Big Thief doesn’t just perform — they inhabit a song. And when Adrianne Lenker and her bandmates take the stage at MASS MoCA on August 8, presented by FreshGrass, the question won’t be whether the show is good. It will be whether you can absorb all of it in one sitting.
The band’s Somersault Slide 360 Tour brings one of the most critically respected acts in indie folk and Americana to a venue that might be their ideal setting. MASS MoCA — with its industrial architecture, Berkshire setting, and reputation as a destination for serious cultural engagement — is the kind of place Big Thief’s music was made to fill. FreshGrass, the festival brand that operates out of MASS MoCA each fall, has a strong curatorial eye for exactly this kind of artist, and the partnership here is a natural one.
Lenker’s songwriting has drawn comparisons to the most elliptical and emotionally precise writers in American music. Albums like U.F.O.F. and Two Hands — both released in 2019 and both landing on year-end best-of lists across major publications — established Big Thief as something more than an indie favorite. They are the real thing: a band making music that feels necessary.
A summer night at MASS MoCA for a Big Thief show is, frankly, the kind of experience you arrange your August around. The North Adams campus at dusk, the Berkshire air, Lenker’s voice in an attentive room — there are worse ways to spend an evening in the Northeast.
Showtime is 7 p.m. on Saturday, August 8. Tickets are available through the MASS MoCA event page.