The LA-based and east Tennessee-raised indie-pop singer-songwriter hannah hausman, like most of us, spent her youth searching for new music across every inch of the internet and convincing her parents to drive her to concerts. Where she starts to differ is her history of writing poetry at the young age of six, which quickly turned into writing music, eventually leading her to her debut 2018 hit, "lost in brooklyn."
She's since released a string of singles, but none as vulnerable as her latest single, "whole foods parking lot."
hausman originally posted a snippet of the song on her TikTok page, and it was more of an inner dialogue with herself, but after seeing how her followers reacted to that one clip, she knew she had to release it.
The title immediately brings to mind that mundane feeling of a Whole Foods parking lot, how even the most routine part of your day can send you into a spiral. It carries a lot of emotional weight, and you can feel that in her voice. While her delicate voice over the simple production puts the focus on the lyrics, the specific details she lists are what makes it personal.
On the surface, it's about seeing someone in the parking lot of Whole Foods, something so casual. Still, it brings up that trauma, the layered emotions of an abusive relationship, how you went from such deep love to fear. It feels like a train of thought, building up to the trance-like, hypnotic chorus.
hausman explains, "After enduring six months of emotional abuse, manipulation, psychotic breakdowns, and episodes [with my ex], there was one final episode in July of 2020 where my roommates and I had to move out immediately. We were all so scared of him that we had to have the police come back with us to get our stuff. "When she saw that ex in the parking lot, something shifted. She realized how much she'd grown and changed. When she sings, "I've learned to speak out. I'm not scared of what you think. Now that you're not around, I've learned how to love myself," it's the release the song needs.
