Interview: The Airport 77s
Andy Sullivan Discusses The Band's Third Album, 'Don't Let Go'
Sometimes the missing puzzle piece for your next album is right in front of your face.
For The Airport 77s’ third full-length, Don’t Let Go, Andy Sullivan (guitar/vocals) and John Kelly (drums) tapped Washington D.C. power popper Cal Everett (4 Out of 5 Doctors) to play bass and contribute two songs. The result is an excellent collection that pushes the band’s sound forward while diving deep on ‘80s and ‘90s influences.
“Cal's a local legend around the DMV, and several people said we should reach out to him. Our initial jam was promising, but we were sold when we saw him at a Fountains of Wayne tribute show where we were also on the bill. Dude has pipes, chops, and songs—the full package,” Sullivan told me for the interview below.
Don’t Let Go explores even more pop rock territory than the band’s two previous releases.
“We take more risks on this record, both lyrically and musically. Rotation (2021) was basically a party record—a blast of high energy, punky power pop with often humorous lyrics, while We Realize You Have a Choice built on that formula with a broader sonic palette. For Don't Let Go we took more left turns. There are a few straight ahead rockers, but a lot of other textures as well,” Sullivan said.
“We recorded it the same way we did We Realize You Have a Choice—bang out the basic tracks in a commercial studio, then labor over the overdubs in my basement.”
I connected with Sullivan by email to discuss Don’t Let Go, what it’s like working with Everett, and some of the major inspirations on this album.
Andy Sullivan Interview
Congrats on the great new album! Don't Let Go explores a lot of different corners of the pop rock universe. Was that by design?
Andy Sullivan: Not consciously. It was more a case of keeping our ears open and seeing what we could develop. ‘Summer Can't Wait’ grew from a melodic fragment heard on the lifeguard's radio at the pool; ‘Like Falling In Love’ emerged at the end of a three-day bike trip in West Virginia, while the title track showed up in my skull during a bike trip in Tennessee. ‘1999’ was inspired by a Verdi opera performance in Maine, while the line ‘Don't make it easy, it's gotta hurt’ came to me while watching a band at the Takoma Park VFW. ‘Satellite’ was prompted by something John said during a conversation about raising kids.
Then it was a question of building out those songs and arranging them. Sometimes they changed dramatically—the rhumba beat on ‘Girl on Fire,’ for example, wasn't originally part of the picture.
After two years of this, we had more than enough material for a record, and that's where the ‘design’ came in—deciding which songs don't make the cut, sequencing the running order, etc. The end result is a record with a much greater stylistic and emotional range than our previous two.
I got hooked right away by the single "If It's On, I'm In." What's the story behind that standout track?
Andy Sullivan: We were making plans for a hootenanny a while back and my friend Tamara said, ‘Well, if it's on, I'm in.’ Bingo: there's your song title.
I sometimes try to see how many harmonic tricks I can sneak into a song before it gets obnoxious. In this song, we have a thirteen-chord sequence in the verse that collectively push the key of B to its limits; a cascade of modulating triplets in the guitar breakdown; a Master of Puppets-style galloping riff section with a scrambl-y guitar solo; and an irregular rhyme scheme. All of that seems like it could get very obnoxious indeed, but the cheery lounge-pop groove keeps things burbling along without too much fuss.
The Cardigans and Antonio Carlos Jobim used this formula with great success to smuggle radical harmonies into people's ear holes. Another huge influence was the Willie Wisely Trio, who specialized in this sort of chaotic, harmonically sophisticated goofiness. Lyrically, it's some dork's pitch to a lady—you know he's going to get shot down, but you have to admire his enthusiasm.
Of course I'm a sucker for the straight ahead power pop of "She's Everything." Do you guys consider yourselves a power pop band?
Andy Sullivan: Yes! We started in 2014 as a cover band specializing in all the classics by Paul Collins’ Beat, Bram Tchaikovsky, The Records, 20/20, etc., and we eventually learned enough bona fide hits of the era to get the ladies on the dance floor. That led to a ton of fun gigs around the area—parades, street festivals, black-tie awards dinners—but eventually we got sick of playing ‘867-5309’ over and over. By the time we started playing original music in 2020, the strictures of power pop were tattooed on the inside of our eyelids.
When people who aren't musical obsessives ask what kind of music we play I say, ‘We sound like My Sharona.’ Everybody likes ‘My Sharona’!
Adding Cal Everett from 4 Out Of 5 Doctors seems to have amped up the '80s pop elements.
Andy Sullivan: Cal uses a lot of chords that were popular during that time period in the two songs he contributed to the record, ‘Anyone But You’ and ‘She's Everything"’ (add9s, sus4s, etc.). Those chords also pop up in other songs like ‘Summer Can't Wait.’
I love that you pepper this album with some arena-worthy guitar playing on tracks like "1999 (Take Me Back)," "Anyone But You," and "Girl On Fire." Who are a few of your guitar heroes?
Andy Sullivan: Richard Thompson is the best guitar player I've seen live, though Prince playing ‘Purple Rain’ at Paisley Park is a close second. Mary Timony has a million cool, economical riffs. John Dwyer of Osees has a million bonkers awesome riffs. I love how Elliot Easton's solos were an essential part of each song they were in. Eddie Van Halen, Mdou Moctar, Bob Stinson, Hound Dog Taylor, Doc Watson, Keith Richards, Brent Hinds and Brann Kelliher, Josh Homme.
If I got in the van with The Airport 77s these days, what would I be listening to?
Andy Sullivan: The Osees until John makes me turn it off; Bad Moves Wearing Out the Refrain; Los Piranas; The Lushpockets; Mdou Moctar; MJ Lenderman; KNOWER; Nad Navillus; The Pro-Teens; The Magmatics; the new Stereolab, The Toxhards, Queens of the Stone Age Alive in the Catacombs, the new Wet Leg (when it comes out), Apollo 66, The Shazam, Dwight Twilley Band, The Soft Boys, Fela Kuti.
It's an album that sounds good on these hot summer days.