Reintroducing Big Thief

Now a trio, the beloved band is putting lingering assumptions about its music and politics to rest.

- BY CRAIG JENKINS

FOR MORE THAN A DECADE, Brooklyn-by-way-of-everywhere trio Big Thief have put out cosmic indie-rock albums to near-universal acclaim. Live, the band departs unexpectedly from the studio script, and performances of the same songs can turn out very different on a given night. During a ten-minute performance of “Not” at the Netherlands festival Best Kept Secret in 2022, singer-guitarist Adrianne Lenker forgets the lyrics early on, and drummer James Krivchenia begins to chant the missing words like a mantra. The verse resumes, and the band soldiers on, Lenker’s perseverant guitar solo howling with the weary relief of a shipwrecked sailor spotting land. It’s these precarious expeditions, where no one fully knows what will happen next, that drive this outfit creatively, they tell me over two recent conversations. “I don’t want to make records to keep a business going,” says Lenker. “I waited tables for ten years and enjoyed it, and I’d go back before I’d force a record.”

The band’s motivations have sparked intense debate lately. Since the unexpected 2023 TikTok virality of “Vampire Empire,” some fans have wondered if the sunny acoustics of recent singles are a ploy to replicate that success. And then there’s the matter of one bandmate’s departure. Big Thief drew harsh criticism from pro-Palestine groups and fans in 2022 for announcing two shows in Tel Aviv, home of longtime bassist Max Oleartchik, which they subsequently canceled, expressing opposition to “the illegal occupation and the systematic oppression of the Palestinian people.” Two years later, when Oleartchik left the band, many assumed that the trio had wanted to cut ties with him over his past IDF service and his presumed indifference to or support for the current war crimes in Gaza.