//GORILLAZ BIOGRAPHY//

Dan The Automator

Role in the Gorillaz Project
Dan The Automator was the producer of the Gorillaz debut album and some of its B-sides. He was called into work on the album relatively late in the sessions, and spent two weeks adding some Hip-Hop beats and samples to the tracks. He also got Kid Koala, who was in the country at the time, to do some scratching on some tracks. He got Del Tha Funkee Homosapien to do raps for 'Clint Eastwood' and 'Rock The House' whilst in the US, and brought the vocal tracks over to the UK to add them to the versions of the tracks Damon had. He also accompanied the band when recording moved to Jamaica for the vocals for the album. He also contacted Tina Weymouth and got her to make a recording on CD of some backing vocals for 19/2000, which were later added to the track. Dan was also heavily involved in promoting the Gorillaz album in America; doing phone interviews, and also doing a DJ set before the band played on their North American tour (he did not play live behind the scenes on any dates though).



Biography
Dan "The Automator" Nakamura is a San Francisco-based hip-hop producer whose work with "Kool" Keith Thornton on the latter's Dr. Octagon project shot him to unlikely acclaim in 1996. A classically trained violinist in his younger days, Nakamura instead fell in love with Kraftwerk and old-school hip-hop, as well as R&B and rock & roll. Dan has also produced and /or mixed tracks for Primal Scream, the Eels, DJ Krush, a collaboration with Dust Brother Mike Simpson for Cornershop and the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. Dan later teamed up with former De La Soul producer Prince Paul as Handsome Boy Modeling School,releasing an album titled 'So...How's Your Girl?'. In 2000 he released Deltron 3030 a collaboration with rapper Del tha Funkee Homosapien and DJ Kid Koala. After working with the Gorillaz, Dan returned to his Nathaniel Merriweather alias (from the Handsome Boy Modeling School album) for Lovage, a lounge-flavored project. The Lovage album 'Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By' was released before the end of 2001. Nakamura kicked off 2002 by releasing his first-ever mix album, the well-received 'Wanna Buy a Monkey?'.



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