more than just a hobby.

thxbby (pronounced “thanks baby”) may be a relatively new trio on paper, after officially becoming an act, but the story behind is more unconventional. Through dating apps, unfinished med school plans, house shows, cross-country drives and a shared determination to make music that feels human, in a moment when everything else is leaning hard into the artificial.

This band's origin started on a dating app. Two of the band members met and started dating on the dating app Hinge.

​Though the two members who met on Hinge quickly became partners in life and in music, it took some convincing to bring their third member, their producer, aboard. Upon hearing one of his tracks, they knew they needed him. 

“We had to DM him four or five times before he finally responded,” Lauren laughs. 

The holdup in getting an answer wasn’t artistic hesitation so much as classic internet brain. The members shared that their producer saw the message, couldn’t listen right away, and then forgot to answer for about four months.

Eventually, Lauren, Cole, and Michael ended up in the same room, cutting songs under the 'Hendry' name from another project. From a duo to a trio, the band grew and their chemistry grew with them.

“We did a couple of songs under the ‘Hendry project, and eventually we decided, hey, let's maybe rebrand and just become a trio,” Michael said. Lauren even made a full PowerPoint presentation to pitch the idea.

 “Once I saw the PowerPoint, I was in,” Cole, their producer, said. “There’s dedication here.”

This dedication is what carried their band from playing at local L.A. venues to expanding to a bigger festival out of the state within 2 years of being a band. The opportunity to play at M3F came as most great opportunities do, unexpectedly. 

The invitation to play at M3F came through a longstanding connection from Michael’s time in the entertainment industry. Michael Blouin is a multi-instrumentalist who spent his time before the band in the music department at William Morris Endeavor (WME) and Innovation Arts and Entertainment (IAE) marketing festivals, Broadway tours, and concerts. After his time, he realized he was meant to be creating his own music, not marketing others'. 

“Just as anything good in this world happens, it came from a place of just knowing the right person in your previous life,” Michael said. “Somebody who works at the festival was connected with me years back when I went to USC…I got a text out of the blue saying, ‘Hey, man, like you guys are the perfect fit for the festival. Do you want to come join and be a part?’ And it was just an obvious yes… as a band that had less than a year under our belt to kind of get called up to the plate like that… it was really, really, really amazing.”

Part of what makes thxbby stand out so early in their career is that every member brings a very different musical background, filling in any gaps in knowledge the others might’ve been missing. 

Lauren has written music for artists, DJs, commercials and films, and has been featured as an actor and model in countless commercial, theatrical, and print productions. Cole was a pre-med student before joining thxbby, who is also a trained musician in classical and jazz piano, voice and many elements of percussion, including jazz drum set. Michael has a lot of experience with music marketing, but also plays multiple instruments, including guitar and tends to genre-hop from jazz to punk to ‘90s hip hop to anything you can imagine. 

Michael grew up on artists like The Beatles and listening to classic rock, then fell deep into indie as a teenager. Cole was a Red Hot Chili Peppers kid who later gravitated toward producers’ bands like Glass Animals and the layered, experimental worlds of Bon Iver and Frank Ocean. Lauren’s earliest obsessions were the pop icons of Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, and the rest of the 2000s “pop girlies,” before she shifted toward more indie-leaning artists like Dijon,   Kascious Clay and Julia Michaels.

Though their Instagram humorously states they “make music for people who don't know how to fold a fitted sheet,” thxbby has more to them than you might think. On the outside, their obvious influences shine, but their earlier influences might be a surprise.  

“We all have very eclectic music tastes, but the Venn diagram doesn't actually have that much surface area in the middle. I was in a jazz band growing up, so a lot of my influences come from jazz and blues, and honestly, the musical theater world as well,” Michael said. 

These unexpected influences add depth to thxbby’s music that other groups may lack. Someone close to the band, Lauren’s father, who has followed and supported her and the band since their formation, can attest to the diversity of their talents. 

“Three diverse talents coming together to form a more perfect union. Creating a sound altogether their own,” James Gerrish said.

“It's interesting hearing us each say them,” Lauren adds. “You see where everything comes from—the pop vocals, the production elements from Cole, and then the rock influence from Michael. It feels like an equal three parts of the pie that have really landed into our own multi-genre kind of approach.”

Spontaneity and the unexpected are largely what shape the thxbby, even their name.

thxbby started as a text. A simple sentence of appreciation.

Michael had once replied to Lauren with a simple, “thnxbb” after she did something for him, nothing unusual. But the phrase stuck.

“I don’t even think it was spelled the same way at first,” Michael says. “But from there, that kind of got the ball rolling, like, huh, could that be it?”

“thxbby” felt just modern enough, and there wasn’t any other artist too close to it.

“SEO-wise, there's no other ‘Thanks Baby’ out there,” Lauren says. “We wanted to be like, when you look us up, we’re the first thing that comes up.”

A part of their identity that doesn’t come up first, however, is the fact that two of them are dating.

“We actually don't often share that,” Michael admits. “We kind of like this potential rumor of, like, who’s dating who? Are all three of them dating? Are they siblings?” It’s a wink at bands like The White Stripes, who famously played with their own story. A little ambiguity, he says, can go a long way toward myth-making.”

For all the big stages they’ve played, thxbby has found their place in the cozy stages, just being part of someone’s Friday night fun. 

“We like being part of somebody’s good time,” Lauren said. “We like being part of your good time and facilitating that.”

It’s hard to tell how long it’ll take for a band to achieve stardom. Yes, "overnight" successes do exist, but they are rare and often the result of years of unseen work, rehearsals and building a local following. There is the “grind” phase, where more bands spend 2-5 years of full-time commitment before truly taking off.

Thxbby’s grind phase is just starting, and they’ve got a lot of surprises for fans in their vault.

“We do have a couple of upcoming releases that we did play at the festival that I'm super excited about,” Lauren said. “Which one, well, we have one called existential disco. That's gonna be that. And then, yeah, that's my favorite song, and ‘Money,’ yeah, we got a lot of good stuff coming out. You guys should be excited.”

As probably the longest follower of the band, Lauren’s father, said, “I have followed Thxbby from its inception,” Gerrish said. “Hooked on the mood they create, I am compelled to say: thxbby. Give me more.”