Songs & Instrumentals by Adrianne Lenker | Album Review
The fourth and fifth solo LPs from the Big Thief frontwoman display her musicianship, writing ability, and depth of feeling in stunning detail.
If I had to recommend one indie rock band to someone totally unfamiliar with the genre, I’d have to pick Big Thief.
The Brooklyn-based quartet of Berklee grads have earned a privileged place high in the echelons of the indie scene. They’ve put out nothing but one quality album after another, culminating in 2022 with the immense double album Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You, a Top 5 album of that year and one I revisit often.
No shade to the rest of the band, but the thing that really makes Big Thief special is frontwoman Adrianne Lenker. A brilliantly talented songwriter, lyricist, and guitarist, she elevates every work she’s a part of, adding a level of humanity and sensitivity to anything from midnight drives with a lover, to Adam & Eve, to potatoes. Lenker also possesses a unique singing voice and style, with an unusual tone and a capacity for intense quiet, forcing us listeners to lean in and engage with her.
As she prepares to release a new solo album this year, I wanted to explore her last solo effort, her own double album of sorts, Songs and Instrumentals. Released together, Lenker is the driving creative force on all ends of these two LPs. Almost exclusively relying on guitar and wind chimes along with her voice for instruments, Lenker is responsible for nearly every sound we hear, and she also worked extensively on the production side. The result is an album that feels more like a trip through someone’s innermost thoughts than most artists are able to achieve.
Starting with Songs, I first noticed how lush and full these songs sound despite the spare instrumentation. Lenker’s guitar work is incredible across this album, and she often layers guitar riffs on top of each other, creating an intricate lacework of plucking and strumming to lay her voice over. For instance, “Forward Beckons Rebound” builds off a glittering, delicate guitar passage that sounds like it comes from a single instrument until you realize it’s far too complex to be created by only two hands.
It’s not just what she recorded that’s special, but how she recorded it. The sudden onslaught of COVID-19 forced Lenker to retreat to a wood cabin in rural Massachusetts as she was writing for this album, and you can hear the locale and conditions if you listen closely. Wind chimes twinkle in the background of “Zombie Girl,” birds chirp in the trees as Lenker sings “Dragon Eyes,” and static audio subtly underpins “Not A Lot, Just Forever.” It’s easy to miss, but it adds worlds of depth and pathos to her songwriting.
But maybe more beautiful than Lenker’s musicianship is her lyrical poetry, combining common themes and ideas into vivid images that strike right at your heartstrings. She wrote Songs in the aftermath of a breakup, and her heartbreak, the rawness of it, provides a thematic thread to hang the album. Although she sings on other topics (her grandmother’s horse, guardian angels, and loved ones lost to the pandemic), the intricacies of relationships were clearly prominent in her thoughts while writing.
Take opening track “Two Reverse,” a song that’s stunning in its musical simplicity. Lenker’s vocal melody and guitar lead mirror each other an octave apart, concealing the complexity in her lyrics with their effortlessness. In between images of her grandmother and the sun shining through jail bars, she repeatedly implores the subject to “stay don’t stray” and likens them to two flowing streams that ultimately diverge:
To my home, two rivers
Through my home, two reverse.
Or look at lead single “Anything,” where Lenker crafts a montage of different moments with her partner, joyful, painful, and everything in between:
Hanging your jeans with a clothespin
Skin still wet, still on my skin
Mango in your mouth, juice drippin’
Shoulder of your shirt sleeve slippin’
Christmas Eve with your mother and sis
Don’t wanna fight but your mother insists
Dog’s white teeth slice right through my fist
Drive to the ER and they put me on risk.
Despite clearly having gone through trouble in their relationship, Lenker expresses a desire to do nothing but enjoy time with their former lover:
And I don’t wanna talk about anything
I don’t wanna talk about anything
I wanna kiss, kiss your eyes again
Wanna witness your eyes looking
I don’t wanna talk about anyone
I don’t wanna talk about anyone
I wanna sleep in your car while you’re driving
Lay in your lap when I’m crying.
And then there’s the wondrous “Not A Lot, Just Forever.” Lenker’s soft delivery and delicate guitar counter-melodies mask the rather bleak realizations at its heart. She likens their relationship to a rock, slowly being worn down by the elements, as though she’s tacitly admitting the end of the relationship was inevitable, just waiting for the straw that breaks the camel’s back:
Not a lot, just forever
Intertwined, sewn together
Like the rock bears the weather
Not a lot, just forever.
While recording Songs, Lenker simultaneously composed the ambient album Instrumentals, which she describes as an effort to capture the musical improvisations that would start and end each day of recording. Comprising two tracks of acoustic guitar improvisations and wind chimes, you can feel her reverence for her instrument in each pluck of the strings. One of her Big Thief bandmates described her time with an acoustic guitar as “always holy,” and you can hear it in how she seems to relish even the instrument’s most simple sounds.
Moreover, even on this nearly wordless album, she still connects Instrumentals to the themes of Songs. The first of the two tracks is titled “Music For Indigo,” curated specifically to help her former lover sleep. Even in the aftermath of their relationship, she still has their best interests at heart.
It’s that emotional intelligence that keeps fans coming back to Lenker and Big Thief, and it makes her one of the most exciting artists out there, in my view. Her depth of feeling, one-of-a-kind way of thinking, and her depth of musical ability leave me dazzled and breathlessly awaiting what’s next for her.
Production: 9/10
Lyrics: 9/10
Songwriting: 8/10
Overall: 8.5/10
Favorites: Two Reverse, Anything, Not A Lot, Just Forever
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Thank you for reading! What did you think of this album? Leave a comment with your thoughts, and I’ll see you in the next review!