Emerson Azarian’s story doesn’t start in a studio. The rising pop star has built a major following around her ‘90s-inspired sound and viral TikToks, but it all started behind the counter of a coffee shop. In between making lattes and cappuccinos, Azarian would film TikToks, pairing her demos with often relatable captions (i.e. “Me opening up the coffee shop when I should be OPENING for Sabrina Carpenter!”). Nothing could have prepared her for the initial shock of her first viral video.
“I just remember my phone was really warm. And I realized it was blowing up. My video was blowing up,” Azarian laughs. “[TikTok] is kind of how it started, and I’m really grateful for that because it left me with no option to overthink it. I just knew I had to release the song.”
Azarian had spent years collecting demos, but TikTok gave her the push she needed to finally share them. “This sounds so funny, but I wasn’t even planning on releasing music for a really long time,” she says in an exclusive interview with Her Campus. “One day, I just decided, ‘Let’s go for it.’” And go for it, she did.
Azarian’s official music journey began when she released her first single, “My Patience,” in July 2023. In April 2025, she released her debut album, Hyperfixation, which featured R&B single “Plans Tonight” featuring Britton Rauscher and the more upbeat, ‘00s-sounding “Lucky Stars.”
“[Hyperfixation] started with ‘Plans Tonight,’” she says. “At first, the album was a lot more R&B-leaning until I heard the beat of ‘Say It Louder’ and I immediately knew I had to scrap my album and redo it.”
While most traditional artists lean on a lyric or a melody to dictate the course of their projects, Azarian is actually guided by her wardrobe. “Fashion does inspire my music, so a lot of the inspiration I had were my outfits,” she says. “Sometimes, I’ll be writing and just picture myself in a tank top and a mini skirt with a particular song.”
And what better era for fashion than the ‘90s, yet another source of inspiration for Azarian? While she does have muses in Christina Aguilera, Mariah Carey, and Britney Spears (the cover art of her “If It’s Alright” single is a direct nod to Spears’s …Baby One More Time album), there’s also a confidence that Azarian strives to emulate.
“The ‘90s girls, they’re not afraid to be themselves,” she said. “They’ll do a fun vocal take that adds a lot of personality and it’s not perfect all the time, which I really love.”
That balance of style and substance is something Azarian carries offstage, too. Her sound channels the playful edge of ‘90s pop icons, but her true grounding force comes from her Christian faith. In an industry where glorifying one’s self-image takes center stage, she’s refreshingly open about the role spirituality plays in her life, even thanking God for the opportunity to do what she loves in an Instagram post announcing the release of Hyperfixation.
“God is the center of everything to me and I think my music journey is a great way for me to be able to share my faith,” she says. “A lot of people who listen to my music aren’t around it and grew up with a toxic idea of Christian faith. So I love being able to share my faith from the perspective of ‘Jesus loves you, and if you take anything from this, I hope it’s that you know you’re loved.’”
Fans — or as Azarian affectionately calls them, Emerstans — can look forward to her PS hyperfixation EP, which will be released on Thursday, Sept. 18. The project was entirely engineered and produced by Azarian herself, a skill she attributes to Brandy — another one of her favorite 90s icons — who’s notorious for her use of harmony stacks. “I’m really excited because this is my first EP that I’ve completely engineered by myself,” she says. “It felt very ‘women in STEM.’”
Azarian may still be climbing, but she’s doing it with a mix of faith, nostalgia, and a whole lot of personality. Whether she’s stacking Brandy-inspired harmonies, pulling outfit inspo straight from the ‘90s, or eating deodorant (go watch her Dirty Laundry music video and then get back to me), Azarian has that rare magic that makes you stop mid-scroll. Don’t be surprised when she ends up on your For You page and becomes your hyperfixation.