Hinder released Welcome to the Freakshow on December 4, 2012, through Republic Records. The Oklahoma City band’s fourth studio album followed 2010’s All American Nightmare, with drummer Cody Hanson and collaborator Marshal Dutton sharing production duties. Across its 11 tracks, the band made room for hard rock, pop and country influences.
“Save Me” introduced the record as its first single and opened the album with heavy guitar riffs and Austin Winkler’s defiant delivery. That aggressive opening was only one part of the record: piano featured in “Get Me Away from You,” while “Wanna Be Rich” worked electronic effects into the band’s guitars. The title track drew on bluesy hard rock, giving the album another variation on its guitar-driven foundation.
The variety was intentional. Hanson told Rock 108 in a release-week interview that the band approached each song individually during production. “There were no rules on this one,” he said. Choosing the final track list meant weighing faster songs, midtempo material and ballads, and some songs the band liked had to stay off the album. Much of the writing was new, too. In a November 2012 interview with Pop-Break, Winkler said Hinder had carried over just one song from the material developed for All American Nightmare. That earlier album had involved a much larger pool of songs, but having leftovers didn’t make them automatic candidates for the follow-up. Winkler wanted the record to reflect what was occupying the writers at the time.
“Get Me Away from You” was especially personal for him. Winkler singled it out as the new song he felt closest to, describing it as a vehicle for emotions he could release onstage. Hinder gave their quieter performances a separate setting before the album arrived through the Bare Bones acoustic tour. In that same conversation, Winkler described stripping the songs down to show them at their most vulnerable. The approach let the band present material without the full electric arrangements that listeners would hear on the album.
The Best Buy edition offered another look at the songs’ development. Its extras included acoustic recordings of “Save Me” and “Get Me Away from You.” Hanson explained that the acoustic bonus recordings were demos the band had submitted to the label. Those versions preserved an earlier stage of the work alongside the finished album, giving listeners a way to compare how the songs developed.
The release also became the last Hinder studio album with Winkler on lead vocals. He stepped away from touring in 2013, and the band announced their separation that November after continuing with guest singers. Hanson said the split carried no animosity and wished him well. In January 2015, Hinder announced Dutton as their new vocalist, giving the co-producer of Welcome to the Freakshow a different role in the band. He sang lead on the follow-up, When the Smoke Clears, released in 2015.
