‘This is our Nirvana!’: Are Geese Gen Z’s first great rock band?

Last week, on a balmy November night in Brooklyn, hundreds of people were queuing up outside the Paramount to see Geese play the last show of their Getting Killed North America tour.

It’s never particularly difficult to identify a fan base on gig night, and Geese’s fans proved no exception. There was a heavy emphasis on band merch, both official and satirical, paired with denim jackets on denim jeans, plaid shirts, and the occasional Afghan coat. It’s exactly the kind of 90s grunge meets 70s bohemia look you’d expect from fans of what the media has declared to be Gen Z’s first great rock band. Not in recent years, decades even, has a rock band commanded this level of fixation among a rapidly growing fanbase. But, for this audience in particular, a scene that ranges from recent graduates to high school seniors whose parents probably think they’re at a sleepover, Geese are speaking directly to their experiences of the present.

I know this because I’m running up and down this queue, speaking to as many of them as possible. Are Geese Gen Z’s first great rock band? It’s a question that speaks to the hype bordering on hysteria around both their latest album, this summer’s ecstatic and sporadically existential Getting Killed, and their frontman, Cameron Winter. But first, a brief history for anyone not familiar with the thrilling crescendo of Geese from a high school rock band to genre-definers: their first album, Projector, was met with buzz when it was released in 2021; their follow-up two years later, 3D Country, which combined sounds of Americana and old-school psychedelia, planted them firmly on America’s underground rock scene.

For many of Geese fans, it was this sophomore album that got them hooked. “When I first got into 3D Country I was like, I’ve never heard anything like this before in my life,” Sarah, 22, tells me in the queue. “And it was the only thing I listened to for six months.” Another 22-year-old named Charlie tells me: “I was obsessed with 3D Country, I saw them live, and it was like going back in time and seeing a proper rock group. That’s what I’ve always wanted to do.”

23-year-old Winter then released the folkier Heavy Metal last year to great acclaim from fans, critics and Nick Cave. Folksy and often melancholic, this is not an album used on Instagram reels, and when I ask fans how they got into the band, “word of mouth” is the recurring answer.

It’s the kind of All-American rock story that invokes memories of great bands gone by. Their Brooklyn upbringing draws natural comparisons to the likes of the Velvet Underground and The Strokes, while their 20th-century school-to-stadium trajectory makes you believe in the virtues of the music industry again. In a discourse peppered with accusations of ‘nepo’, ‘TikTok friendly’, and the dreaded ‘industry plant’, Geese stand out as being wholly genuine. “This is the kind of band you could see at a house party,” says Dan, 22, says. 

“This is our Nirvana,” a fan named Cameron proclaims. But tribute band, they are not – Geese are planted firmly within their generation’s zeitgeist. “They voice a lot of the anxieties of our generation,” adds another fan, who refuses to be named. “They’re young, they’re relatable, and a lot of the rock bands of the past ten years are very derivative. They feel really special in that way.”

It’s also a collaborative effort. “The energy of the fans feels like nothing else,” another fan named Dani explains. “We went to the free gig in Brooklyn and it was the happiest show. It feels like how I imagined some of the bands in the 90s would’ve felt like.” Other fans also brought up ‘Geese-fest’: according to 18-year-olds James, John and Dexter, if you turned up early enough, you could kick it with the band themselves and play video games. “They’re really nice,” John says. “We played [Super Smash Bros.] with [bass player] Dominic. We lost.”

And then, of course, there’s Cameron Winter. Winter, in a vein similar to a young Bob Dylan, toes a line between generational jester and spokesperson. The frontman is spoken about with a warmth by fans that speaks to a successful relay of personality that never feels curated or contrived. In fact, he is spoken about more like a mate. “Cameron’s lyricism has a spirituality that’s been missing among Gen Z-ers. I like that a lot,” Gabe, 20, tells me.

“He is a voice for a lot of like-minded young people that don’t really know how to express themselves,” says Noah, aged 22. “In a thoughtful and direct kind of way. There’s a lot of cultural statements in terms of fashion, but the way [he] puts things into words, poetically, is something I feel like we haven’t really had, in terms of storytelling.”

It’s a noticeable difference from the usual trappings of contemporary stan culture. Geese fans are not hysterical over the topic of Winter and his bandmates; their online social media presence is not obsessive fan wars, but rather, comparing notes on shows in comment sections. When the concert starts, and Winter sporadically speaks to the audience, he does so to a view of swaying bodies and the occasional joint, rather than a sea of raised iPhones.

So, are Geese Gen Z’s first great rock band? Aged 23 with just three studio albums under their belt, it is probably too early to say. But if the likes of Nirvana and The Strokes were defined for their canny ability to reflect the spirit of their generation, they have already succeeded. The closing date of their Getting Killed tour felt like a celebration of a generational belonging, in which Geese are both poet and commander. 

Check the gallery above for pictures from the night