Putting a dreamy finish on textured indie rock, Bay Area-based singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist
Madeline Kenney emerged with her first recordings in 2016. After collaborating with
Toro y Moi on albums by each of them, she took a subtly more expansive, experimental approach with
Wye Oak's
Jenn Wasner on 2018's
Perfect Shapes and 2020's
Sucker's Lunch.
Born and raised in Seattle,
Madeline Kenney started taking piano lessons at the age of five and later began writing songs. In her teens, she started working as a professional baker, meanwhile earning a degree in neuroscience before relocating to the Bay Area in 2014. Though she moved to pursue a career in baking,
Kenney quickly took to the local arts community and became active in modern dance, painting, and, once again, songwriting. Finding work as a nanny and voice and piano teacher, she also started a small record label and learned engineering and production with help from the Women's Audio Mission in San Francisco.
With production by
Toro y Moi's Chaz Bear and arrangements by
Kenney, her first EP,
Signals, arrived on Bear's Company Records in 2016. She then appeared on
Toro y Moi's July 2017 album,
Boo Boo, and Bear returned to produce
Kenney's full-length debut,
Night Night at the First Landing. It was released on Company Records in September 2017.
With
Kenney and newfound collaborator
Jenn Wasner both playing multiple instruments on the album, her more explorative second long-player,
Perfect Shapes, was produced by
Wasner.
Wasner returned to the studio with
Kenney as well as
Wye Oak bandmate
Andy Stack for 2020's
Sucker's Lunch. ~ Marcy Donelson