Some collaborations feel inevitable, and Water Season, the new joint EP from Hooky and Winter, is one of them. Scott Turner & Sam Silbert aka Hooky, the Philadelphia-based act known for their lo-fi, dreamy blend of shoegaze and indie rock, have built a reputation on hazy, introspective soundscapes. Meanwhile, Brazilian-American artist Winter (real name Samira Winter) has long been a torchbearer of ethereal indie pop, crafting lush, melancholic worlds where reverb-soaked guitars meet wistful melodies.
Both artists have explored the outer edges of their sound in recent years. Winter’s 2024 EP …and she’s still listening saw her dive into trip-hop and experimental electronic textures, while Hooky’s Mirage, also from 2024, was a trippy, glitchy, reverb-drenched sonic exploration that played with the boundaries between shoegaze and electronica. It makes sense, then, that these two artists would find common ground, blending their strengths into something that feels both fresh and deeply nostalgic. Water Season is the result.
Water Season spawned when Winter and Hooky met online as fans of each other’s music and soon started corresponding with ideas, the first of which was ‘horseshoe.’ After relocating from Los Angeles to New York, Winter took a trip down to Philadelphia to visit Turner and Silbert in the summer of 2024. A true friendship began and the trio spent the whole day writing songs together. Informed by Winter’s adoration for otherworldly dreamscapes and Hooky’s digital edge within the Philadelphia shoegaze scene, Winter and Hooky quickly realised their sounds fit like a puzzle. They coalesced their love for lo-fi, indie, and electronica to pair beautiful melodies with experimentation, sampling and guitar. What resulted was a sonic snapshot of the intersection of time and feeling; the bittersweet and fleeting sensation of the end of summer fading into fall.
Let’s dive in and see what the EP has in store for us.
The EP opens with ‘horseshoe’, a track that immediately establishes their sonic chemistry. A delicate electronic pulse flickers beneath shimmering guitars, while Winter’s breathy, melancholic vocals wash over the mix like sunlight through shifting clouds. There’s something hypnotic about the way the song unfolds, evoking the feeling of flipping through old photographs and recalling emotions that linger just out of reach. I gave this track a spin on my February DKFM radio show I loved it that much!
Next up is ‘in your pocket’, a track that leans into lo-fi beats and hazy melodies, leaning into that bedroom pop sound with glitchy electronica. Hooky’s knack for layering textures is on full display here, with softly distorted guitars melting into electronic flourishes, creating a dreamlike haze. It feels weightless, perfect for late-night sundown listening.
The third track, ‘lost tears’, is where the EP takes a more melancholic turn. Built around a hypnotic guitar loop and distant, echoing percussion, it carries a wistful energy, as if the song itself is slipping through the cracks of time. There’s an understated beauty to it, a reminder that some of the most powerful emotions exist in the spaces between words.
Closing the EP is ‘i like you’, an intimate, stripped-down rework of ‘horseshoe’ into a song that feels like the sonic equivalent of a secret confession. The track’s gentle acoustic guitar and fragile vocal delivery create a sense of warmth, vulnerability, and quiet longing. It’s a perfect way to end the record—soft, poignant, and lingering like a memory that refuses to fade.
What makes Water Season special isn’t just the strength of its individual songs but the way it captures a specific, almost intangible feeling. It’s the sound of the end of summer fading into autumn, of golden-hour nostalgia giving way to the crisp uncertainty of change. There’s an intimacy to these tracks that makes them feel like shared secrets, whispered between two artists who understand each other’s sensibilities on a deep level.
The beauty of this collaboration lies in the seamless way Hooky and Winter complement each other. Hooky’s hazy, lo-fi textures provide the perfect backdrop for Winter’s celestial vocals, while her dreamlike songwriting elevates the project beyond simple nostalgia. Together, they’ve created an EP that feels weightless yet deeply affecting. A faded musical Polaroid that still manages to evoke an entire universe of emotions.
The Water Season EP is out via Julia’s War Recordings on Valentines Day February 14th 2025. You can stream in all the usual places and download from the Hooky and Winter Bandcamp Page.
You can follow Hooky on social media here…
You can follow Winter on social media here…
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