Adrianne Lenker Stuns Intimate Brooklyn Audience With Songs From New Album ‘Bright Future’
variety.comEthan Shanfeld The Music Hall of Williamsburg was buzzing at 9 p.m. Monday night as 600-some people filed into the venue to watch Adrianne Lenker debut songs from her new solo album “Bright Future,” out Friday.
When the Big Thief frontwoman sauntered onstage, acoustic guitar and notebook in hand, she faced a rapturous audience the size of which she has already outgrown. (In November, the indie folk darling will play two nights at Brooklyn’s 3,000-cap Kings Theatre.) But then, the second she plucked the first notes of “Cell Phone Says,” an unreleased new album cut, there was silence.
That awestruck, respectful sort of quiet persisted throughout the 90-minute show, until “Anything” prompted some light audience harmonizing and “Vampire Empire” got people singing, “Falling, yeah!” After a rousing solo set from Palehound’s El Kempner, Lenker cycled through a handful of songs alone — favorites from her 2020 album “Songs,” plus Big Thief’s apocalyptic stunner “The Only Place.” Lenker then brought out Nick Hakim and Mat Davidson, who sing and play piano, violin and guitar on “Bright Future,” and finished the concert as a trio.
Intriguingly, it was sometimes difficult to discern between the three musicians, whose delicate playing gelled together in an ambient swell.
Read more on variety.com