Singer and songwriter Hailey Knox first built a following with acoustic guitar-and-loop-pedal meditations on hits by artists including Adele, the Weeknd, and Justin Bieber in the mid-2010s. Accompanying her guitar performances was a soulful voice that quickly drew comparisons to artists like Sheryl Crow and Ingrid Michaelson. She released her debut EP, A Little Awkward, in 2016 as she formulated a more sophisticated, full-band sound for her full-length debut, 2018's Hardwired Mixtape. She collected millions of streams for the single "A Boy Named Pluto" in 2020, and singles like the next year's "Gucci Prada Balenciaga" and 2022's "Waiting on You" kept her in playlist rotations.