Nat and Alex Wolff’s self-titled fourth album is a rare kind of record – one born from sibling intuition, musical trust, and a love of music that feels as real as it is timeless.

Stream: ‘Nat & Alex Wolff’ – Nat & Alex Wolff

There is something uniquely distinct and almost impossible to put into words about the relationship between siblings.

There is a sense of safety, a kind of telepathy, and a bond that is as complicated as it is beautiful.

Parallels can easily be drawn to the relationship many of us are lucky enough to have with music. It becomes a safety net at a young age, something you instinctively know will always be there for you, no matter what you are going through.

When siblings fall in love with music together, we have seen firsthand the magic it can create. With brothers Nat and Alex Wolff, it is crystal clear that the music they make together is not for show – and it is not an act. They share an incredibly deep love and appreciation for music in all its forms.

Nat & Alex Wolff - Nat & Alex Wolff — ‘Nat & Alex Wolff’ by Nat & Alex Wolff

That love shines through on the acclaimed sibling duo’s self-titled album, released January 16 via Coup D’Etat Recordings / Broke Records. From the first ten seconds of “Tough,” which blends elements of several genres into one, to the full stream-of-consciousness heartbreak of “I Can’t Hurt You Anymore,” to the explosive release of “Midnight Song,” and finally the peaceful guitar-driven bow of “Rosalind,” the brothers’ fourth LP is a purposeful, articulate, and deeply artful body of work. From top to bottom, it is an album that clearly took its time. The sibling dynamic seems to have played a key role in that process, allowing them to feel safe enough to explore, to experiment, and to trust each other completely with the choices they made.

Atwood Magazine recently caught up with Nat and Alex Wolff on the day of their album’s release. In conversation, their love for music is even more evident. It felt like we could have talked not only about this album, but about music as a whole for days. There is something truly special about music born from that place – from people who love it so deeply and feel compelled to make it – not because they have to, and not because they expect something in return, but because it is simply what they carry inside of them.

Enjoy our conversation with Nat & Alex Wolff below, and stream this beautiful album wherever you listen to music.

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:: connect with Nat & Alex Wolff here ::

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“Soft Kissing Hour” – Nate & Alex Wolff

A CONVERSATION WITH NAT & ALEX WOLFF

Atwood Magazine: Hey guys! This is a phenomenal album. I’m so excited to chat about it.

Alex Wolff: Thank you so much.

Nat Wolff: Thank you! You guys have written such great stuff about us, and just great stuff about a lot of people we love, so we’re really excited to talk to you.

Very appreciative. I’m glad you’re fans of the magazine. That’s awesome.

Nat: Oh yeah.

This is one of those albums where you can tell it was made by people who truly love music. Every song feels warm, cohesive, and really thought through.

Nat: That’s so sweet. Yeah, we really do love music. We grew up with so many different inspirations and bands we loved, and we grew up in a house where my dad was a pianist, so there were always instruments around. Music has just always been the rhythm of our lives.

I want to dive into a few songs, mostly the newer ones that just came out. I want to start with “Tough.” It's such a great opener. Even the first ten seconds, the twinkly piano into the electric guitars, it’s such a strong way to kick things off. How did that end up as track one?

Alex: That piano intro was kind of an accident. I went to the piano and played something, and then we reversed it or did something weird to it. It just sounded like the opening of an album. It reminded me of “With A Little Help From My Friends” on Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band – something strange, intriguing, and pretty.

Pretty quickly, we felt like that song encapsulated the whole album. We’d also never done a song where Nat and I were truly equal leads. Nat sings the verse, I sing the pre-chorus, and we sing the chorus together. We wrote it that way too. It felt like the most “us” song, completely written by the two of us together, not one person writing and the other tinkering later.

That really summed up the album – the two of us playing everything, writing everything, and then on that one singing together.

Nat: I also remember saying the night before that I wanted to write a chorus as epic and catchy as “Believe” by Cher.

That’s awesome. It is very epic.

Nat: Shoot for the moon, maybe you’ll land among the stars.

Exactly. It grabs you immediately, and knowing it’s such a joint effort makes it even better. Okay - “I Can’t Hurt You Anymore.” Wow. Sad song. In the best way. It’s one of those songs you put on when you’re sad and want to twist the knife just a little more.

Alex: Yeah, kind of cathartic.

Exactly. It’s beautiful - very singer-songwriter. I hear Bob Dylan, Nick Drake. Tell me about that one.

Nat: Thank you. What is it about sad music? When you’re sad, you want to listen to sad music on headphones. Somehow it makes you feel better.

Alex: Less Lonely. You can be like “At least I’m not as sad as that guy!”

Nat: One of my favorite songs is “Martha” by Tom Waits. It’s devastating. That last line:

And I remember quiet evenings trembling close to you

I’d gone through a pretty brutal breakup and then got COVID, so I was stuck alone in a hotel room, not allowed to leave. It was the first time I was really alone with my thoughts after everything. The song just poured out of me. It was like 15 minutes long. Alex helped me pare it down to its essentials. There were probably ten billion verses. It was about figuring out what actually got the feeling across without repeating the same thing.

The take on the album is the first full take I got through with guitar and vocals together. I stopped once, played the wrong chord, then did another take straight through. That was it.

That’s amazing.

Nat: There was something about catching lightning in a bottle. Not trying to make it perfect – just making it sound like me alone in that hotel room.

That’s exactly why it hits so hard. It feels like pure stream-of-consciousness. One day you’ll have to release the 15-minute version - It’ll be your “All Too Well.”

Nat: We do have a seven-and-a-half-minute version.

Okay, it’s officially on record. People are going to ask for it.

Nat: I played that version live once and couldn’t remember all the verses. Our bandleader just held his phone up with the lyrics and scrolled while I sang.

That’s amazing. Okay, “Whole Other Life.” I love this one. It’s melodic and bright, and I feel like I could listen to it a hundred times without getting sick of it. Tell me about the song and the production as well.

Alex: That one was special. We worked with this producer Sachi Diserafino who’s amazing – he’s worked with Dijon and a lot of great artists, and

Nat: He has an amazing band called Joy Again.

Alex: Yeah, he’s amazing. We were already fans of his, but we ran into him at an Alex G show at Radio City. I had the song kicking around, but usually Nat and I really hammer songs out before the studio. For some reason, after that show, I thought, “Let’s just try this one.” It came together really fast and felt so good that we rerouted the entire album just to put it on there.

This album felt like two brains at war, being impulsive and following instincts, but then stepping back and being critical. We ended up cutting a few songs after everything was finished.

Nat: Yeah, the album shifted a lot. It ended up being much more reflective of who we are and what we love. Alex wrote “Whole Other Life,” I wrote “Horse,” and we just knew those songs needed to be on the album.

“Horse” feels cinematic, like it could be in a movie. You don’t know what direction it’s going to take, which I love.

Nat: You need to write the movie!

Haha, Absolutely.

Alex: What scene would it be?

Something intense.

Nat: Someone running.

Maybe a heist?

Nat: Ooh, a heist.

It’s such a great song.

Nat: That one was the scariest to play for Alex. It touches on traumatic things from my childhood. My hands were shaking when I played it for him, and he immediately said, “We need to record this tomorrow.” So we called Satchi and came back.

The scariest songs are usually the best ones. Does it feel less scary now that it’s out?

Nat: It’s actually been healing. People have reached out saying it helped them too. Live, it’s taken on a totally different energy. Sunday will be the first time we play it live with this arrangement.

That’s amazing. Okay “Candy Speak.” This might be my favorite.

Alex: It’s one of mine too.

Top three for sure. That intro - is it a demo?

Alex: No, something weird happened with a mic in the studio and it sounded cool. We accidentally recorded a room mic and decided to start the song there. We kept pushing the entry later and later so it almost feels like you’re wondering, “Is this even the song?” and then it whooshes in.

Tell me about writing it. I love these lyrics so much. They’re so vivid and sadly relatable.

Nat: That one was a fun way to vent about being love-bombed.

Alex: Alternate album title.

Nat: Yeah, being epically love-bombed, then realizing 60% of the fault was mine. You think you’re the victim, then realize they told you exactly what it was from the start and you signed up for it.

The first week of a love bomb feels great!

Nat: Then it takes a dark turn. For the second verse, originally I had a verse that didn’t quite say what I was saying and then I showed Alex the version that it ended up being. He was like, “This is the song.” I was like, “Can we put this on an album?” And now it’s one of people’s favorites.

You said he went home and you only gave him hеad. Then I just saw red, then I just saw rеd

It’s the best part. People are going to cling to that one.

Alex: I think so too.

“Midnight Song.” I love a big outro. Tell me about this one.

Alex: It was written on a guitar with, like, two or three strings.

Every time you tell this story, the guitar has fewer strings.

Alex: Eventually it’ll have no strings. I was in a songwriting mood but didn’t have a full guitar, so I wrote this melody. I was about to play Leonard Cohen in a TV show and had been deep in that world.

I had this idea for a strange outro in 7/4 that felt like a release. We’d never done anything like it, turning a ballad into something more Kid A-esque. I’m really proud of how it turned out.

The drum intro is actually from a voice memo of me playing drums at home. Then Nat had this poetry book in the studio, flipped it open, and there was a phrase that perfectly fit. It felt very Lord of the Rings.

Nat: We repurposed a phrase from the book. There’s the story of – I always wondered how they came up with the lyrics for “Being For The Benefit of Mr. Kite!”. There’s an interview late in John Lennon’s life where he said he was reading a pamphlet about the circus and they just kind of went line by line about the circus.

That’s incredible. I had no idea!

Alex: The circus is like, to whom this may concern, this is a cease and desist letter to the Beatles.

Speaking of The Beatles - the last song. I get huge Beatles vibes. Fleetwood Mac too. It’s such a beautiful closer. Tell me about writing it.

Alex: “Rosalyn” came from a messed-up 12-string guitar I got in Sweden. I write my best songs on broken guitars. I felt really far away from everyone and wanted to reach out to my girlfriend and to my roots. I’d been in such a dark Leonard Cohen headspace and needed something sweet, but still layered.

Nat: One of the most special things about making music with Alex is that when we’re apart, we check in with each other through songs. We send each other music and immediately know where the other is emotionally. That’s how we’ve always stayed connected, personally and creatively.

I’m really happy this song closes the album. After all the complexity, it gets to the core of why we started playing music – melody, honesty, being earnest.

That really brings it full circle. The album wears its influences proudly, but it never feels like it’s trying to be anything other than itself. Thank you so much for talking with me.

Alex: Thank you.

Go celebrate tonight!

Nat: Hell yeah. Hope to talk soon. Thank you so much.

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