Allegra Krieger is the kind of songwriter who can invest even a simple walk down the block with whole worlds of spiraling thought. On “Into Eternity,” the latest single from her upcoming album Art of the Unseen Infinity Machine, that’s exactly what she does.
Krieger begins the song strumming softly and observing the world around her: “There was trash making spirals in the air and a little black dog running up the street.” Soon she’s remembering an old relationship and a tragic loss. Her stream-of-consciousness thoughts roll on, the tension slowly mounting, until she’s distracted by a yellow butterfly. Just for a moment, though: “And I totally forgot about that butterfly, and moved on with my life, as if it were nothing/Just a flash of color, like everything else, falling into place in a timeline.”
Her words make that mundane moment with the butterfly feel like a profound reflection of how time passes and everything changes, which is one of Krieger’s signature moves. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, the New York-based singer-songwriter said she began writing “Into Eternity” while she was on tour with Hand Habits last fall.
“I was driving up from North Carolina through Richmond, and the start of that was written in the car, without an instrument,” she tells RS, adding that she finished writing the song after getting back home to New York (as mentioned in the lyrics). “It was very stream-of-consciousness, that one. I felt that feeling of all these things, whether they’re big or small, that all of a sudden you’re on the other side of it and it’s gone.”
It’s not uncommon at Krieger’s shows to see the entire room fall silent so they can listen closely to one of her meditations on impermanence. You can already tell that “Into Eternity” is going to be one of those. “I don’t know if it’s within my control, but I love seeing shows where that level of attention and presence is there,” she says. “I really appreciate whenever everyone’s kind of dialed into the same plane.”
Art of the Unseen Infinity Machine is out Sept. 13 on Double Double Whammy. Krieger launches a co-headlining tour with singer-songwriter Greg Mendez in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 17. There’s also a new T-shirt with a design featuring the lyrics to “Into Eternity” for sale on her Bandcamp.
