UP & COMING: UWEC Student Finds Artistic Spark Through Music
Izaiah Hooper has released two new singles in the past year and isn’t slowing down anytime soon
Izaiah Hooper, a third-year marketing student at UW-Eau Claire, released his latest single, “Phones Not Ringing,” on Dec. 1. The song has a unique origin story, as its first iteration was recorded inside the closet of Hooper’s campus dorm room two years ago.
Armed with an empty closet and a trash bin he turned upside down to use as a chair, Hooper went on to create a random late-night project in a Sutherland Hall dorm room with his friend Gabriel Smerillo. It soon turned into a new passion project for Hooper as several close friends encouraged him to pursue the song’s potential.
Hooper recorded the song again, still in a closet – albeit a bigger, more soundproofed, closet – which was then engineered by Jake VanDeYacht, an apprentice under Tristan Roberts, a Green Bay-based audio engineer. This is the second song Hooper has had professionally engineered, the first being “Zero G,” released in August.
Originally from St. Paul, Izaiah has been making music since he was 15, using his step-brother’s computer software, FL Studio, to create songs while his brother was at work. His music is melodic, lyric-focused rap and hip-hop, perhaps paralleling artists Frank Ocean and Childish Gambino.
“I just did it for fun, but then it became more of a serious thing,” Hooper said. “It was helping me get through things I didn’t even know I needed to get through.”
With large goals, Hooper doesn’t plan on slowing down anytime soon. For the past year, he has been working on what will be his debut EP, a five-song body of work called The Gemini Project. The EP’s release is set for sometime in 2024.
This past summer, Hooper and friends Tyler “Farls” Farley and Nahom “Nahomie” Baka traveled to Las Vegas and were able to record a song at Studio1212. The engineer liked their sound so much that he is including their song on an album with some of the other artists that have recorded in the studio.
For now, Hooper will continue to make music while finishing his undergraduate degree and working at Eau Claire Vintage. He hopes to perform live locally in the future and plans to move back to the Twin Cities after graduation to represent his hometown.
“For me, I'm just making music that's unique to me and that's original to me,” Hooper said. “Everything I write are true stories and comes from the heart. I don't feel like there's a lot of that today.”
You can listen to Izaiah’s music on all streaming platforms and keep up with him on Instagram (@izaiah.hooper).
