Throughout the early 2000s, members worked regular day jobs while continuing to create music, leading to the release of the critically acclaimed album Let Go, in 2002.

"[1] Caws and Lorca met at the Lycée Français de New York; both spent some of their childhood in France and Belgium, and played in many bands, including the Cost of Living and Because Because Because.

Their first drummer, Daniel (later alluded to in the song "The Plan", from the album High/Low), was replaced by Aaron Conte, with whom the band recorded their first 7", The Plan/Telescope (1994), as well as the demo tape Tafkans, the raw version of High/Low.

After a Blonde Redhead show at the Knitting Factory, Nada Surf met former Cars frontman and Weezer producer Ric Ocasek.

Tired of the requirements of the A&R director, the band judged the album was perfect as-is (even though Elektra suggested the inclusion of an acoustic version of "Popular"), and broke their contract.

Subsequently, the band performed at their record release party at Luna Lounge in New York City and toured extensively for several months to rebuild their North American fan base.

Mostly recorded the year before, the album was produced by their friends Louie Lino and Chris Fudurich, who had engineered The Proximity Effect; the band paid them with $1 and $5 bills, the money earned from tour merchandise sales.

[9] In 2008, the band released Lucky, an album made with producer John Goodmanson at the Robert Lang Studios in Seattle, from material recorded the year before.

In 2010, the band released If I Had a Hi-Fi, an album of covers including songs by the likes of Depeche Mode, Kate Bush, Spoon, and The Go-Betweens.

[14] In 2018, for the fifteenth anniversary of Let Go, the charity album Standing at the Gates: The Songs of Nada Surf's Let Go was released to benefit the ACLU and The Pablove Foundation.

It consists of tracks from the band's 2002 album, covered by various artists, including the Long Winters, Ed Harcourt, Ron Gallo, Rogue Wave, Holly Miranda, and Aimee Mann.

In November 2019, Nada Surf announced that their ninth studio album, Never Not Together, would be released via Barsuk Records (US) and City Slang (UK) on February 7, 2020.

[15] The band also announced a major world tour to celebrate the album's release, starting on January 14 in Seattle, before moving through the US and also encompassing dates in the UK, Germany, Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark.