Nigel Godrich

It won Best Alternative Album at the 40th Grammy Awards and sold more than 4.5 million copies worldwide.

Working in improvised studios without supervision, Godrich and the band learned as they went, and credited the success to the open process.

Nigel Timothy Godrich (born 28 February 1971) is an English record producer, recording engineer and musician.

He has worked with acts including Radiohead, Travis, Beck, Air, Paul McCartney, U2, R.E.M., Pavement, Roger Waters and Arcade Fire.

Early in his career, Godrich worked as the house engineer at RAK Studios, London, under the producer John Leckie.

After the closure of Audio One, in 1990 Godrich worked at RAK Studios, London, first as a messenger and later as a studio assistant.

He would stay late at night, inviting musician friends to play there while he practised recording them.

At RAK, he became a tape operator for the producer John Leckie, with whom he worked on albums by Ride and Denim.

After four years, Godrich left RAK to go freelance and set up his own studio, Shabang, where he planned to create dance music.

Godrich first worked with the rock band Radiohead when John Leckie hired him at RAK to engineer their EP My Iron Lung (1994) and their second album, The Bends (1995).

The band nicknamed him "Nihilist", approving of his efforts to take their sound in new directions.

When Leckie left the studio to attend a social engagement, Radiohead and Godrich stayed to record B-sides.

One song, "Black Star", was instead included on The Bends.

He met Radiohead while working at RAK on their second album, The Bends (1995).

Six months later, he was hired to engineer and mix The Sound Of... McAlmont & Butler (1995), the debut album by McAlmont & Butler.

Godrich said it was a "brilliant experience" and credited Bernard Butler with teaching him how to produce records.

In 1995, Godrich produced Radiohead's charity single "Lucky", plus the B-sides "Bishop's Robes" and "Talk Show Host", released on the 1996 single "Street Spirit (Fade Out)".

Radiohead hired him to produce OK Computer (1997), which was a major success and brought him attention from major artists.

He has produced all of their albums since, and has worked on several projects with the Radiohead singer, Thom Yorke, and the lead guitarist, Jonny Greenwood.

Godrich is a member of the bands Atoms for Peace (with Yorke) and Ultraísta.

Radiohead invited Godrich to co-produce their third album, OK Computer (1997).

He won the Grammy Award for Best Engineered Non-Classical Album for their sixth album, Hail to the Thief (2003).

In 2006, he launched the music webseries From the Basement.

For their seventh album, In Rainbows (2007), Radiohead initially hired a new producer, Spike Stent.

According to the guitarist Ed O'Brien, Radiohead wanted to get out of the "comfort zone" by working with a new producer, and the bassist, Colin Greenwood, said Godrich was busy working with Charlotte Gainsbourg and Beck.

Radiohead re-enlisted Godrich after their sessions with Stent proved fruitless.

In 2010, Godrich and Beck composed the score for Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Godrich's first film work.

Nigel Godrich was born in Westminster, London, the son of Victor Godrich, a BBC sound supervisor, and Brenda Godrich.

He was fascinated by recording at an early age.

As a child, after he asked for a machine to make records, his father bought him a cassette machine; Godrich used it to make recordings of his television, train sets and running water.

Godrich was educated at William Ellis School in North West London, where he shared classes with his friend and the future Zero 7 member Henry Binns.

Godrich began playing guitar, inspired by Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa.

He first visited a recording studio at the age of 16, when his band recorded a demo at Elephant Studios, Wapping, and spent time asking the engineer questions.

He studied at the School of Audio Engineering (SAE), London.

After graduating from SAE, Godrich became a junior staff member at the Audio One studio complex, working as a tea boy.

He did not enjoy his time there.

According to Godrich, "With a beeper in my pocket, I'd wait next to the kettle, ready to deliver my hot beverages. I wasn't even allowed in the studios, but I [would] hang there thinking, 'OK, it's only the first rung, but at least I'm on the ladder.'"

In 2013, Godrich told the Guardian: "OK Computer was such a big thing for me because I was given power for the first time. Some of these incredibly intelligent and insightful people said 'do what you want' to me so I worked my arse off for them and together we did something that represents where we all were at the time. And it stuck for some reason. People got it, so that changed my life."

Godrich has produced every Radiohead studio album since.

Godrich's father died during the recording of Radiohead's ninth album, A Moon Shaped Pool (2016).