Gin is about the journey.
Geographically, she tracks from Auckland to Buenos Aires to Sydney. Vocally, she runs from Macy Gray to David Gray to Edith Piaf. Musically, she moves between Fiest and Broken Social Scene to Neil Young and Fiona Apple. Lyrically, she moves from sorrow to sunshine. Soulfully.
Gin is Gin Wigmore, a remarkably complex singer, always keeping it true. Her five-track debut, Extended Play, was released by Island Records Australia on August 2nd.
“My stories are simple because I want to reach people. I want to touch lives,” Gin says.
“But at the same time I like to bring mystery. Sometimes we all need to ask: How? Why?”
Certainly, these questions also apply to Gin, and the high and low roads she has traveled to this point.
Gin is from Auckland, New Zealand. A family tragedy forced her to deal with grief a world away, on a student exchange program in Argentina. When she returned home, Gin articulated, in a song, the pain of losing her father to cancer. She was 16.
The song, titled Hallelujah, and another Gin original, Angel Fire, went on to win the International Songwriting Contest in New York. Gin beat 11,000 songwriting aspirants from 77 countries.
“Hallelujah was my way of telling my family I had dealt with dad's passing,” Gin says.
“And honestly, I didn't want to share these feelings with anyone else. I wanted the moment for myself.”
That moment is now the poignant and potent centerpiece of Extended Play.
Extended Play, produced by Tony Buchen (Blue King Brown, The Whitlams, Macromantics, Kid Confuscious), contains Hallelujah, These Roses, SOS, Under My Skin and Easy Come Easy Go.
Gin's songs are driven by a startling voice; her delivery rightly described by critics as whiskey and dry.
“Gin presents her songs with a voice of contradiction,'' notes Tony Buchen. “It is raspy yet delicate, forceful and fragile.’’
Gin smiles as she asks: How? Why?
“I try not to think too much about where my voice comes from,” she says.
“I'm channeling characters and emotion. I keep moving and I tell stories.”
The journey continues.
