After the quiet storm that was her single “All Your Words,” Durham’s ethereal folk singer-songwriter Emma Geiger returns with “Empty.” Featuring violin by Emma Kelly (Happy Axe, Maple Glider) and pedal steel by Michael Grigoni, this new offering explores once again the emotions tied to decision-making and the complexity of letting go of love. “The violin and pedal steel are like two voices in conversation, one wanting me to stay and one wanting me to leave”, Geiger explains. The song is accompanied by a beautiful video, that she co-directed with Archer Boyette.

“The idea for the video started with the pomegranate without knowing why, just feeling connected to it as something beautiful and strange,” she adds. “But it holds a lot of significance that fits with the song’s themes. It is a symbol of death, abundance, love, and is also in the myth of Persephone, who after eating the seeds of a pomegranate is doomed to spend part of the year in the underworld with Hades. The story in ‘Empty’ feels parallel to this myth; the entrapment in love despite a desire to escape; being convinced by the other to stay. There seem to be endless parallels between the world we created in the video and Perseophone’s fate; the river as a boundary between earth and the underworld; the pomegranate pulled from it as though sent from the underworld; submerging in the river as both departure from earth and rebirth. It’s interesting how these myths subconsciously shape our perception of the world.”