Allegra Krieger sits down at Kiki’s, a cozy and chic Greek restaurant that occupies the end of Division Street, and starts discussing memories of her childhood. Growing up, the singer-songwriter bounced around from state to state, moments from each era fading and binding together with each subsequent move. First, it was Pennsylvania — the suburban structure pales next to the swampiness and underbelly of Florida, her second location. Childhood affects all the ideas you formulate during your adulthood, and Krieger’s music is for the small moments in life, when you find yourself stuck in the woods and can remember the sound of the crickets percolating. “There’s always glimpses of certain domestic moments,” Krieger says. “There’s intimate moments with neighbors. The world is spinning above you as a child, and as I grew older, certain ideas stuck out. What can be chaos can turn into perspective.”

There are no more woods in her life. Krieger, 28, has been living in New York since 2016. She now resides in Chinatown, away from some of the city’s trendier artist haunts. (“I can’t do the scene anymore,” she tells me). New York is the first place that felt like where she was permanently meant to be, judging by her laugh when I comment that it is the greatest city in the world. Despite putting down roots here, she has spent some time in Los Angeles, the dark glamor allowing her to take in the seaside atmosphere. While in LA, she was recording an album — last year’s I Keep My Feet On The Fragile Plane, her first for the respected indie label Double Double Whammy — and approaching the end of a relationship. She was in a romantic mood; writing a lot was her remedy to deal with the impending breakup. “I think we knew that something was not right,” Krieger says. “We moved back to New York and spent two more months in the relationship. We should have stayed in California for a few more months.”

Recording in LA seemed to invite comparisons between Krieger and the folk women of the past. One common reference point among critics and fans alike is Joni Mitchell; her pioneering catalog might be an impossible bar to measure up to, but it’s also easy to see why people make the connection. The femininity in both artists is mystical and physical — it asserts itself in the face of life’s challenges, giving you a multi-dimensional character. For Krieger, the experience of meeting a dude at the bar often becomes a stimulus for musical exploration. She is a champion of the idea that the best way to spark inspiration is walking around and running into people. Those encounters become songs, and eventually, themes emerge within certain bodies of work. “My last album was about domesticity, and it was zoned in on smaller moments. That reflects sonically as well,” Krieger says. “This one is going to be bigger, and in depth, open-ended. I’m recognizing my own confoundedness and uncertainty in a world that contains so much good and evil.”

The new LP is called Art Of The Unseen Infinity Machine, and it arrived this month after a year full of unluckiness and disarray. As we sit down at Kiki’s, she is still reeling from a fire in the bike shop below her building. Krieger is still here to tell the story because a firefighter carried her out to safety. One of her neighbors was not so lucky. Krieger is back in her building now, and she’s now struggling to sleep; the smoke is still burned into her brain. “It could have been so much worse,” Krieger explains, reflecting on her time holed up in an extended stay hotel at the city’s expense. “I stayed with so many people. I don’t know where to begin. I’m getting re-oriented and cleaning up.”

Though much of Art Of The Unseen Infinity Machine was completed before the fire — “One Or The Other” being one key exception — the event looms large over the album. The title is derived from a lyric on “Never Arriving,” a song on which her folk-rock aesthetic is switched out for an uncommonly energetic garage jam. Besides the overt glee on “I’m So Happy I Cannot Face Tomorrow,” the album is transfixed on inward emotions. Acceptance for one’s rougher edges and complexity feels like a core idea. “How Do You Sleep” might be the saddest song on an album where death is always creeping in wait. The record turns self-reflection into a kind of appreciation, one born out of an outward trauma.

After completing the writing for Infinity Machine, Krieger hit the studio with a live band, but the synergy was off at times. “I would do this solo if I could, but I am bad with technology,” she says, with her light eyes giving me a kind of unpretentiousness despite her rich ideas. “I don’t always feel super natural in the studio, but I have gotten better.”

Despite moments like the wail Krieger unleashes at the end of “Came,” she sometimes struggles to command her voice within the strong songwriting that populates the record. There’s a slight timidity within the atmosphere of the music, a trait that contrasts with Krieger’s startlingly raw handling of topics like sex, suicide, and lingering guilt. Her music explores a bespoke idea of suffering, perhaps a feature of her parents’ Catholicism. “My perspective is about forgiving yourself,” she says. “I don’t want to sound cliché about it though.”

I suggest that there’s a tendency with artists to focus on a basic idea of self-improvement and overcoming trauma. “Totally, I just believe in being honest with myself,” she responds, self-assuredly. “I am not a perfect person nor will I ever be. I am lucky right now to have a supportive partner, but I did not always have a lot of luck in relationships.”

Right now, Krieger is focused and relaxed, full of love and eager to make music again. “I like the balance of stark realities with mystical and religious sentiments,” she expresses. “It changes depending on the mood and where I am at in life.” She’s walking in the streets of the world, finding inspiration through everything from fellow bar patrons to the mass that she might attend, a woman unbounded by her history and upheaval.

Art Of The Unseen Infinity Machine is out now on Double Double Whammy.