Biography
Emerging from the Bay Area underground, Dan the Automator first reached global notice through his partnership with Kool Keith on the innovative 1996 classic Dr. Octagon. Though he has worked across many styles as a constantly collaborative producer, he remains identified above all as a key architect of left-field rap. That niche finds clear expression in the conceptual albums he shaped for Handsome Boy Modeling School's So...How's Your Girl? (1999), Deltron 3030 (2000), and Lovage's Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By (2001), each marked by imaginative storytelling and eccentric humor. His most prominent commercial successes as co-producer encompass Gorillaz' Top Ten U.K. pop hit "Clint Eastwood" (2001) and Kasabian's number-one U.K. albums West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum (2009) and Velociraptor! (2011). In his fourth decade of activity he has formed the duos Pillowfight and Got a Girl, overseen returns by Deltron 3030 (2013) and Dr. Octagon (2018), and supplied music for film and television, among them Always Be My Maybe (2019).
Born in San Francisco, Dan Nakamura began violin instruction at age three and maintained those studies through his teens. An avid listener across many genres, he took up DJ'ing while still in high school, drawing inspiration from early hip-hop landmarks by Run-D.M.C. and Malcolm McLaren. After graduation in the late 1980s he constructed a home studio in his parents' basement and began producing and remixing under the name Automator, appearing on 12" singles by King Tech & MC Sway and Hi-C and issuing the EPs Music to Be Murdered By (1989) and King of the Beats (1990) on short-lived labels. Shortly thereafter he contributed as writer, producer, and bassist to a track by the Overlaps on the Ubiquity compilation Mo' Cookin'.
These underground efforts led to Dr. Octagon, a collaboration with Ultramagnetic MC's' Kool Keith. Blending lo-fi hip-hop beats with surreal atmospherics reminiscent of experimental U.K. trip-hop, the project surfaced first on 12" in 1995 and then as a self-titled album the following year on Nakamura's Bulk Recordings imprint. Licensed by Mo Wax in the U.K. and reissued domestically by DreamWorks under the title Dr. Octagonecologyst, the record achieved modest mainstream traction. Kool Keith's explicit lyrics and unconventional phrasing shared credit for its impact with Nakamura's inventive production, whose rolling rhythms incorporated weeping violins, extraterrestrial electronics, and heavy-metal guitar alongside scratches by DJ Q-Bert. While Dr. Octagon gained traction, Nakamura and Kool Keith also cut the Automator EP A Better Tomorrow for Ubiquity. Both projects originated in the basement studio now known as The Glue Factory, which later hosted DJ Shadow's Endtroducing..... and sessions for Solesides artists including Latyrx's The Album.
With Kool Keith declining to tour behind Dr. Octagon, Nakamura accumulated production and remix credits for Primal Scream, Eels, DJ Krush, Cornershop (multiple tracks on 1997's When I Was Born for the 7th Time), and the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion (1998's Acme). He also radically reworked material by Hindi film composers Kalyanji Virji Shah and Anandji Virji Shah on Bombay the Hard Way: Guns, Cars & Sitars. Teaming next with fellow hip-hop absurdist Prince Paul, he launched Handsome Boy Modeling School, a moniker borrowed from an episode of the Chris Elliott sitcom Get a Life. Their 1999 debut So...How's Your Girl? mixed frenetic sampling, including abundant Elliott dialogue, with an all-star roster of guests. At the same time Nakamura established the Tommy Boy-affiliated 75 Ark, which housed Antipop Consortium and the Deltron 3030 venture uniting him with rapper Del tha Funkee Homosapien and DJ Kid Koala. The trio's self-titled 2000 debut presented an elaborate science-fiction narrative set in a dystopian future, framed by Nakamura's densely layered cinematic beats. That year 75 Ark also released an expanded edition of A Better Tomorrow EP, retitled A Much Better Tomorrow.
Nakamura reached his broadest audience in 2001 through the cartoon band Gorillaz, overseen by Blur's Damon Albarn and artist Jamie Hewlett. The group's self-titled debut achieved platinum status on both sides of the Atlantic, propelled by "Clint Eastwood" (number four U.K. pop, number 57 U.S. pop), co-produced by Nakamura and featuring Del tha Funkee Homosapien. Returning to the Nathaniel Merriweather alias within Handsome Boy Modeling School, he then assembled Lovage, a Serge Gainsbourg-inspired lounge project featuring vocalists such as Faith No More's Mike Patton and Elysian Fields' Jennifer Charles. Lovage's Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By appeared later in 2001 and charted on Billboard's Independent Albums list. In 2002 Nakamura compiled the DJ mix Wanna Buy a Monkey?, interleaving several of his own remixes and productions with selections from Brand Nubian, Doves, and Masta Ace.
Throughout the remainder of the 2000s his work continued to branch outward. He initiated a partnership with Glassjaw's Daryl Palumbo in Head Automatica in 2004 and rejoined Prince Paul for the second Handsome Boy Modeling School album, White People, which briefly entered the Billboard 200. Three years later he produced Dan the Automator Presents 2K7, the soundtrack to a 2K Sports basketball video game installment, enlisting E-40, Ghostface Killah, and Mos Def. Alongside full-length collaborations such as Men Without Pants (with the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's Russell Simins) and co-production of Kasabian's platinum-certified U.K. release West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum, he supplied tracks for Jamie Cullum, Hieroglyphics' Casual, and Latyrx's Lyrics Born.
The 2010s brought fresh duos, further production assignments, and continued soundtrack work. After contributing two pieces to the Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World score, Nakamura co-produced Kasabian's second platinum U.K. album Velociraptor! and participated in DRC Music, a Warp-supported collaboration between U.K. and U.S. producers and Congolese musicians. Bulk Recordings, reactivated, issued the 2013 self-titled Pillowfight album (Nakamura and Emily Wells) and the Deltron 3030 follow-up Event 2, followed in 2014 by I Love You But I Must Drive Off This Cliff Now under the Got a Girl name (Nakamura with Mary Elizabeth Winstead). In 2018 Nakamura, Kool Keith, and Q-Bert revived Dr. Octagon for the Bulk release Moosebumps: An Exploration into Modern Horripilation. His film and television credits meanwhile expanded to include Money Monster, Broken Bread, Booksmart, and Always Be My Maybe.
Born in San Francisco, Dan Nakamura began violin instruction at age three and maintained those studies through his teens. An avid listener across many genres, he took up DJ'ing while still in high school, drawing inspiration from early hip-hop landmarks by Run-D.M.C. and Malcolm McLaren. After graduation in the late 1980s he constructed a home studio in his parents' basement and began producing and remixing under the name Automator, appearing on 12" singles by King Tech & MC Sway and Hi-C and issuing the EPs Music to Be Murdered By (1989) and King of the Beats (1990) on short-lived labels. Shortly thereafter he contributed as writer, producer, and bassist to a track by the Overlaps on the Ubiquity compilation Mo' Cookin'.
These underground efforts led to Dr. Octagon, a collaboration with Ultramagnetic MC's' Kool Keith. Blending lo-fi hip-hop beats with surreal atmospherics reminiscent of experimental U.K. trip-hop, the project surfaced first on 12" in 1995 and then as a self-titled album the following year on Nakamura's Bulk Recordings imprint. Licensed by Mo Wax in the U.K. and reissued domestically by DreamWorks under the title Dr. Octagonecologyst, the record achieved modest mainstream traction. Kool Keith's explicit lyrics and unconventional phrasing shared credit for its impact with Nakamura's inventive production, whose rolling rhythms incorporated weeping violins, extraterrestrial electronics, and heavy-metal guitar alongside scratches by DJ Q-Bert. While Dr. Octagon gained traction, Nakamura and Kool Keith also cut the Automator EP A Better Tomorrow for Ubiquity. Both projects originated in the basement studio now known as The Glue Factory, which later hosted DJ Shadow's Endtroducing..... and sessions for Solesides artists including Latyrx's The Album.
With Kool Keith declining to tour behind Dr. Octagon, Nakamura accumulated production and remix credits for Primal Scream, Eels, DJ Krush, Cornershop (multiple tracks on 1997's When I Was Born for the 7th Time), and the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion (1998's Acme). He also radically reworked material by Hindi film composers Kalyanji Virji Shah and Anandji Virji Shah on Bombay the Hard Way: Guns, Cars & Sitars. Teaming next with fellow hip-hop absurdist Prince Paul, he launched Handsome Boy Modeling School, a moniker borrowed from an episode of the Chris Elliott sitcom Get a Life. Their 1999 debut So...How's Your Girl? mixed frenetic sampling, including abundant Elliott dialogue, with an all-star roster of guests. At the same time Nakamura established the Tommy Boy-affiliated 75 Ark, which housed Antipop Consortium and the Deltron 3030 venture uniting him with rapper Del tha Funkee Homosapien and DJ Kid Koala. The trio's self-titled 2000 debut presented an elaborate science-fiction narrative set in a dystopian future, framed by Nakamura's densely layered cinematic beats. That year 75 Ark also released an expanded edition of A Better Tomorrow EP, retitled A Much Better Tomorrow.
Nakamura reached his broadest audience in 2001 through the cartoon band Gorillaz, overseen by Blur's Damon Albarn and artist Jamie Hewlett. The group's self-titled debut achieved platinum status on both sides of the Atlantic, propelled by "Clint Eastwood" (number four U.K. pop, number 57 U.S. pop), co-produced by Nakamura and featuring Del tha Funkee Homosapien. Returning to the Nathaniel Merriweather alias within Handsome Boy Modeling School, he then assembled Lovage, a Serge Gainsbourg-inspired lounge project featuring vocalists such as Faith No More's Mike Patton and Elysian Fields' Jennifer Charles. Lovage's Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By appeared later in 2001 and charted on Billboard's Independent Albums list. In 2002 Nakamura compiled the DJ mix Wanna Buy a Monkey?, interleaving several of his own remixes and productions with selections from Brand Nubian, Doves, and Masta Ace.
Throughout the remainder of the 2000s his work continued to branch outward. He initiated a partnership with Glassjaw's Daryl Palumbo in Head Automatica in 2004 and rejoined Prince Paul for the second Handsome Boy Modeling School album, White People, which briefly entered the Billboard 200. Three years later he produced Dan the Automator Presents 2K7, the soundtrack to a 2K Sports basketball video game installment, enlisting E-40, Ghostface Killah, and Mos Def. Alongside full-length collaborations such as Men Without Pants (with the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's Russell Simins) and co-production of Kasabian's platinum-certified U.K. release West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum, he supplied tracks for Jamie Cullum, Hieroglyphics' Casual, and Latyrx's Lyrics Born.
The 2010s brought fresh duos, further production assignments, and continued soundtrack work. After contributing two pieces to the Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World score, Nakamura co-produced Kasabian's second platinum U.K. album Velociraptor! and participated in DRC Music, a Warp-supported collaboration between U.K. and U.S. producers and Congolese musicians. Bulk Recordings, reactivated, issued the 2013 self-titled Pillowfight album (Nakamura and Emily Wells) and the Deltron 3030 follow-up Event 2, followed in 2014 by I Love You But I Must Drive Off This Cliff Now under the Got a Girl name (Nakamura with Mary Elizabeth Winstead). In 2018 Nakamura, Kool Keith, and Q-Bert revived Dr. Octagon for the Bulk release Moosebumps: An Exploration into Modern Horripilation. His film and television credits meanwhile expanded to include Money Monster, Broken Bread, Booksmart, and Always Be My Maybe.
Albums
Easter Sunday (Music From The Motion Picture)
2022
Easter Sunday (Music from the Motion Picture)
2022
Booksmart (Original Motion Picture Score)
2019
2K7
2006
2K7 - Instrumentals
2006
Singles
