Hannah McFarland

About Hannah McFarland

Hannah McFarland started writing songs in her childhood bedroom in Eugene, Oregon, mostly as a way to avoid doing homework. She picked up guitar at thirteen and spent her high school years playing open mics to rooms of politely disinterested coffee drinkers. After a brief and unsuccessful attempt at college, she moved to Portland in 2014 and started playing wherever people would let her set up a microphone.

Her first EP, Copper & Clay, came out in 2016 and got about as much attention as you'd expect from a self-released bedroom recording. But Waiting for the Rain, a sparse acoustic track from that collection, started circulating on indie folk playlists and somehow found an audience. The song is basically just McFarland and her guitar, singing about watching Oregon rain through a window and feeling stuck. Nothing groundbreaking, but something about her delivery made people listen.

The attention from that track led to her signing with Dead Vine Records, a small indie label out of Seattle. Her debut full-length, Glass Houses, dropped in 2018 and showed considerably more ambition than the EP. She brought in a full band and producer Trevor Moss, who'd worked with The Shins. The title track became her biggest song to that point, with its fingerpicked guitar line and lyrics about transparency and vulnerability that managed to avoid being precious about it. Small Towns, another standout from that record, captured the specific claustrophobia of growing up somewhere you needed to leave but can't quite forget.

McFarland spent most of 2019 on the road, opening for bigger acts like Iron & Wine and Julia Jacklin. She's said in interviews that those tours taught her more about songwriting than anything else, watching how seasoned performers could hold a room with just their presence and material.

Her second album, Borrowed Time, came out in early 2021 after pandemic delays. Recorded largely in isolation, it's noticeably more introspective than Glass Houses. The production is more layered, with subtle synths and atmospheric touches that give songs like The Long Way Home and Better Left Unsaid a dreamier quality. Some fans preferred the stripped-down earlier work, but the album showed growth even if it didn't blow up commercially.

These days McFarland splits time between Portland and a cabin near Mount Hood where she writes. She's been playing festivals semi-regularly and released a handful of singles in 2024 that suggest she's experimenting with slightly more electric sounds. Nothing radical, just someone who's been doing this long enough to trust her instincts. She's got a dedicated following that shows up to shows and actually listens, which in 2024 feels like the realistic version of success for someone making thoughtful folk music.

Hannah's shows are small and attentive. People don't talk during songs. There's usually someone crying by the third or fourth song, not in a manipulated way—just because she makes you feel things you didn't know were sitting there. She talks between songs, real conversations, not banter. No production, no backdrop, just presence.

Known for Waiting for the Rain, Glass Houses, Borrowed Time, Small Towns

See Hannah McFarland Live