Control · Fall 2026Page 71 of 100.THE REVIEW
Three studio microphones hang from crossed boom stands in front of a dark curtain.
Three microphones hang from crossed booms before a curtain. Double Infinity is Big Thief’s first album as a trio, and the smaller circle sounds warmer and more generous.The photograph is by César Guillotel on Pexels.

Review

Losing a member made this band looser, and mostly better.

Double Infinity is Big Thief’s first album as a trio, and it trades the band’s old intensity for a wider, warmer circle.

Written by CONTROL

This article runs 371 words and takes about two minutes to read.

7out of 10
Album
Double Infinity
By
Big Thief
From
4AD, 2025

Big Thief’s previous album, Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You, ran to twenty songs and more than eighty minutes, recorded in five studios across the country. Double Infinity, released by 4AD in September 2025, has nine songs and lasts under forty-three minutes. The contraction is not only a matter of editing. In July 2024 the founding bassist Max Oleartchik left the band, and the remaining trio of Adrianne Lenker, Buck Meek and James Krivchenia answered the loss by opening the door wider.

They spent three weeks at the Power Station in New York with the producer Dom Monks and brought in a circle of collaborators: Joshua Crumbly on bass, the singers Hannah Cohen, Alena Spanger and June McDoom, and the ambient pioneer Laraaji, who plays zither and electronics on “Grandmother.” Several songs are credited to all three members, which is new for a band long organized around Lenker’s writing.

A condenser microphone in a round shock mount is shown close up against a dark background.
A single condenser microphone sits in its shock mount, waiting. Big Thief traded some of its old intensity for a looser sound on this record, and mostly gained by it.The photograph is by Luc on Pexels.
A handheld microphone on a stand faces a dim rehearsal room with a keyboard.
A microphone on a stand faces an empty rehearsal room. After losing a member, the band sounds less tightly wound and more willing to let a song wander.The photograph is by Flavio Vallone on Pexels.

A bigger room

The result sounds communal in a way Big Thief never quite has. The backing voices turn Lenker’s melodies into something closer to a chant, and the arrangements move with the patience of people listening to one another. “Incomprehensible,” the opener, is plain-spoken and unhurried, and it lands harder for how rarely it raises its voice. It is one of the best things the band has recorded.

The looseness has a cost. “No Fear,” at nearly seven minutes, and “Grandmother,” at six, drift from atmosphere into vagueness, and the band’s old knack for sudden, jagged intensity rarely surfaces. Meek’s guitar, once the group’s wild card, is mostly content to add shading. Listeners who came to Big Thief for the tension of four players on the edge of a song will find less of it here.

Still, the album makes an argument about what a band is. Groups that lose a member usually close ranks and prove they can carry on unchanged. Big Thief did the opposite and widened the circle, and the record carries the warmth of that choice even where the songs themselves go slack.

The verdict: this is a generous, occasionally sleepy record that is worth owning for its first half and its opening song. Start with “Incomprehensible” and let the rest arrive slowly.