be Oliver Tree
- born in Santa Cruz in 1993
- spends his teenage years making weird electronic music under the name “Tree”
- somehow gets Thom Yorke’s approval for a Radiohead cover
- studies business (hates it)
- ends up at CalArts studying music technology instead
- spends years building one of the strangest characters the music industry has ever seen
- bowl haircut, tiny sunglasses, giant JNCO-style pants, colorful windbreakers
- riding scooters everywhere
- signs with Atlantic Records in 2017
- drops “Alien Boy”
- releases “Hurt”
- films himself getting launched off cliffs, crashing vehicles and doing his own stunts
- announces retirement
- cancels retirement
- announces retirement again
- keeps doing it for almost a decade
- releases Ugly Is Beautiful, then Cowboy Tears, then Alone in a Crowd, then Love You Madly Hate You Badly
“Life Goes On” explodes worldwide
“Miss You” becomes one of the biggest songs on the planet
spends years making fake endings part of his brand
moves between characters so often people stop separating Oliver Tree from the joke
starts a new world tour in 2026
- flies to Brazil
- appears in videos with helicopters
- posts content teasing his return
- gets into a helicopter in Rio de Janeiro
- another helicopter enters the same airspace
- collision above Recreio dos Bandeirantes
- six people die
- Oliver Tree is one of them
A huge part of the internet thought it was another Oliver Tree bit.
Today we lost a good artist.