Who is involved in UNKLE?
 

I've heard mixed answers, but the only person that I KNOW is part of UNKLE is DJ Shadow. Some people have said Thom Yorke is involved with it, some have said all of Radiohead, and some have said that DJ Shadow just works with a bunch of various artists, Thom Yorke/Radiohead just being one of many.

Can someone please straighten this out?

Richard Ashcroft, Pj Harvey (maybe), Thom Yorke

One of the Beastie Boys sang a song.

James Lavelle produces.

DJ Shadow writes and 'guests' contribute to the music. This differs from song to song. Richard Ashcroft on one, Thom Yorke on another.

The strange thing is that James Lavelle tours under the Unkle name but without any of these people. Then again, he's not even a musician but a head of a label and just 'produces' what goes on.

Ohhh okay, thanks much remjim.

UNKLE existed before the Psyence Fiction album. Earlier in its history, the group/entity/thing was known as U.N.K.L.E., and a fellow named Nigo was involved at times. I have some early mp3s, but I'm a bit hazy on the early lineup myself. DJ Shadow was not involved before Psyence Fiction.

As for that album, Shadow did the vast majority of the work... being pushed to do so by Lavelle, and even suffering back problems because of amount of time spent in the studio getting the album done. I really don't know what Lavelle did, aside from pulling together talent (Badly Drawn Boy, Ashcroft, Yorke, Jason Newstead, Mike D, Ian Brown) and a little bit of heavy breathing on one track. From what I've heard, he's a pretty lackluster DJ and not the friendliest guy around.

Psyence Fiction is mostly a DJ Shadow album with lots of guest stars. Josh's one request/addition to the talent pool was Kool G Rap. As for the 'all of Radiohead' theory, it has been said that the entire band, or almost the entire band was involved at one point or another, but it's not noted what any other band members did, exactly.

There were about 3 singles with lots of remixes from that album. No word yet on what the future of UNKLE will hold, or if Shadow will ever be involved again.

...and there may have been a PJ Harvey track remixed by UNKLE somewhere along the way, but she wasn't a part of the group.

Thanks for the info El Gray. I had no idea that Unkle existed before Pysence Fiction.

BTW - Do you happen to know which PJ Harvey track?

No, I don't even know that there is one... I only mentioned it because someone had suggested that she might be a part of UNKLE.

There are a lot of UNKLE remixes out there that I don't have, so I can't say definitely, sorry.

Just a heads-up, James Lavelle has a "Global Underground: Barcelona" mix CD coming out on October 15th. According to Amazon, there's also a limited edition version coming out, with an additional CD-ROM (though, I'm not sure what's on it).

BTW, I love UNKLE's remix of Folk Implosion's "Natural One." Check it out if you can find it.