THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Cousin Betty is the brainchild of Australia’s Damien Stofka, a singer-songwriter and guitarist who has created riffs and written songs for Molten Universe, Death Mattel, LITTER and various other projects for the last 15 years.
After releasing the highly regarded singles Drone and Tape Hiss, Cousin Betty have released their debut EP Left. Cousin Betty’s sound is a mesh of distorted and psychedelic-influenced indie desert rock with some grungy garage-infused overtones.
During the strictest period of the pandemic lockdown, Damien began communicating with other artists and was inspired to try and make something more consistent of his vision. A friend from Canada, equally bored and in want of inspiration, asked Damien for some of the files from his old sessions to re-mix and produce. The tones and richness of these efforts were the motivation Damien needed. As the restriction lifted on local travel, he took some recording equipment to frontman Matt Downey’s house.
There, while their six-year-olds entertained themselves on computer games, Matt, his partner Katie Jane and Damien finished Lizard Queen and four other songs in mere hours. Gone now was the restrictive concept of theme, allowing the songs to tackle any topic. While that meant a slight direction change for his initial vision, Damien still felt a great attachment to the journey of his Cousin Betty – a matriarchal maverick who’ll live on in memory only.”
