Adrianne Lenker – Ruined Review

With the beating heart of Big Thief brushing off the monumental accomplishment of Big Thief’s wonderful Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You, there is a sense Adrianne Lenker is cut from a rare cloth. Their latest single, Ruined, certainly does well to approve it ahead of next year’s Bright Future. That they have – a consistency and need to continue creating and releasing not for the mandated contracts which steer some former creatives but through a desire to cement work worthwhile. Listen on in to Ruined, then, a track which finds itself in the consistent warmth and desirable abilities of a fine songwriter once more returning to work in isolation. A similar ilk to Daniel Rossen, but without the decade-long wait.  

Repetition is sweet but the crawling, thankful tone taken on Ruined lends itself to the titular repetition. Impact like this is tender and once in a lifetime. To hold this power over someone, to have it left behind by another – Lenker gets to the core of it and creates a deeply set and tremendously moving experience. Linger on those memories experienced with those no longer around, it is all we have left of them. Ruined settles in as deep as it can to this, clutching so desperately yet so powerfully to the memories, everything rushing through in the experience of remembrance. A strong place to find yourself, and in a way, Lenker brings about a sense of thanks for having those memories in the first place. To be ruined is to have been loved. 

Yes, there is heartbreak – that much is found in the generous piano added towards the end of Ruined, the off-kilter experience of sudden notes springing through and engaging with surprise. Nobody plans for love but Lenker is in the aftershock of it, running through the list of memories made and accepting they are now just that. Time is finite and so too is the love experienced by another, be it through death, divorce or distance. Ruined is a beautiful musing on this and the tenderness displayed throughout this piece from the Big Thief alumni is a heartbreaking yet shakingly optimistic tearjerker. Sophisticated and mature on its look at grieving a lost love, Ruined does not bite the hand which once flickered against its skin but respects the distance now set.  

Lenker then provides yet another example of her work being aeons ahead of most. Their experience and tremendous achievement on Ruined are reflected in the growing warmth of Big Thief and the continued triumph of her solo efforts. Much can be said for how honest and open a track like Ruined can be to work – and it is much to the credit of Lenker who grieves a lost love mutually ended. Sufjan Stevens had similar flickers on Javelin, a year-best release from a man left wondering what could have been from a love snatched away by a third party. That piece and Ruined are not the same – the contexts of their grief are moved far away from one another, but the impact is all the same. There it goes, ruined. Lenker provides one of the best tracks of the year – that much is assured here.