Max Vanderwolf

BIOGRAPHY

Born and raised in New York, Max Vanderwolf began his musical adventures in the city's underground art and rock scenes, moving through post-punk, psychedelic rock, downtown noise, jazz, hardcore, performance art, anti-folk, metal, and various forms of glam-infected rock. During this period, he developed a reputation for genre-defying songwriting and emotional directness while fronting his band, Naked Sun (Noise/BMG), and also making significant contributions on the eponymous King Of Kings album on Geffen Records.

In 2002, Vanderwolf relocated to London, becoming the vocalist and creative force behind Last Man Standing. Their sole album, released in 2008, received critical praise from Mojo and Uncut, and the band performed at major festivals including Glastonbury, Reading Festival, Bestival, and Wilderness. Throughout his time in the UK, Vanderwolf continued recording a wide body of material that resisted easy classification, frequently collaborating with producer and drummer Chris Wyles and guitarist Chris Cordoba.

Vanderwolf’s first release under his own name, Extinction!, featured collaborations with Robert Wyatt (on “When The Fire Grows Cold”) and Daevid Allen of Soft Machine on the title track. Its follow-up, 12 Little Killers, was recorded in London and co-produced and mixed by keyboardist Sam Sallon. The album drew comparisons to artists such as The Jam, David Bowie, and Cat Stevens, earning a four star review in Mojo.

Following several tumultuous London years, Vanderwolf escaped to the United States, eventually finding himself in Los Angeles during the global pandemic. Isolated in a new city, he entered a period of deep retrospection and renewed creative focus. Rehearsing outdoors in the Santa Monica Mountains and recording at Red Star Studio in Silver Lake, Vanderwolf released the epic The Great Bewilderment, a 45-minute concept album tracing Vanderwolf’s life unraveling in London and his re-emergence in Los Angeles. The album received strong reviews and featured a special guest appearance by Adrian Utley of Portishead.

Seeking a more immediate connection to his audience, Vanderwolf launched the Vanderwolf Singles Club, a digital-only six-song cycle, released one chapter at a time. The final entry in the series, “The Path of Love”, earned Vanderwolf a viral moment, with the song’s accompanying visualizer surpassing seven million views on Instagram and introducing his work to a new global audience.

After three years in the studio with producer Tim Sonnefeld, Vanderwolf’s new album, Songs You’ll Never Hear, is set for release on April 17, 2026. Informed by the utter wreckage of our current epoch, Vanderwolf's album integrates strings and horns to give the listener a lush experience despite the destruction around us.

On the final mixing session of Songs You’ll Never Hear, Vanderwolf's vision became blurry. Following an MRI, and in keeping with his steady stream of tumultuous events, he discovered he had a 5 centimeter brain tumour. He is currently receiving treatment in San Francisco and is determined to return to the studio to complete a fourth album he has started.
Along with his career as a composer and performer, Vanderwolf, under his birth name Glenn Max, has had a stellar career as a curator, programming festivals and booking artists like David Bowie, Ornette Coleman, Davie Byrne, Kraftwerk, Patti Smith, Beck, Stephen Malkmus, Massive Attack, Jarvis Cocker, Kim Gordon at places like the Meltdown Festival at Royal Festival Hall and Village Underground in the UK, Knitting Factory in New York and most recently at the Skirball Center in his new hometown of Los Angeles.