Cochrane was born and raised in Seattle’s Broadview neighborhood. One of two kids, she grew up in a not-very-musical household — her mom works for a moving company, her dad in health care publishing — but deep down coveted dreams of a music career. (She could be said to be most familially kindred, in a creative sense, to her elusive uncle, Rick Sabo, a guitarist who found some local cult success in the 1990s.) Cochrane did choir, but she regrets, she said, not taking part in School of Rock, the music-education program with several Seattle-area branches. At Ingraham High School, she was ASB class president, and played softball, too.
When she graduated, Cochrane went to San Diego State University, where half her time was disrupted by pandemic-related restrictions and where she got a political science degree. Music still beckoned. “Music has just always been my No. 1,” she said. “It was always a pipe dream, and it’s cool that I’m (now) chasing my pipe dream, but I never really spoke out loud to people like, ‘Oh, I want to be a rock star,’ or ‘I want to be a songwriter,’ or ‘I want to be a pop star.’”
Cochrane, who returned to Seattle after college and works by day as a server at an Edmonds restaurant and as a country club employee, has been releasing music consistently since 2021. But, starting with October 2024’s “Afraid to Die,” a more recent string of aesthetically united singles has been coming out at a noticeably steadier pace. Cochrane said that she’d “love them to be part of a larger project; I wanted nothing more but to release a full-length album ever since I started making music four years ago.” But she’s pragmatic about the professional conditions most hospitable to an impactful LP release.
As a 24 year old singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer, Hannah Geller’s music is virtually untouched by any hands other than her own. Her genre bending music blends elements of psychedelic, progressive, blues, and alternative rock that can only be heard to be believed. Hannah has a live band who plays all of her original music with her around Southern California.
