Listen to Alexander Nate  sing about reticence — how he’s “used to showing no emotion, used to going through the motions, trying to hide my pain” — and the riddle of his music forms like a Gordian knot tied in silk: Is he using the smoothness of his voice to divulge his feelings or conceal them? Or could it be both?

Nate grew up in Lorton, Va., listening to the likes of Sam Cooke, Al Green, Usher and other top-level R&B smoothies who made their names spinning the heaviest human emotions into melodic chiffon. Under their influence, Nate got serious about his songwriting roughly five years ago, and he spends most of his time in Los Angeles, putting him closer to the center of the great American pop machine. 

He always sounds centered in his voice, a plush baritone that anchors his sound. “This is where my voice belongs and I feel comfortable here,” Nate says. “This is where I like to stay and tell these stories — and I hope that other people can sing along, too.”

That sense of accessibility and groundedness goes hand-in-glove with Nate’s interest in penning songs that address “the core of what we all go through with love and loss — the loss of a parent, friendships, relationships,” he says. “I want people to be able to say ‘Me, too.’ ”

(Source: Washington Post)

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