Hank Heaven

Hank Heaven never intended to be a songwriter. Raised in New York’s Hudson Valley in a family of professional musicians, Hank emerged as something of a guitar wunderkind, enamored with and excelling in the swing music of yore. Still a teenager, they toured the world with jazz bands before moving to Brooklyn and becoming a guitarist for hire with magnetic indie acts—Samia, Del Water Gap, and Gus Dapperton, just to sample. Why would Hank need songs of their own?

But early in 2022, Hippo Campus singer Jake Luppen co-produced the start of a new quartet called Peach Fuzz—Samia, Hank, Ryann, and Raffaella Meloni. Around that time, Luppen realized Hank had melodic ideas and tuneful bits of their own. He encouraged Hank to develop these songs. Call Me Hank—a charming and smart five-track debut, where an aching piano ballad about dejection shared room with sharp and hooky rejoinders about substandard partners—emerged as one of 2023’s most promising EPs. Hank had plenty to say and so many ways to say it, hopscotching from hyperpop to pop-country and from melancholy to mirth. The evolution of Hank, both musically and personally, has since been brisk by necessity.