After proving everyone wrong with his solo album, Cameron Winter wants to do the same with his Brooklyn-based band.
Tomorrow night, four Brooklyn-raised kids will make one of the biggest jumps a band can make: from indie darlings to the musical talent on Saturday Night Live. Geese, a band buzzy but by no means pegged as the next big thing in music as recently as three years ago, have catapulted from a pleasant indie group bringing about a new style of New York City rock to one of the most exciting acts in a decade plus.
How the hell did all of that happen?
In 2023, the quartet of Cameron Winter, Emily Green, Dominic DiGesu, and Max Bassin tried their damndest to sound unlike anyone else making music in their hometown. The friends, who met while attending schools in Brooklyn, released an distinctive, oft-thrilling, occasionally disorienting album called 3D Country. It was a flag planting of sorts, a call to weirdos and freaks everywhere that Geese would be the band for them. After 2021’s Projector placed them firmly within the gaggle of post-Strokes NYC rock bands, 3D Country was something grander and stranger, a willingness to get wacky in order to stand out. But, their bonafide interest in country-funk, noise rock, prog, and ’70s Laurel Canyon pop only took them so far. It was a sketch of who they would become, but they wouldn’t begin to fill in this portrait until the following year, when Winter released a solo album, Heavy Metal.
It was an album of unexpected greatness, the sort of thing the band’s inimitable frontperson was always interested in, always pushing on people, but never really found an audience for…Until he did. In an interview with SSENSE, he told writer Matthew Schnipper, “Ever since the band got any sort of foot in the door I’ve been showing people the songs that I just would make on my own. There was usually not so much interest in those. For the longest time, I just made it passively on the side.”
It was a project that very few people wanted to see the light of day. Winter, following his intuition—one that would lead the band to the Saturday Night Live stage—kept working on it. Geese’s label, Partisan Records, released the album in December of 2024, reportedly hoping it would be buried amongst year-end recaps and 2025 predictions. In a GQ profile, writer Grayson Haver Currin wrote, “Early feedback from the label, management, and his dad was bad, even before…Winter could finish Heavy Metal.” He added, “There was a strong sense that the record would crater, leaving a sensitive kid whose career hitherto seemed like one brilliant accident deflated.”
Everyone—except Winter—was wrong. The album found a bigger audience than any Geese album up to that point. His warbly, wonderful voice found a new home amongst impressionistic wanderings and ramshackle arrangements. It’s a method he fine-tuned on Geese’s breakthrough, Getting Killed, widely considered the best album of 2025. But, there are plenty of excellent indie albums that don’t sling a band onto the SNL stage. The group’s ascent can be attributed to a coalescing number of factors, including, but not limited to, a mystique and aura that Winter brings to everything he does; a recent willingness on the show’s behalf to take risks on more exciting, experimental artists (shoutout Mk.gee and Dijon); and Getting Killed blending Geese’s weirdest ideas with some of the most charmingly catchy hooks you’ll find anywhere. “Cobra” features lines like, “Baby, let me wash your feet…forever,” and will be the soundtrack for many Brooklyn weddings in 2026 and beyond.
In April of 2025, Cameron Winter performed two shows at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Winter, without a band or opening act, played the piano and sang by himself. In September, Geese released Getting Killed. When Winter embarked on another solo show, this time at a sold out Carnegie Hall on December 11, the stakes were noticeably higher. Michael Stipe of R.E.M. and Trey Anastasio of Phish were in attendance. The show was documented by filmmakers Paul Thomas Anderson and Benny Safdie.
It felt like a moment, not just for Winter and Geese, but for the future of music itself. Hyperbole? Perhaps. But is there anything more anti-algorithmic than a guy with this voice fronting the most exciting band on Earth? Is there anything that will make major label execs lose sleep over the next year like trying to find the next Geese? It’s a fool’s errand, because not even Cameron Winter is sure what Geese will be. On Saturday night, though, they’ll show the world who they are right now. I can’t wait.
Read More:
Welcome to ‘The Watchlist with Michelai’: Your Weekly Entertainment Reset
Adidas Drops Bob Marley Collection as Jamaica’s World Cup Dream Lives On
How Drake Maye’s Brand Value Could Skyrocket With A Super Bowl Win
The Year of the Crown: Why 2026 Unapologetically Belongs to Anne Hathaway
Historic $100M Gift Creates Long-Term Financial Security for Team USA Athletes
