Sitting framed on one of my living room shelves is a note from my grandmother addressed to me, written several months before I was born. The letter, scrawled with impeccable handwriting, reads as an introduction for me to the world; a call to leave the comfort of whatever I knew before to enter the bright, scary universe that I’d soon come to know. The last line reads “Come April, you will be asked to leave the place you call home. But loving arms will be there to receive you.” I glanced up at the note while listening to Big Thief’s sixth full length record, Double Infinity, and began to feel the pull of the music differently.

Through lightly plucked guitars weaving through buzzing melodies and bright stuttering percussion dancing beneath, the sweet twang of Adrienne Lenker‘s voice on “Incomprehensible” calls out “And everything I see from now on will be somethin’ new.” As the first album released without bassist Max Oleartchik, the territory that the band step into on Double Infinity is similarly bright and scary. In a recent interview in The Independent, Adrienne Lenker said that “it feels like a new era, like beginning again.” It’s this idea of tabula rasa, or leaning into a new chapter that can be felt within the fibers of Double Infinity.

“Take ‘Words’—track two and pure magic. The band enlisted many of their friends to play on the record, and you can hear that collaborative spirit in every note. As Buck Meek told Northern Transmissions, ‘for this record, we knew we wanted to record with a big band, with 8-12 of our friends or something.’ The result is lavish instrumentation that builds layer upon layer: melodies that soar and dive while drummer James Krivchenia creates this beautiful, off-kilter groove underneath.

It’s that collaborative spirit that feels like the river that runs through Double Infinity, and the glue that holds the songs together as the band steps into their own bright, scary new territory. Originally meant to be recorded in isolation in the woods, the band decided to fling the metaphorical doors open and enlist a larger space where their friends can join. That space wound up being Manhattan’s Power Station Studios (where the likes of Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, David Bowie, Billy Joel and Dire Straits have recorded). Los Angeles’ captures that room feel perfectly. Ambient laughter weaves through the opening before the track gathers momentum, building toward something that envelops you like a warm embrace. Lenker’s meditation on unspoken connection adds to the song’s cathartic, bright, and airy quality.

‘How Could I Have Known’ brings Double Infinity to a close with something approaching triumph. The song feels like an exhale after a long journey—not defeated by uncertainty, but somehow elevated by it. There’s a warmth in how the music expands, suggesting that the real victory isn’t in having all the answers, but in learning to embrace the beautiful mystery of not knowing.

This is Big Thief at their most generous and open-hearted, creating space not just for their friends in the studio, but for listeners to find their own meaning within these songs. Double Infinity doesn’t just document a band in transition—it celebrates the beautiful uncertainty that comes with stepping into something new.

Pre-order Double Infinity by Big Thief HERE