Dan Hayden

Dan Hayden is a hip-hop producer based in Bristol, UK.

His consistently earthy, experimental style draws on influences within and outside of hip-hop: from Hendrix, Radiohead and James Brown through to Madlib, J Dilla and fellow UK beatmaker Paul White.

Writing and listening to rock and funk as a guitarist in his teens, he quickly learned that his passions lay wherever there were heavy, syncopated rhythms and with artists who refused to sit still creatively.

Gravitating then towards hip-hop in his twenties, and having been introduced to production through a flatmate, Dan became fascinated by how the tunes he was listening to were put together, and especially how producers chopped and manipulated samples creatively. He went on to spend night upon night teaching himself to make raw, off-kilter beats from his limited vinyl collection, constantly trying (and often failing) to hit the line between pleasingly leftfield and incoherent.

Nowadays, Dan is drawing more and more on his skills as an instrumentalist, building synths, bass and 6-string guitars – and even occasionally vocals – into his work.