Oliver Tree’s Will Redirects His Estate to Artists, Not Heirs

Oliver Tree, the singer and performer known for his chaotic visual style and songs like “Alien Boy,” died yesterday in a helicopter collision along with five others. Within an hour of the news, a clip from an April interview with Zach Sang resurfaced, in which Tree detailed the unusual terms of his will.

Dressed as Shrek for no stated reason, Tree spoke with a blend of deadpan humor and earnest belief. He dismissed the idea that declaring each album his last was a gimmick. “It’s not schtick. You never know when it’s my last album. I could die any moment,” he said. The conversation moved to creativity’s communal nature—he mentioned Charli XCX and Troye Sivan’s jet-ski-filled “2099” video arriving just before his own stunt-heavy “Cash Machine” clip—and then to his estate.

Tree stated that no family member, not even a future spouse or children, would inherit his wealth. “They’re not gonna be a silver spoon,” he said, explaining that his own father’s work in the 2000s had already provided a baseline. College costs for his children would be covered, but everything else would flow into a foundation called Doctor Oliver Tree’s Art Grants for Baby Geniuses.

The foundation, structured to draw interest from his music residuals and possibly other assets, is designed to fund the act of physical creation rather than educational expenses. Tree framed it as money “going back to artists,” an investment in the ongoing, uncredited pool of ideas that he believed no single person truly owns. The interview, recorded months before his death, now reads less like a joke and more like a deliberate, posthumous statement on art and accumulation.