When, over the weekend, the rock band Geese played back-to-back sold-out shows at Forest Hills Stadium in Queens, it felt like a homecoming—even if the bandmates actually hail from Brooklyn.
Made up of frontman Cameron Winter, guitarist Emily Green, drummer Max Bassin, and bassist Dominic DiGesu, Geese has attracted a rabid following for their experimental sound and unexpected arrangements. Winter has also become a shooting star in his own right, playing a stripped-down Carnegie Hall gig last December that has since become a Paul Thomas Anderson-directed concert documentary.
Inside Forest Hills Stadium, the crowd is notably varied. “It’s so funny seeing the different masses of people coming together for Geese: actual Kips Bay finance bros singing ‘Cobra,’ Tumblr-coded teen girls standing stoically in the bleachers, and couples my parents’ age on a date,” Vincent Perella, a social media editor (and Bushwick resident), tells Vogue. “Maybe Cameron Winter is the one to bring us all together.” Amid the crush—and the hats adorned with goose plushies—is even representation from the internet-boyfriend contingent, in the form of The Summer I Turned Pretty star Christopher Briney.
“This is my third time seeing Geese, and every single time I do, no words can express my joy,” says Lisa Sharifi, a born-and-bred New Yorker and Columbia student. “They play a new set every show, so each time you go it’s a whole new experience—and that’s why you keep coming back.”
“I live in England and I’ve seen Geese 18 times, but tonight was my favorite show,” another young fan, Matt Webb, says later. (Standing beside Webb is a new friend he’d made the same night.)
When the band takes the stage and strikes up “Long Island City Here I Come,” Bassin is wearing a tee from the merch stand reading “Geese Is for Lovers.” Winter soon has the crowd eating out of his hand, his unmistakable voice roaming from an intentionally warbly baritone to a Thom Yorke-ish falsetto. At the center of the stadium, the mosh pit gets moving toward the end of the show, as everyone sings along to “Taxes” and then shouts along to the encore, “Trinidad.” Even after the band shuffles offstage, the air feels electric, the crowd lingering in place to delay the post-set comedown.
Below, the band shares some exclusive snapshots from the weekend.
