Formed in the foggy timeline around the fall of the Twin Towers, the death of Elliott Smith, the peak influence of Pitchfork and the dawn of the iPod, the members of Winterpills met and began making music in the old-fashioned winter of 2003 in the heady Northampton, MA music scene. At first 4 friends – later 5 – who all knew each other’s songs and talents and had all recently suffered a common adult loss of some kind or another (a dead parent, some breakups, a custody battle, etc), they gleefully stumbled upon their sound: Flora Reed and Philip Price’s harmonies and “heartrending” songwriting (so says No Depression), Dennis Crommett’s tender shoegaze guitar, Dave Hower’s risky drumming, Max Germer’s spare basslines. “Winterpills gradually builds elegant arrangements… While the gathered instruments offer some solace, the songs stay haunted,“ wrote Jon Pareles in the New York Times.
The cinematically-weird pop songs came effortlessly and partly channelled the freshly mourned Smith but also caught a bit of the dust of Low, The Innocence Mission, Big Star, Joni Mitchell, maybe a little Radiohead, but something else all their own. “I don’t know why Winterpills aren’t one of the most cherished pop bands in the world,” wrote Jonathan Lethem in Rolling Stone: “Their songs are mournful, slow-exploding and lyrically dazzling, and their albums have a coherence that’s rare.”
Over the past 20 years, the band has released 7 albums and numerous singles and EPs, has spent weeks both on the road and in the woodshed, and seems unwilling to relent. Emerging from the forced hiatus of the pandemic has given them a new perspective on their art. The restless Price released 3 solo albums during the unhappy break, but the full band is back with a trove of new music for the familiar alchemy to begin again. There will be a new album in 2025, in time to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their first album, the eponymous “Winterpills”.
“An ice-filigreeing-the-bare-trees sound, cold and achingly beautiful — is what sets this group apart… downright glorious when the harmonies start, as crisp and shining as crystal.” – The Washington Post
