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Big Thief’s Next Life

The indie-folk shapeshifters embrace change, collaboration, and loss on their sixth album, Double Infinity.

by Madeline Lines

Photos by Alexa Viscius

Change has always been Big Thief’s constant. Across six albums, the band has shapeshifted from hushed folk whispers to sprawling double LPs, holding their center in Adrianne Lenker’s luminous songwriting. Now, with Double Infinity — their first album made in the city, their first without longtime bassist Max Oleartchik, and their most collaborative project yet — Big Thief face transformation head on.

The four-piece has, for the moment, become a trio. “We had to figure out who we are,” Lenker admits. “It’s almost like a breakup. You ask, well… what am I now?”

Palm trees flicker behind Lenker’s face on Zoom — hers is one with a childlike expressiveness that can go from pensive to joyous and back in a second. The members of Big Thief are scattered like a constellation across the continent. “I’m in Los Angeles,” chirps Buck Meek, sitting cross-legged on what looks like a studio floor, surrounded by instruments. “New York City,” adds James Krivchenia from an unassuming white wall. “Coconut Beach!” exclaims Lenker, floating in front of a cartoonish tropical background.

Big Thief is not a band with a sound or identity rooted in one place. Their music is road-worn and restless, jangling and glittering, always shifting like the landscape in your rearview mirror. One of the few constants in their discography so far has been geography: Big Thief records have always been made in the quiet countryside. Double Infinity, out September 5 on 4AD, is the first born in the city — a harbinger of their new chapter.

“Instead of being in an isolated country bubble, where we could jump into the river and hike in the woods like we usually do… the challenge was to be immersed in the city where there’s all these cultures and different walks of life and people and textures,” says Lenker. “Where you feel like a small part of a big thing.”

The band set up camp at Power Station, a storied Manhattan studio where echoes of Bruce Springsteen still hum in the walls. The urban environment opened the doors to collaboration, with a revolving cast of players flowing in and out of sessions. Among the fullness, though, was absence.

Last summer, Big Thief announced Oleartchik’s departure after nearly a decade together, citing “interpersonal reasons, with mutual respect in our hearts.” For a band whose closeness has long been legendary — Lenker and Meek were once married, divorced, and still remain bandmates; the group often describes tending to their relationships with the dedication of a family — the split reverberated deeply.

“It changed everything because we had to figure out who we are,” Lenker says again, her words weighted. “That was like a breakup, for real.”

The rupture pushed the band into reinvention. Where Dragon New Warm Mountain, I Believe In You sprawled across 20 tracks, Double Infinity is distilled to nine. “We wanted to make it really sharp, like a laser pointer,” says Krivchenia. It’s also the first time the band co-wrote a song, with “Grandmother” buoyed by zither and refrains from ambient pioneer Laraaji.

“We didn’t really talk about the arrangements or give any direction at all,” says Meek. “Everyone was just bringing their history to the table, their instincts, their voices. They were just interacting.”

“There are between 10 and 12 people playing at any given time on this record,” adds Lenker. “I’ve listened to it front to back several times and I still believe I haven’t heard all the sounds people made.”

 

Despite the layers, Double Infinity feels thematically focused — concerned with aging, letting go, and surrendering to time. On “Incomprehensible,” which first went viral via a live recording on TikTok, Lenker sings: My mother and my grandma/my great-grandmother too/wrinkle like the river/sweeten like the dew.

Fans obsessed over the unreleased track. “Sometimes I have the little voice of wanting to please the fans, thinking if they wanted the slow, halftime version, maybe we should have recorded that,” says Lenker. “But then I’m like, wait a sec, once you go down that road, you lose yourself as an artist.”

“I love how often people come to the shows with the expectation of a song they heard live on the internet, then we play it differently,” says Meek. “For the most part, you can see all those expectations just melt away when people are having a real experience in the room, just being human.”

That tension between the fast-whirling internet and Big Thief’s meditative approach is evident again on “All Night, All Day,” quickly labeled “raunchy” and “steamy” by headlines. Lenker laughs at the reduction. “Those are just words. When I sing it, it doesn’t feel raunchy. It feels like crystal spring water. For me, it’s about reclaiming my relationship with sex and the energy around it to being something clear.”

As ever, Lenker’s songwriting carries the weight of personal renewal. Raised in a religious cult, she’s long used songs to rebuild her relationship to the world. On Double Infinity, her lyrics lean simple, almost elemental, as on “Happy With You,” where she repeats a single line nearly into infinity: I’m happy with you/why would I need to explain myself?

 

Even amid the unease of loss, the record is filled with joy. Perhaps more than any other Big Thief album, it feels alive, in motion, impossible to pin down.

“We’re not searching for the perfect version of a song,” Meek concludes. “We’re searching for the version that’s alive, on that day, with that group of people.”

With Double Infinity, Big Thief prove that impermanence is their truest muse. The album is less a monument than a living organism, pulsing with collaboration, sharpened focus, and hard-won joy. For a band that has weathered breakups, departures, and reinvention, this sixth record doesn’t mark the end of anything — it marks the beginning of Big Thief’s next life.