featured artist: betty airs

Grunge and 50s rock ‘n’ roll are not often used to describe the same band. And yet, the members of (relatively) recently formed Betty Airs have somehow managed to infuse their sound with both influences. Theirs is a band creating old music through a more modern filter, whilst being careful not to overemphasise the grunge element.

‘We wanted to go back to the roots of rock ‘n’ roll,’ says vocalist/guitarist, Darren Cross. ‘I thought a couple of years ago that people will eventually be over dance music and it’ll have to go back to that sound. We wanted to just do upbeat music that people can dance to, and it got the grunge element because we just make it louder in the choruses.’

Formed by members of Run!Hide!, Cristian Campano and Michael Zagoridis, along with Cross (aka The E.L.F.) a mere year ago, Betty Airs is taking things as they come, though the band’s focus is firmly pressing forwards with the intent to start recording and put out an EP early in the new year after they complete their current tour to promote the release of their debut 7 inch, titled ‘Reverse Now’. But as with all contemporary bands, regardless of whether they take influence from the new or the old, they have had to embrace the workings of the Internet and social media. Nonetheless, Cross has a somewhat different approach to most musicians, making all the music he produces available for free online.

‘I’ve always been really involved with the online thing. Two or three years ago, I sent an email to Youtube about a video I’d made and they made it the video of the day. It got a quarter of a million hits and it cost me 10 bucks to make, whereas now, it’s getting pretty tough to get on a blog or to get your music out or played on the radio; it’s just so monopolised in Australia. You just kind of do your own thing and if people want to buy it off iTunes…I mean, iTunes gets 70c of it so what’s the point? I’m not too sure. A few years ago, it was quite inspiring, and you still had a chance to get through.’

Betty Airs’s music is reminiscent of that which many of us heard blaring from our parents’ primitive sound systems during childhood, but Cross’s reintroduction to the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, Neil Sedaka, and Bill Haley and the Comets came via less conventional means than you might expect.

‘My ex-ex-girlfriend used to read the news on one of the radio stations in Sydney and after we broke up, I never wanted to listen to it. So I started to listen to this radio station that played all this fantastic 50s music that I’d kind of heard when I was a kid. That really influenced my whole outlook on playing guitar again.’

But this is hardly the extent of Cross’s current musical influence, though it comes as little surprise that with their unique sound, the band listens to music across many genres, with Cross mentioning that he’d downloaded a song by Enya earlier that day, and really likes AC/DC.

But what does Darren Cross definitely want you to know?

‘Someone at the pub once asked me if Cristian was a Spanish gang member because he has a bit of an emo vibe going on. But he’s the nicest guy; he can’t even make a sandwich, let alone shoot a gun.’

Sydneysiders can catch Betty Airs’ launch of Release Now this Saturday, December 18, at the Roxbury Hotel, supported by Step-Panther, Community Radio and The Faults. Watch the video clip for Reverse Now below!