Betty Who
Feb 1, 2015
Jessica Anne Newham better known by her stage name Betty Who, is an Australian singer-songwriter and musician based in New York City. She is signed to RCA Records. The singer was born in Sydney, Australia, where she lived until her mid-teens. Trained since the age of four as a classical cellist, she moved to the United States in 2007 to attend Interlochen Center for the Arts in Michigan, whose alumni include Norah Jones, Rufus Wainwright, and Josh Groban. Newham is also self-taught on piano and guitar, and wrote her first songs at age 14, and began performing as a singer-songwriter at age 16.
After high school, Newham attended Berklee College of Music in Boston. During her first semester, she met producer Peter Thomas who was also attending Berklee. Thomas suggested pairing Newham's songwriting with a more dreamy, anthemic production style. The two began writing new material together and developed Newham's sound over the next two years.
Newham's debut EP, The Movement, was released on April 16, 2013. An independent, free-download release initially, the EP's huge success online helped lead to a large amount of major label interest, before she ultimately signed with RCA Records. It premiered on Billboard on 9 April 2013, one week prior to its official release date and continually received rave reviews from countless major blogs and magazines throughout 2013. Upon release, Idolator described the EP as "A spine-tinglingly euphoric 80's pop nugget," indie pop blog All Things Go claimed she was "charting new musical territory," and the famous UK outlet Popjustice called it "the best proper EP so far of 2013." Press continued to organically build throughout the year, with Elle Magazine calling her "Your Next Pop Obsession" on 5 August 2013 and TIME hand-picking Newham as one of 14 Musical Acts To Watch in 2014.
On September 11, 2013, Spencer Stout uploaded a YouTube video of him proposing to his boyfriend Dustin in a flash mob dance routine at a Salt Lake City, Utah Home Depot. The video, which featured "Somebody Loves You" became a viral hit online, and as of April 2014 garnered over 11 million views. The attention of the video coupled with the track's official iTunes release, led to the song debuting at number 44 on the overall iTunes Charts, as well as debuting as the number 4 most viral song on Spotify.
Betty Who's full-length debut album, Take Me When You Go, was released on October 7, 2014. Thirteen songs, four of them being taken from her previous EPs, appeared on the album. Her latest single is entitled, "All Of You."