Oliver Riedel (1971)

 Early years

Riedel was born on 11 April 1971 in Schwerin as an only child. Growing up, Oliver had relatively good relationships with both of his parents. He attributes this to the small gap in between their ages. As a child, Oliver wasn't a good student, but he made his way through school with the assistance of his mother. Oliver was quite shy, especially during his teenage years, and while his friends partied at discos, he would often be found just "hanging around".

 Musical career

In 1990, at the age of nineteen, Oliver began playing in a folk-fiddle/punk-rock band called The Inchtabokatables. In 1994, Riedel, Till Lindemann, Richard Z. Kruspe, and Christoph "Doom" Schneider entered and won the Berlin Senate Metro beat contest that allowed them to record a four track demo professionally. Paul H. Landers and Christian "Flake" Lorenz would later join the band they named Rammstein.

The six released their first album, Herzeleid in September, 1995. Their second album, Sehnsucht was released in 1997, which would later become platinum. In April 2001, the album Mutter was released and a European tour followed, ending on 13 July 2002. It has been reported that at this time the members of Rammstein were seriously discussing whether to continue or not in their present form. It was decided that they should all take some time off and then reconsider whether to continue.

In 2003, Rammstein started work on the fourth album, which was to prove a turning point in Rammstein's sound and maturity. September 2004 saw the fruits of this work in the release of Reise, Reise ("Journey, Journey").

In 2005, Rosenrot was released.

Rammstein's latest album Liebe ist für alle da was released in October, 2009.

 Personal life

He has two children, one of them a girl named Emma, and is separated from her mother.

He likes photography and sports, especially skateboarding and surfing. In the making of the video for "Keine Lust," he mentions wanting to go snowboarding while wearing a fat suit. It has been said he is the most computer-literate member of the band.

His character is more mature and subtle during live performances. He tends to keep crew cut and skin-bald hair styles along with some styles of goatees. He is also the tallest member of the band, standing at 2.01 m (6'7").