19 August 2024

Last Wednesday, Brooklyn‘s pop-folk dreamers BIG THIEF
played in the beautiful park Rivierenhof in Antwerp, Belgium.

Frontwoman/songwriter Adrienne Lenker, who released her 6th, widely praised solo
LP Bright Future last March, drew all attention with her heartfelt and poignant voice.

The set consisted mostly of new songs, but as it were vintage Big Thief, mixed
emotions musings, they all were received with much approval of the enthusiastic
crowd.

Here’s one of the new ones, titled Taker.

My favourite one of the 90-minute set was Vampire Empire which they
started playing live last year. An acoustic version of the song is on her
new solo album.

A funny thing happened when they ended the show with a steamy newbie named Incomprehensible. When the band returned for 2 encores, they played that song again,
but much slower.

Lenker explained that they wanted it to play it again, but slower, as it should be done, because the first time was too fast on purpose because she needed to pee urgently. Laughter all over the place. To end a magical night in a green surrounding, they
rocked out with Grandmother, also a new piece.

One small negative remark. I was a bit disappointed because BT didn’t perform one
of their most gripping songs ever, Change from their latest album Drag New Warm Mountain I Believe In You which came out two years ago. I’m pretty sure they didn’t
it because they played that ‘Incomprehensible‘ one twice.

A diamond of a ballad.

(Photos by Turn Up The Volume)