Sky van Hoff (born 1986) is a German record producer, songwriter and musician. He works primarily with acts in the metal and rock genres, including Rammstein, Emigrate, Till Lindemann, Sleep Token, Kreator and Electric Callboy. Before becoming a producer, van Hoff was a guitarist for metal band Machinemade God and toured extensively with the band until opening his own studio in 2008.
Career
In 2003, van Hoff joined metal band Machinemade God as a guitarist and signed his first record deal as a band member with Metal Blade Records in 2005.[1][2][3] His first album with the band, The Infinity Complex, was released the following year.[4] He wrote and produced the band's next album, Masked, released the following year.[5][6] After receiving requests to produce other German metal acts, van Hoff opened his own studio in 2008.[7][8] In the years that followed, he worked with Kreator, The Sorrow and Caliban.[9][10] In 2012, van Hoff appeared on the third season of the German version of The X Factor as a musical director for Sandra Nasić's team, where he supervised and produced the "Groups and Bands" category.[5][7] He was a producer for the folk duo Mrs. Greenbird, the winner of the season, and subsequently produced their self-titled debut album released the same year.[11][5]
In 2018, van Hoff contributed to Rammstein guitarist Richard Kruspe's solo project Emigrate and their third album, A Million Degrees, with production, recording and mixing.[12][13][14] He was later brought in by Kruspe to record and edit guitar parts for Rammstein's untitled studio album.[15][6] Following the album's release in 2019, van Hoff joined the band on their stadium tour as Kruspe's monitoring engineer.[16][6] In 2021, van Hoff produced and composed the music for Rammstein singer Till Lindemann's first solo single, "Ich Hasse Kinder", and was a producer on Emigrate's fourth studio album, The Persistence of Memory.[17] He received notable praise for his work on Lindemann's single from YouTube personality and music producer Rick Beato.[18] van Hoff rejoined Rammstein in the studio for their next studio album, Zeit, contributing guitar production, recording and editing.[17] After the album's release in 2022, van Hoff continued touring with the band as a monitoring engineer until the end of the tour the following year.[8] He again collaborated with Lindemann on the singer's debut solo album, Zunge, as a producer, songwriter and instrumentalist.[19]