Machismo, Neo-Nazis, Why America Still Hates Women, and Their Upcoming Double Album Let’s Have Fun in the Dark

Transmission 284: Interview with The Dead Betties

The Dead Betties are a Brooklyn rock band with Joshua Ackley on lead vocals and bass, Derek Pippin on drums, and Eric Shepherd on guitar. Their music tackles systemic bigotry, the expectations placed on authenticity, misogyny, and how society restricts who gets to be considered a victim. The band describes themselves as ‘unapologetically queer dudes in rock,’ using distortion and noise to express what they call ‘righteous fury’ and ‘real anger’ in a genre they felt was dominated by machismo.

Title: Whitey
Artist: The Dead Betties
Release Date: 2025-11-21
Genres: Garage Rock, Noise Rock, Post-punk
Description: The Dead Betties discuss sexual assault survival, toxic positivity, and misogyny on their Rotten Princess Records EP Whitey, out November 21.

On their Whitey EP, the single ‘What’s A Good Victim Supposed To Say?’ comes from frontman Joshua Ackley’s experience as a rape survivor. Ackley uses the song to challenge what he sees as the ‘cult of positive thinking’ and the ‘dangerous and repugnant concept’ that victims need to perform their trauma in specific ways to be believed. The band gained recognition playing venues like CBGB and festivals such as Homo-a-Gogo. They’ve released music on Warner Music, Chainsaw Records, and Rotten Princess Records, with coverage in Rolling Stone, Brooklyn Vegan, and Out Magazine.

Featured image: Jonathon Marin

How did you meet? What was the driving force that gave birth to the band?

Derek Pippin, our drummer, and I met back in junior high school. We were always drawn to the same kind of music, culture, and energy. In high school, he played in a band called The Carls and invited me to join. It was a lot of fun, but what really clicked was the creative connection between us; we realized we were two total weirdos.

After graduation, we decided to go all in and form our own band, move to New York City, and play every club we could until we made a name for ourselves. But the actual name The Dead Betties came a little earlier, during one very late night in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Derek, our friend Maisie, and I were at the Frontier, talking and joking about how America loves to build women up into icons and then glorify their downfalls. That tragic, distinctly American cycle of fame and destruction really stuck with us. So, The Dead Betties became a kind of tribute and critique of that pattern.

Once Derek and I made it to New York, we met Eric Shepard, who became our guitar player and much more. Finding him felt like fate. He completed the sound, the chemistry, the vision. That’s when The Dead Betties truly came to life.

Who were your role models for being “definitively queer” in your music when you started in 2000?

Honestly, I didn’t have any. As a gay guy in music back then, definitively queer role models were almost impossible to find. The landscape in the late ’90s and early 2000s was dominated by machismo, a kind of forced, fake masculinity that left no room for authenticity or vulnerability. So when we started The Dead Betties, we decided to invent ourselves in the image we wanted to see. We wanted to fill a void in culture that simply didn’t exist: a space for angry, outrageous, unapologetically queer dudes in rock.

Our real role models weren’t in music; they were in film. John Waters and Greg Araki were huge inspirations for us. They made life seem dangerous and hilarious and beautiful all at once. Musically, I’ve always felt there was deep queerness in certain women of the ’90s—Courtney Love, Tori Amos, and all the disco icons from the ’70s like Donna Summer, Diana Ross, and Gloria Gaynor. And of course, Madonna. Those women embodied defiance and self-creation in ways that deeply resonated with me.

So, The Dead Betties were born from that feminist lineage, that outsider energy. There really weren’t role models for people like us, and honestly, that’s still true in a lot of ways.

We wanted to fill a void in culture that simply didn’t exist: a space for angry, outrageous, unapologetically queer dudes in rock.

What was the NYC queer punk scene like in 2000?

In 2000, there really wasn’t a scene for bands like us. We didn’t have a natural home, so we often found ourselves aligning more with the lesbian rock scene—spaces like Meow Mix, where incredible artists were creating community and sound. But there wasn’t really a place for angry, loud, outrageous people making guitar-driven music.

That changed when Dean Johnson from Velvet Mafia came into our lives. Dean, rest in peace, was a legendary figure in New York nightlife and truly our first champion. He saw one of our earliest shows at CBGB in 2001, came backstage afterward, and invited us to play his Homocore party there. That single moment changed everything for us. From then on, we played every Homocore, and those shows opened the door to bigger opportunities, including headlining Homo-A-Go-Go in Olympia.

Dean was the one who first called us a queer punk band. And that label stuck because it gave a name to what we were doing. Back then, the scene was just beginning to form, and it never quite got the credit it deserved. Most queer artists at the time were making dance music or electroclash, which was about to explode as a genre, but there weren’t many queer bands channeling real anger through distortion and noise. We often ended up on bills with heavy metal or noise bands simply because no one else sounded like us.

That outsider position became part of our DNA. We’re still playing, still angry, and still fighting to make space for music that doesn’t fit the mold—something raw, defiant, and a little dangerous.

The band has faced bigotry since the beginning. Is there a specific early memory that cemented your mission?

We faced bigotry in some pretty obvious ways early on. When we first started touring, neo-Nazis and outright homophobes would show up to our shows. In some cities, they made it impossible for us to play. It was shocking and, at times, terrifying. But the prejudice didn’t just come from the fringes. It came from the industry too.

One moment that really stuck with me happened when we were being courted by Vice Records in the early 2000s. Vice was the talk of New York then, and we were hoping to sign with them. One night at a party, Gavin McInnes of Vice and the eventual founder of The Proud Boys—who wasn’t even on their A&R staff—as I recall, loudly shouted something to the effect of, “No one here gives a fuck about your faggot music.” That was the moment I knew we weren’t getting signed to Vice. His anti-endorsement, if you will, hit hard, but it also lit a fire in me. I decided right then that we’d fight even harder and prove that we belonged. And eventually, we signed with a bigger label.

That kind of bigotry wasn’t limited to one person or one night. It was systemic. Bookers and promoters would avoid us, and even other bands didn’t want to share a bill. Todd P., who was a major promoter at the time, was openly dismissive, even nasty to us, at shows and events. We were constantly navigating around that bro-centric, PBR-and-trucker-hat scene that was fine with women being queer but had no space for a dude like me.

So, we built our own path and relied on our friends and allies. There was a legendary party at the time called QxBxRx, hosted by Stephen Crow, Andrew Martini (Limp Wrist), and Eric Karf at the Cake Shop in New York City. QxBxRx really became our lifeline for local shows. We played it constantly, and it always drew a full, passionate crowd—people who wanted to experience the other side of music: something loud, visceral, angry, and fun.

Out of that scene, we ended up finding something far more vibrant and alive than the spaces that had closed their doors on us. We also became part of the Bands Against Bush movement, which gave us a broader platform to connect our music to activism. So, as cheesy as it sounds, when one door closed, others opened, and often they opened to better rooms. Being shut out of certain communities taught us who we were and who we wanted to stand beside.

Why was this song, and this specific moment, the right time to share such a personal experience?

Surviving sexual assault is an intensely personal experience. No two people live through it, or live with it, the same way. For me, what finally opened the door to write about it and to talk about it publicly was the death of the man who assaulted me when I was 11. When he passed away last year, something inside me shifted. It was as if a key turned and unlocked a space I hadn’t been able to reach before. For the first time, I could think about what happened in a clear, almost unemotional way. I could begin to intellectualize it, put language around it, and see it as part of a larger system, not just a personal wound.

What I started to really think about is how unfairly society treats survivors, how narrow the lanes are for what a “good victim” is allowed to look like. There are a few archetypes you see over and over again. One is the respectable survivor: polished, composed, full of life lessons, able to forgive and move on—the person who becomes palatable through grace and respectability. Another is the broken survivor: chaotic, self-destructive, overly sexualized, turning pain into spectacle as a way to cope. And then there’s the stoic survivor: the one who never talks about it, who suppresses it completely to live the life society wants them to live.

The video for “What’s a Good Victim Supposed to Say?” is really about what happens when you find yourself trying to live inside all three archetypes—the collision, the confusion, the exhaustion of trying to perform your own healing in ways that feel acceptable to other people.

For me, the man who assaulted me has been forgiven. That happened a long time ago. But forgiveness doesn’t bring clarity, it brings complexity. You start to wonder, am I forgiving because I’ve healed, or because it’s what’s expected of me? That’s what the song and the video wrestle with—the messy, contradictory process of surviving, speaking, forgiving, and still trying to feel real in a world that keeps telling you what your pain should look like.

You’ve spoken about the dangers of forced positivity. How do you see that trend harming survivors?

I think it’s important to say there are different kinds of positivity. The one that’s most destructive is the saccharine, commercialized kind—the “hustle and grind” version that’s become so popular lately. You know, the get up, go, go, go, rise and grind, stay grateful, manifest harder kind of energy. I’m glad people are finally starting to make fun of it, because it’s exhausting, it’s disingenuous, and it’s not sustainable. No one can exist in that state all the time.

That style of positivity becomes militant, a mindset that demands constant forward motion and cheerfulness even when you’re struggling. For anyone who’s been through trauma, loss, or even just disappointment, it’s deeply harmful. It pressures you to perform happiness instead of examining what’s actually wrong or giving yourself space to heal. You end up glossing over your pain with this disposable, Instagram-ready version of optimism that never lasts.

Now, genuine positivity, the kind that comes from passion, love, and empathy, is something else entirely. That’s real. The Wu-Tang Clan said it best: “Positive energy activates constant elevation.” There’s truth in that. Positive energy can lead to peace and growth. But forced positivity, the kind that demands you reframe everything in your life as a “lesson” or “blessing,” is its own kind of control. It feeds this modern cult of wellness that has nothing to do with actual wellness and everything to do with denial.

Beyond your personal experiences, what specific political or social issues from the last decade fueled the anger on this record?

We live in a society that hates women. That’s not hyperbole; it’s the truth. Even globally, culture remains profoundly misogynistic. More than half of the world’s population is female, yet in the U.S. we’ve spent the last decade rolling back hard-won rights, undoing decades of progress toward equality.

The overturning of Roe v. Wade wasn’t treated with the outrage it deserved. It was a blip on the cultural radar, a passing headline, and that says everything. When the rights of gay men came under threat, the community mobilized fast, lobbying hard behind the scenes to protect marriage equality. That’s why I don’t think those protections will be overturned anytime soon. But where was that same urgency for women? Where was the collective action when Roe fell, when women’s bodily autonomy and equal rights were stripped away?

As the son of a feminist mother and someone raised by strong, outspoken women, I can’t answer this question any other way. The single political and social issue that keeps The Dead Betties awake at night, that fuels the rage on this record, is the grotesque and regressive treatment of women in our society.
We should all be fighting with everything we have to restore and reinforce the rights of girls and women, not just in America but everywhere. Watching those rights erode and seeing “trad-wife” ideology creep into mainstream culture, is horrifying. The fact that the media treats it as a quirky lifestyle trend instead of the cultural backslide it is—that’s appalling. This isn’t about fashion or femininity. It’s about human rights.

What non-musical inspirations, like writers, activists, or films, informed the Whitey EP?

Derek and I are both from the Four Corners, right on the border of the Navajo Nation, so Native culture has always been a part of our lives. Growing up there, you can’t miss the stark divide between the white and Navajo communities. It’s economic, social, and attitudinal. You see firsthand the effects of centuries of oppression and marginalization. That awareness never leaves you.

Recently, someone from our hometown, Deanna Allison—who’s now one of the stars of Dark Winds—really inspired us. Deanna went to school with both Derek and me. She spent time growing up on the reservation and faced all the discrimination that came with that. To now see her as a lead actress on a major show that not only depicts the political and cultural tension between white and Navajo communities but also celebrates the beauty, resilience, and deep familial strength of Native people—that’s extraordinary.

I never thought I’d live to see a Navajo girl from our town become a national television star, portraying her community with that kind of authenticity and power. Watching her do that was a wake-up call for us. It reminded me that we all have a responsibility to keep creating, to use our platforms and our art to push culture forward.

If Deanna can do what she’s doing with grace, courage, and purpose, then we as artists have to hold up our end of the bargain. We’re all the adults in the room now. The world feels like it’s sliding backward in so many ways, and it’s the creative forces—the musicians, the writers, the actors—who have to keep the light on. Seeing her out there doing such good and meaningful work made me want to record Whitey. It reminded me why art still matters.

You criticize “performative authenticity.” Are there any thinkers or artists who you feel are getting it right on this topic?

Oh no, I’d hate to compliment anyone. I’d much rather sit here dissing everyone, and I mean that sincerely. Because “performative authenticity” drives me insane. You can log onto any platform and see everyone performing authenticity to the point where it’s not even a real thing anymore. If you have to perform being authentic, you’ve already lost the plot.

We’ve become a culture of rehearsed honesty. Everyone is giving the same 15-second version of themselves they think people want. Even longer interviews are just stitched-together soundbites now. It’s all so manicured, so overproduced, and yet we’re constantly told it’s “raw” or “unfiltered.” When authenticity becomes a brand, it dies. The cake’s burnt. We’re cooked.

That said, a few people still get it right. Musically, U.S. Girls comes to mind. Meg Remy is a genius. She’s utterly herself, in a way that feels spontaneous, chaotic, and alive. She’s not trying to imitate anyone’s formula for being real; she’s just being.

Quentin Tarantino also gets it right—not because I always agree with him, but because he doesn’t perform himself. He’s like an untamed hot spring: unmanicured, unpredictable, bubbling straight from the ground. You might not like everything that comes out, but it’s undeniably his.

And I’ll add Blood Orange—Dev Hynes. I’ve never met him, but his work feels underperformed in the best way. It’s deliberate but never desperate. It feels like art made by someone who’s thinking deeply, not posing for the camera.

So yes, there are still flashes of the real thing out there. They’re just rare. When you stumble on authenticity now, it’s almost shocking.

Are you already working on new material?

I’m so glad you asked, yes. The Dead Betties have been recording and releasing a steady stream of singles and EPs for a while now, but it’s been a long time since we’ve truly sat down and made a full album. So, I’m thrilled to say our next project is going to be a double album called Let’s Have Fun in the Dark.

Two records in one, Let’s Have Fun and In the Dark, and together they form a kind of love letter from outsiders to America, and to outsiders in America. In a way, it’s our version of an Americana record, but told through the lens of alienation and rebellion, the underbelly of the American dream.

We’ve written around 52 songs so far and plan to narrow it down to 22 for the final tracklist. It’s a big, ambitious concept, deeply inspired by 1970s and 1980s storytelling, especially the collision between literature and cinema in that era. A huge influence is Christine, Stephen King’s novel and John Carpenter’s film. The two famously didn’t see eye to eye, but I love both versions. To me, Christine is this weird, perfect love letter to Americana, rebellion, and anti-Americana all at once. The goal is to release it in 2026, and I can promise it’s going to be something completely new for us.

The final scene in Christine says it all. After the car’s been destroyed, its ghost sparks to life in a junkyard, the radio flickers on, and the lead character, Leigh, just says flatly, “God, I hate rock and roll.” Then the movie ends. To me, that’s the most rock-and-roll thing you could possibly say at the end of a movie, and that’s exactly the spirit we’re channeling for Let’s Have Fun in the Dark.

Photo courtesy of The Dead Betties

Matteo Damiani

Matteo Damiani is an Italian photographer and author. Curator of the sites Retrofuturista.com; weirditaly.com; china-underground.com and others