GENRE: Rock
LABEL: Partisan/ Play it again Sam
REVIEWED: 28th September, 2025
RATING: 9.1/10
Geese’s “Getting Killed” is a striking study in contrast: jaunty, propulsive instrumentation cushions Cameron Winter’s mordant, sometimes cryptic vocal turns, while sudden eruptions of noise and dissonance unsettle the track’s ostensibly pop-forward frame. Released as the title song from their September 26, 2025 album, the piece sits at the center of an LP many critics call the band’s boldest work yet, and it embodies that risk-taking in four minutes of restless invention.
Musically, the song rides a taut rhythm section and chiming guitars that recall post-punk’s nervous energy, but Geese fold in unexpected touches — trombone accents, abrupt dynamic drops, and production choices that favor immediacy over sheen. The arrangement balances hooks with a sense of controlled chaos: melodic fragments return just long enough to register, then splinter into jagged interludes.
Lyrically, Winter flirts with surreal narrativity and bleak humor; phrases land like aphorisms, resisting tidy interpretation while suggesting themes of anxiety, absurdity, and capitalism-tinged dread. His delivery — alternately weary and alarmed — sells the tension between vulnerability and performative bravado that gives the song its emotional gravity.
If the track has a shortcoming it is intentional obliqueness: listeners craving straightforward storytelling may find the lyrics evasive, and the sudden tonal shifts can jolt those expecting a single mood. Yet that instability is the song’s argument — Geese refuse to smooth edges for radio comfort; they invite listeners to be active, to re-hear and discover. Taken on its own, “Getting Killed” is an exhilarating, occasionally discomfiting single that signals a band pushing their sound into stranger, more provocative rock statements.
It stakes out ambitious directions and rewards repeated listens: messy, magnetic, and hilarious in its nihilism, the track confirms Geese as a group unafraid to demand attention rather than politely linger in the background.
