Hello reader,
How are you today? Ready to prep for the weekend with some great music?
Today, we’re excited to share another emerging artist that should be on your to-listen-to list: Kingston, NY, via Charleston, South Carolina, singer-songwriter Ginger Winn.
Born and raised in South Carolina, Ginger Winn has been singing and writing songs since age nine. She grew up surrounded by classic country and Americana. She says those “roots definitely show up in how I write melodies and tell stories.” However, she tells SWT that sonically she’s “really drawn to artists who blend emotional depth with a modern indie or alt-pop edge, like Phoebe Bridgers, Samia, and Kacey Musgraves.”
“I also love a good 90s-inspired rhythm section and anything that makes you want to bop your head while still feeling something,” she says.
When it comes to her own songs, she feels her sound is a “blend of indie folk, pop, and rock.”
“I strive to make music that’s nourishing,” she says. “Something that holds emotion while still leaving space for hope. My songs are usually centered around guitar, and I love weaving in layered harmonies and textures. It’s raw and heartfelt, but always with a flicker of light.”
In 2022, she began producing music for others online. In 2024, she released her solo debut album, STOP-MOTION, which was produced by David Baron (The Lumineers, Noah Kahan, Shawn Mendes). The attention from the album led to a West Coast tour with the group Gipsy Kings.
Earlier this year, Winn released a mental health-focused surprise EP entitled Reflections. It was written in the wake of losing her father to suicide on Thanksgiving, including a heartfelt song “To Dad” and a cover of The Lumineers’ “Gloria.”
On June 13, Winn will keep her prolific run of releases going, with her sophomore album Freeze Frame. The album was produced and engineered by A.J. Yorio (Michael Marcagi, The Heavy Hours) and finds Winn taking on immensely heavy topics like suicide, grief, and anxiety.
“My biggest goal was to make something honest,” says Winn. “I wanted to create a body of work that could hold the full emotional arc of grief but still offer warmth and light. I hoped people would feel less alone when they listened.”
“If it could comfort someone going through something hard, or make them feel like someone out there understands, that was the goal. I also wanted to stretch myself sonically and emotionally, and this album really helped me do that.”
She considers Freeze Frame to be a bold new chapter after STOP-MOTION. Much of that comes from working with a different producer and drawing from new life experiences.
“It’s really cool to see how I, as Ginger Winn, can create two very different albums that still feel authentic,” she says. “The contrast really highlights how much I’ve grown and changed as an artist, and it’s been an amazing journey to see how different Freeze Frame is from STOP-MOTION.”
The writing and recording process for the album was deeply personal and emotionally charged for Winn.
Says Winn via press release, “I had never lost someone that close before. It shifted everything. We recorded in January, while the emotions were still raw. Freeze Frame is a reflection of that—of change, of loss, of holding on to fleeting moments before they disappear.”
Most notably, the recording of the album in Cincinnati at Yorio’s home studio in January also coincided with a record snowstorm. Winn’s co-writer Matt Baione reached out to Yorio about recording in the studio, and despite his son being born eight weeks earlier, agreed to book time for her.
“I had just flown in to work with A.J., and the next day a blizzard hit,” she recalled. “We were totally snowed in. I couldn’t even get to the studio. AJ sent me a track he’d started, and at the same time, Matt, my co-writer, had sent me some lyrics. We realized they fit together perfectly and ended up writing ‘Freezing’ that day, all from inside. It was kind of magical, like the storm forced us to sit still and let the music come through.”
Adds Yorio in the album’s press release, “Sharing my home and family with Ginger amidst the epic snowstorm felt like living in a really intriguing Netflix series. It was an utter blast.”
Winn says Yorio really helped her create a sonic space where she could explore “all the emotional corners of these songs.” As did Matt Baione, as he sent her “a lot of lyrical seeds that ended up blooming into full songs, often in unexpected ways.”
“It was a really collaborative and intimate process,” she says.
In SWT’s opinion, the single “Socrates” is a fantastic introduction to Winn’s music and embodies the sound and themes of the album well. We’re stoked to highlight the song as part of our Singles Spotlight series.
For Winn, the inspiration for the song was the “idea of planting seeds for the future, like the famous notion that those who plant acorns may never see the trees, but they do it anyway.”
“It’s about valuing and respecting people who make sacrifices and contributions for the greater good, even if they don’t see the immediate results.
Personally, I can really relate to that message. Having lost my dad to a tragic means as well, I’ve gained even greater appreciation for everything he did for me and for setting me on the career path I am now. It can be so easy to take things and people for granted. Sonically, the song has a great hypnotic drumbeat-driven melody, and Winn’s lyrics and vocals really add to the atmosphere and power of the song. There’s a rawness in her lyrics and delivery that makes the track a favorite on the album.
I’m excited for the release of Freeze Frame and to see where Winn goes from here.
You can find the tracklist for the album Freeze Frame below:
- Escape
- Pants on Fire
- Hyperallergic
- Cold Plunge
- Chaos & Perfection
- Train
- Socrates
- Not You
- Scenes from a Wake
- Glass Rib Cage
- Circling Squares
- Freezing
- Main Character Syndrome
- Blizzard
You can find details about Winn’s album release show below:
You can follow and listen to Ginger Winn at the links below:
- Instagram: instagram.com/thegingerwinn
- Facebook: Ginger Winn on Facebook
- Threads: threads.com/@thegingerwinn
- X: x.com/thegingerwinn
- TikTok: tiktok.com/@thegingerwinn
- YouTube: youtube.com/@theGingerWinn
- Spotify: Ginger Winn on Spotify
- Apple Music: music.apple.com/us/artist/ginger-winn/1735173620
Joshua is co-founder of Scummy Water Tower. He’s freelanced for a variety of newspapers, magazines, and websites, including: Rolling Stone, The Boston Globe, Chicago Sun-Times, Guitar World, MTV News, Grammy.com, Chicago Magazine, Milwaukee Magazine, MKE Lifestyle, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, A.V. Club, SPIN, Alternative Press, Under the Radar, Paste, PopMatters, American Songwriter, and Relix. You can email him at josh@scummywatertower.com.
