Owens was born in Miami, Florida. At the time of his birth, both his parents were members of the Children of God traveling religious community. Shortly before Owens’ birth his infant brother Steven died of pneumonia due to the reluctance of the church’s members to seek professional medical assistance. In 1981, Owens’ family left the United States to travel with the church and he lived “all over Asia” until he was ten, before traveling throughout Western Europe. Owens learned to play guitar in his early teens and would perform covers of Everly Brothers and The Fleetwoods songs on the street. At the age of sixteen, he left the church while based in Slovenia and followed his sister to Amarillo, Texas. Owens spent his first four years in Texas working as a nighttime shelf stocker in Albertson’s grocery store as well as in various restaurants. In 2001 he met artist Stanley Marsh 3, who hired him first as a lawn mower and later as a personal assistant. After nine years in Texas, Owens moved to San Francisco, California with the intention of becoming a “famous painter”. There he met musicians Matt Fishbeck and Ariel Pink and joined their band Holy Shit as a touring guitarist. In 2007, Owens was inspired to form his own band and began writing songs for the first time at the age of 28.

With Girls, Owens released two studio albums and an EP. Girls’ first recordings were released as a single, “Lust for Life”, on the independent label True Panther Sounds in 2008. Album was released in 2009.

The band released their second full-length album Father, Son, Holy Ghost on September 9, 2011 in UK/Europe and on September 13 in the USA.

In July 2012, Owens announced via his Twitter feed that he was leaving the band and will continue to record music under his own name.

On October 25, 2012, Owens announced that he would release his debut solo album, titled Lysandre, in January 2013. The album was recorded with a group of musicians in Los Angeles with producer Doug Boehm – who produced Girls’ Father, Son, Holy Ghost. Owens released a statement with the announcement of Lysandre’s release explaining that the album tells the story – in track sequence – of the first Girls tour in 2008 and takes its title from a girl he met in France during that trip. His statement calls the album “a coming of age story, a road trip story, a love story.” The album and new solo career have allowed Owens to satisfy his own creative whims, and although he is sitting on a couple records worth of new material,”he admits that the gap between writing and recording gives him the distance to reappraise a song’s quality.”

Owens, along with the seven musicians who appear on the album, performed Lysandre in full at San Francisco’s The Lodge at the Regency Center on 9 November 2012. He was featured on the cover of Issue #83 of the Fader.

In September 2012, it was announced by Saint Laurent Paris (formerly Yves Saint Laurent) that Owens would be the face of their Spring/Summer campaign, to be shot by returning Creative Director Hedi Slimane. A promotional video was released during Paris Fashion Week featuring multiple black and white images of Owens edited to the audio of Girls’ “Just A Song”.

In October 2013, Owens became the new face of the H&M campaign promoting the Isabel Marant range.

He released his second solo album, A New Testament, on September 30, 2014 in the US and September 29 worldwide.

In December 2016, he announced on Twitter that he has formed a new band named Curls with two other musicians, Cody Rhodes and Luke Baće.