Tanukichan NPC

About

Tanukichan has had a very busy 2023. In March, she released her second record, GIZMO, which Gorilla vs Bear called a “shoe-gazy dream-pop gem.” Hannah van Loon and her new live band have headlined shows across North America, opened for Melanie Martinez, supported Alvvays and Alex G’s summer tour, and are embarking on another headlining tour. Together they wrote a new song “NPC” (or “Non-player Character,” a term familiar to gamers). At home, it’s easy to blend into the background when you’re surrounded by strangers or hiding away. This song is about enjoying that anonymity, “feels kind of nice to disappear” van Loon sings, atop fuzzed-out, reverb-soaked riffs and alt-metal drums.

Artist Bio

Tanukichan is the solo project of classically-trained Bay Area native Hannah van Loon, whose music screeched to a halt when she discovered what she affectionately calls “dad rock” in her tween years. Throughout her self-described “sheltered” adolescence, van Loon taught herself guitar by spending hours in front of the radio, replicating riffs and chords from omnipresent bands like The Beatles and Incubus. 

Although van Loon is the creator and leader of Tanukichan, until now, the project could have been considered a collaboration between her and the Grammy-nominated chillwave pioneer Chaz Bear of Toro y Moi. After seeing an early Tanukichan show in 2016, Bear expressed an interest in working with van Loon; Radiolove, Tanukichan’s first headbanger of an EP, arrived on Bear’s own Company Records that same year. The promising four-song project was followed in 2018 by van Loon’s breakout debut LP, Sundays, which prompted her first solo headlining tour and dates opening for artists like Kero Kero Bonito and The Drums. Sundays earned Tanukichan enthusiastic critical acclaim, with Pitchfork writing that it “captures the spirit of a day whose wide-open nature fosters anxieties as well as ambitions” and Rolling Stone lauding its “bruising riffs, taut grooves, and open-road-ready guitar anthems.”

In March 2023, Tanukichan released her sophomore album GIZMO. While still rooted in the eerie shoegaze she’s become known and loved for, it also sees her go beyond her comfort zone, incorporating elements of grunge, industrial synths, nu metal basslines, and electric guitars that culminate into a captivating wall-of-sound. Shortly after the release of GIZMO, van Loon was approached by producer Franco Reid where they bonded over their love for Incubus. That correspondence led to the single “NPC” which was performed while touring heavily in the summer of 2023, opening for artists like Alex G, Alvvays, and Melanie Martinez. 

The new EP Circles, out September 20th, 2024, solidifies van Loon and Reid’s new partnership taking Tanukichan to new heights and sonic territory that feels larger, arena-ready, and more like a highspeed night drive than the hazy summer dream of its predecessors.