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, Rovi