Winter’s Adult Romantix: A Sonic Reflection on LA and Chang

Sometimes, saying goodbye is the most honest kind of expression. It might be a misty hug or a casual text, but either way, it locks a moment in place. It’s both fleeting and heavy like a wistful “see you later” frozen in time, knowing the next encounter will carry a different weight.

For over ten years, she’s been a key figure in Los Angeles’ music scene, carving out a distinct spot with her richly detailed dream pop sound. Born in Curitiba, Brazil, and having played in early bands in Boston, she landed in LA in 2013. The city’s DIY rock community became her home, with her longtime Echo Park basement hosting countless shows and early rehearsals. Winter soaked up LA’s creative energy, its cosmic vibe, and chaotic warmth. But eventually, she needed more something different to push her growth and that meant leaving for New York.

In the two years leading up to that coast-to-coast move, Winter wrote songs in flux between tours, in various cities, and a rotation of sublets. The result is Adult Romantix, her latest LP and debut on Winspear, following 2022’s pivotal What Kind of Blue Are You? It’s a bittersweet goodbye letter to her LA chapter.

Her previous album was, in her own words, “a total reset.” It was dark, deeply personal, and marked a turning point. Facing the end of a decade in LA brought a flood of memories shows at The Echo, long drives through Southern California, endless summers that felt both alive and ominous. Instead of purging pain, Adult Romantix visits the ghosts of those memories, pulling them into the present. Winter describes it as “a tunnel of summers and memories,” drawing inspiration from romantic literature like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and ‘90s rom-coms, mixing intense drama with playful innocence.

Musically, the album moves away from the electronic experiments of her 2024 EP ...and she’s still listening, favouring textured, yearning indie rock that evokes a 'lost LA summer.' While her last record leaned into ‘90s dream pop, this one points to Sonic Youth’s Rather Ripped, Elliott Smith’s melancholy acoustic rock, Dean Blunt’s hazy electronic edge, and California shoe gaze bands like Further and Star flyer 59. The sound is rough and bittersweet, filled with swirling guitars, open-tuned acoustic moments, and a smoky, pitched-down vocal delivery that drifts between wistful daydreams and late-night moods.

The album opens gently with “Just Like a Flower,” blending sweet indie melodies with a sudden burst of whammy pedal-driven guitar chaos reminiscent of Dinosaur Jr. The first song Winter wrote for the project, “In My Basement Room,” is a lush, fuzzy tribute to her old Echo Park basement a space that shaped much of her early sound and spirit. The quiet, intimate “Misery,” featuring Horse Jumper of Love’s Dimitri Giannopoulos, came from a moment of chance when both artists were subletting the same Brooklyn bedroom, adding a layer of shared space to the track’s emotional resonance.

Other collaborators include former tourmate Hannah van Loon of Tanukichan, who shares vocal duties on the shoegaze-tinged “Hide-a-Lullaby,” and Samuel Acchione of Alex G fame, lending washed-out guitar and vocals to the ambient “Running.” The Brazilian roots Winter carries also surface in tracks like the sparkly, percussion-driven “Without You” and the dreamy “Candy #9,” both featuring Portuguese verses.

Lyrically, Adult Romantix balances high-stakes romance and gothic drama with the easygoing vibe of classic indie-pop. Lines like “Drunk and stoned / In my bed / Listening to ‘Fuck and Run’ / Since I was 12” (“Just Like A Flower”) sit comfortably alongside bold declarations like “Love’s never gonna die” (“The Beach”). For anyone who’s navigated young adulthood, this push and pull won’t feel contradictory—it captures the familiar mix of raw feeling and casual detachment that marks those years.

At its core, the album wrestles with nostalgia: how to cherish memories without getting stuck in them or letting them cloud the present. For Winter, Adult Romantix isn’t about closing chapters but rather pinning them down, holding them in place for a while longer.

Saying goodbye to a place like LA is never simple. Its streets, venues, and moments become living parts of your story. Through this album, Winter summons the “scent memories” of her twenties and starts to look forward, not by forgetting the past but by understanding it anew. The record is full of raw emotion, self-reflection, and that bittersweet feeling that summer’s end brings. In “Hide-a-Lullaby,” she sings, “Write it down with tears, lick your lips so bitter in sweetness, send to the angels above,” a line that perfectly captures the mix of drama and tenderness threading through the album.

Adult Romantix is a love letter to a city, a time, and the complicated act of moving on without ever fully letting go.