On his new single “My Favourite Mug,” Hooper turns his attention to something modest, familiar, and deeply human: the quiet comfort of everyday ritual. The track serves as a gentle entry point into his debut full-length album Super Duper, set for release this Spring, and introduces a songwriter whose relationship with music has been shaped from the very beginning.
Raised on a small island off Canada’s west coast, Shane Hooper grew up steeped in song. His father played in the platinum-selling band The Grapes of Wrath, while his mother was one half of beloved indie-folk duo Lava Hay. Music wasn’t just present—it was foundational. That early immersion led Hooper to the CBC Searchlight Finals while still in high school and instilled an intuitive, lifelong approach to songwriting.
“My Favourite Mug,” which Hooper describes as “an anthem for homebodies,” distills that background into something deceptively simple. On the surface, it’s a love song to an inanimate object. Beneath that, it’s a meditation on the small, grounding habits that provide steadiness amid change. The song’s charm lies in its restraint, finding emotional weight not in grand gestures but in familiarity and repetition.
Musically, the track nods to the melodic storytelling of 1960s singer-songwriters, filtered through a rough-edged ’90s sensibility. Recorded mostly live off the floor at Montreal’s Mixart Studios—a space that feels frozen in the ’60s and ’70s—the song captures the loose, unpolished chemistry of a band playing together in real time.
Now based in Montreal after stints in British Columbia and Toronto, Hooper has become embedded in the city’s indie scene, collaborating with members of Fleece, the Nora Kelly Band, and Pastel Blank. “My Favourite Mug” carries what Hooper calls “a nostalgia for a past you never lived,” while pointing forward to what’s next: an artist settling into his voice, balancing grit with tenderness, and creating music that feels lived-in, welcoming, and unmistakably like home.
