Fred again..

Before Fred again.. was a headliner, he was a name in the small print. Fred Gibson co-wrote and co-produced UK No. 1s for other artists, then turned his phone’s voice memos into a series of albums that made him one of the most watched DJs of the 2020s.

Brian Eno’s a cappella group

Frederick John Philip Gibson was born on 19 July 1993 in Balham, London. At 16, through a family friend, he joined an a cappella group that met at Brian Eno’s home. The connection became a working one: in 2014 he co-wrote and co-produced Someday World with Eno and Karl Hyde, and took part in the Red Bull Music Academy in Tokyo the same year.

The hit-maker years

His production and writing credits piled up fast: Roots Manuva’s Bleeds (2015), Charli XCX’s “After the Afterparty” (2016), Lil Yachty, Plan B and BTS. He co-wrote George Ezra’s “Shotgun”, a UK No. 1 in June 2018, and co-produced Stormzy’s “Own It” with Ed Sheeran and Burna Boy, a UK No. 1 in 2019. He is credited on 12 of the 15 songs of Sheeran’s No.6 Collaborations Project. By the end of 2019 he had credits on 30% of the year’s UK No. 1 singles, and in 2020 he became the youngest winner of the Brit Award for British Producer of the Year.

Actual Life: a diary on record

Under his own name, Gibson took a different route. The Actual Life series, started in 2019, builds tracks from voice memos, social media clips and other artists’ music. The first volume, subtitled with its dates (April 14 – December 17 2020), came out in April 2021 as a diary of his life during the pandemic. Actual Life 2 followed in November 2021 and Actual Life 3 on 28 October 2022, preceded by singles including “Delilah (Pull Me Out of This)”. “Marea (We’ve Lost Dancing)” ended up in Ruben Östlund’s Palme d’Or winner Triangle of Sadness.

Boiler Room, Grammys and the big stages

In July 2022 he played a Boiler Room set in London that became the third most-watched on the channel’s YouTube. The same month he released “Turn On the Lights Again” with Swedish House Mafia, sampling Future’s 2012 track “Turn On the Lights”. “Rumble”, with Skrillex and Flowdan, followed on 4 January 2023. That year he played Madison Square Garden in February and Coachella in April alongside Skrillex and Four Tet, recorded an NPR Tiny Desk concert and released Secret Life with Eno.

At the 66th Grammy Awards in 2024 he won Best Dance/Electronic Album for Actual Life 3 and Best Dance/Electronic Recording for “Rumble”, and was nominated for Best New Artist.

Ten Days and the USB project

The album Ten Days came out in 2024. In 2025 he launched the USB project with a stream of singles, among them “Back 2 Back”, “21 Years”, “Last 1s Left” and “London”, plus “You’re a Star” with Amyl and the Sniffers in October. “Victory Lap”, with Skepta and PlaqueBoyMax, arrived in June 2025, and the USB002 tour ran from October to December 2025, ten shows in ten cities. In 2026 he shared the Brit Award for Best Dance Act with Skepta and PlaqueBoyMax.