In an interview with The Brag, Lenker said of those lyrics, 'I feel within myself a constant dialogue between my masculinity, my femininity and the part of me that is neither of those things. Her lyrics often contain discussions of gender and the gender binary. While Lenker is comfortable with the label ' queer', she has expressed a desire not to define her sexual orientation beyond that. In 2019, Lenker was in a relationship with the artist Indigo Sparke, and the two separated sometime in 2020. They divorced in 2018, remaining in Big Thief as 'deep friends'. The pair began to play together, and married when Lenker was 24. Lenker met future Big Thief co-founder Buck Meek at a concert when she lived in Boston, and then she encountered him again in a bodega the day she moved to New York. On October 23, 2020, Lenker released her two most recent albums, Songs and Instrumentals. Lenker released her third solo album, Abysskiss, on October 5, 2018. In 2015, Lenker and Meek, alongside Max Oleartchik and James Krivchenia, formed the band Big Thief, whose first album was released in 2016.

On May 1, 2014, Lenker, together with future bandmate Buck Meek, released the LP records a-sides and b-sides. On January 9, 2014, Lenker released her second solo album, Hours Were the Birds. On February 28, 2006, when Lenker was 14, she released her first solo album, titled Stages of the Sun. She attended the Berklee College of Music on a scholarship provided by Susan Tedeschi of the Tedeschi Trucks Band. She did not attend high school and instead received her GED at the age of 16. Her other interests included studying martial arts, and she was the state karate champion three years in a row. Lenker wrote her first song at the age of eight, and recorded her first album at age 13.

She spent a summer traveling throughout the midwest and living out of a Ford cargo van. Her parents rented homes in Coon Rapids, Nisswa, and Bloomington, Minnesota, before settling down in Plymouth, Minnesota, where she lived for 10 years.

Lenker was born in Indianapolis and was raised in a Christian cult until the age of four, but primarily grew up in Minnesota. Adrianne Elizabeth Lenker (born July 9, 1991) is an American musician, best known as the lead vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter of Big Thief.

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