"Better" is a 2007 single by British singer-songwriter,

Tom Baxter Tom Baxter (born Thomas Baxter Gleave, 29 October 1973) is an English singer-songwriter based in London. He was born in Ipswich, Suffolk, and grew up in Camborne Cornwall with his 4 siblings. The second son of Jeff and Julie Gleave (who were r ...

, co-written with Sam Semple. It was released on 3 December 2007, reaching a peak of No. 10 in the Irish Singles Chart and No. 67 in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

in 2008.

Track listing

#"Better" #"Too Far Gone" #Love Is Not Enough

Chart positions

Boyzone cover

The first version of the song to chart was a cover by

Boyzone Boyzone were an Irish boy band, created in 1993 by talent manager Louis Walsh. Before even recording any material, Boyzone made an appearance on RTÉ's '' The Late Late Show''. Their most successful line-up was composed of Keith Duffy, Steph ...

, released in December 2008 as the second and final single from their second greatest hits compilation, '' Back Again... No Matter What''. It became their final single released before the death of band member

Stephen Gately Stephen Patrick David Gately (17 March 197610 October 2009) was an Irish singer, who, with Ronan Keating, was co-lead singer of the pop group Boyzone; all of Boyzone's studio albums during Gately's lifetime hit number one in the United Kingdo ...

in 2009.

Background

Boyzone's version of the song features both

Ronan Keating Ronan Patrick John Keating (born 3 March 1977) is an Irish singer. He debuted in 1993 alongside Keith Duffy, Michael Graham, Shane Lynch, and Stephen Gately, as the co-lead singer (with Gately) of Irish pop group Boyzone. His solo career start ...

and

on lead vocals. The single received less promotion than ''Love You Anyway'', due to the band's tour commitments, and charted much lower, selling 30,000 copies and becoming Boyzone's first single to miss the top 3 in Ireland and the first to miss the top 5 in the UK.

Music video

The music video for "Better" premiered on 14 October 2008. The entire video was shot in black and white, with each member of the group singing to a woman he is holding – with the exception of Stephen Gately, who is shown singing to a man – the only time a Boyzone video has depicted a same-sex

love interest ''Gli Innamorati'' (, meaning "The Lovers") were stock characters within the theatre style known as commedia dell'arte, who appeared in 16th century Italy. In the plays, everything revolved around the Lovers in some regard. These dramatic and pos ...

. The video marks the last appearance for Gately in a

video, due to his death in October 2009.

Track listing

* Digital download # "Better" – 3:36 # "Coming Home Now" – 3:46

Chart positions

References

{{authority control 2008 singles 2007 songs Boyzone songs Polydor Records singles Pop ballads LGBT-related songs Song recordings produced by Stephen Lipson