Nick Hook

Nick Hook is NYC’s waviest resident: an in-demand collaborator, producer extraordinaire, and all around provider of vibes who’s lent his touch to projects from Run The Jewels, A$AP Ferg, Hudson Mohawke, and countless others, all while building a creative community around his Space Pit studio in Greenpoint. Now the redheaded kingpin steps forward with his Relationships LP on Fool’s Gold, a full album of collaborations that are unconventional, unexpected and all-the-way live (literally: each song was recorded in-person with Nick behind the boards, a refreshing move in the email verse era).
It’s been a true journey for the St. Louis-born Hook, who was barely out of his teens when he hit the road in 2004 with his first band Men, Women & Children. They recorded two full-length albums for Warner Brothers before splitting, but in the process Nick saw his future moving behind the boards. After relocating to New York, he met vocalist Tiombe Lockhart while working at an infamous East Village sake bar; the two went on to form Cubic Zirconia, who signed their Follow Your Heart LP to Fool’s Gold with Lockhart as lead singer and Hook producing and co-writing.

Hook made the transition from band member to album architect in 2011, when London DJ L-Vis 1990 enlisted him to record and co-write the Neon Dreams LP on Island Records. That same year, Nick was selected for the Red Bull Music Academy, where he met and collaborated with music greats like Bootsy Collins and Tony Visconti. Through RBMA, Nick would go on to tour the globe with Baauer, recording samples in the deserts of Dubai and volcanoes of Japan for Red Bull’s “Searching For Sound” project. Wanderlust would also fuel Nick’s 2014 Collage v.1 EP, featuring Egyptian Lover, DJ Sliink, Bodega Bamz, Kilo Kish and even Bernie Worrell of Parliament Funkadelic fame. This cross-country creation was documented from the recording booth to the vinyl pressing plant by Ninja Tune / Serato, and cemented the road as Hook’s true home outside the studio.

All his experience - in the studio and throughout this thing called life - was leading Nick Hook to his debut album Relationships. From the psychedelic, Parental Advisory sticker-ed wildness of “Head” with 21 Savage and Bulletproof Dolphin, to the rowdy and righteous “Can’t Tell Me Nothing” with UK phenom Novelist, the album is a testament to Nick’s generous heart, mischievous attitude, and untamed creative spirit. Novelist sums it up in an Instagram post about the producer earlier this summer: "Nick Hook - This man gave me a new outlook on life when I met him in New York at 18 years old when I went out there alone. He reiterated to me that FREEDOM starts in the mind and to do what you want with 100% of your energy."