“Like The Sopranos, I could tell you it’s a mafia show about a guy in New Jersey, but it’s actually about everything. Because it crests to a point where you just go, whoa! When art is really good, you can’t even pull it apart. So we aren’t setting out to hammer these themes, they just come up in response to being alive in the weird, crazy world.”
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Since forming a little over a decade ago, Big Thief have built a huge, and hugely committed, audience around their folky indie Americana. Their previous LP, Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You in 2023, won two Grammy nominations.
Each member has other musical projects – Lenker has been releasing solo records, with increasing levels of success, since she was 14 – and last year they came together to bring the music of 83-year-old Tucker Zimmerman to the millennial masses by producing and playing on Dance of Love.
For the new album, their first since the departure of bass player Max Oleartchik, they amassed a community of musicians around them. The trio at the heart of the group cycled through the winter streets each day to hunker down at the Power Station studio in New York City. And that atmosphere, of music as a place of community, somewhere to somehow escape into, pervades Double Infinity.
For a band attuned to the politics of the day, they’ve taken a conscious step away from the horrors of the news agenda to create songs to commune around.
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“There is a heavy feeling at the moment,” says Krivchenia. “You can feel the collective weight of everything.
“It’s hard to sift through and find the space and energy to create within that. But what constantly comes up for me is that I’m just so grateful to be able to play music with these friends.
“We’ve cultivated such a deep relationship and language – our lives are totally intertwined in this
awesome way.”
“We’ve developed this kind of chosen family,” adds guitar player Buck Meek, who is perhaps the most jetlagged of the trio. “We’ve developed a shared value system around the creative process and around music which is really just a proxy for our humanity together.”
Lenker leans in, eyes ablaze. It’s the most awake and engaged she’s looked so far. “Everything that exists like that is proof that there’s much more to humanity than just that awfulness,” she says. “It’s proof that we are capable of being much more than villains.
“I come into contact with so many more beautiful things than horrible things. Anywhere you go you see the beauty of humans and it’s astounding and powerful. You see people loving each other and hear music and prayer rituals and it’s incredible and beautiful. I believe in my deepest heart that love is the most powerful thing.”
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This reminder that not all art, not all culture, needs to be refracted through the awfulness of the global political situation is welcome.
“I mean, it’s all existing at once,” adds Krivchenia – the band have a happy knack of backing up and evolving each other’s thoughts.
“It’s not like, oh, sweet, peace and love, it’s all good. But this is happening too and deserves its own attention. So our recording sessions felt very nourishing. Like this magical retreat.”
“Exactly,” Lenker is back. “Phones and technology and social media can connect us like never before, but the danger is that it can also provide the illusion that we’re being active. You have all these people funneling their energy into something that isn’t really doing anything. It makes people disassociate from their bodies.”
It could be the scintillating conversation with Big Issue, it could be the unusual hot drinks they are concocting by mixing and matching herbal and fruit teabags, but Lenker, Krivchenia and Meek are waking up. And it feels very Big Thief – taking in the nourishment and pouring out the wisdom and the joy.
“If you’re not present to receive the blessing of a moment – like looking at beautiful sunset or a bird landing on a branch or receiving that hug from your mother – there’s a loss there,” continues Lenker.
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“When you take in the good in life, it allows you to have fuel and energy to contribute to the world in a
positive way.
“I feel it is my responsibility to take in the nutrients so I have the sustenance to, in a long form way, contribute to the world. This album feels like a co-creation and a collaboration with the universe.”
Double Infinity is out now on 4AD. Tickets for Big Thief’s 2026 tour of the UK and Europe are available now.
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