Dan "The Automator" Nakamura is a producer, in the hip-hop-and-techno sense. Dan can also handle the turntables. IN fact, that's what he started out doing, until he got itimidated by the other Bay Area DJs, and started to produce his own (quite phat) beats. But he hasn't let his DJ skills die, as he displays in his mix-album, Wanna Buy a Monkey?.

Dan has a couple albums of his own, but his work is best seen in albums he's made with various alternative hip-hop groups, mostly one-off concept project such as Dr. Octogon, Deltron 3030 and Handsome Boy Modeling School.

His beats have a notable techno leaning, rather than being straight hip-hop beats. As a child, Dan was a classically trained violinist, and it shows in his beats, which exhibit a solid knowledge of music theory, and take on a far more epic scale than the four repeated measures you're liable to hear on MTV. But don't let the violins and off-beat samples fool you. These are definitely phat beats.

Albums

Credits*

*Credits were stolen wholesale from Allmusic.com. If you know of something they left out, let me know.