Noch eine weitere DJ Compilation Serie? Nicht ganz. Die G-Stone Master Series enthält weder angesagte Remixes noch aktuelle Clubhits – sie ist auch kein DJ Mix Tape für die Stereoanlage zuhause.

Stattdessen weiht sie den Hörer in die Lieblingstracks von Peter Kruder, Richard Dorfmeister und anderen G-Stone Artists ein. Obskure Popsongs, Klassiker und experimentelle Instrumentals sind hier versammelt und mit persönlichen Notizen der Künstler versehen, die von der Bedeutung der Tracks für ihr eigenes musikalisches Schaffen erzählen.

Was suchen Menschen in der Musik, was gibt sie ihnen? Darum geht es bei dieser Compilation, um eine Zusammenstellung von einzigartiger, inspirierender Musik, die mein ganzes Leben und meine eigene Musik beeinflusst hat. Ich spiele diese Stücke immer und immer wieder in meinem Zuhause, für meine Freunde oder sobald ich den Vergleich mit einer gewissen Qualität suche, bevor eigene Stücke in die Welt hinausgehen.

Diese Songs aus den 35.000 Schallplatten meiner Sammlung auszuwählen, war eine sehr große Aufgabe – in diesen Wänden aus Vinyl in meinem Haus sind großartige Erinnerungen versteckt. Am Ende standen dann siebzehn Stücke, von denen jedes eine Geschichte für und über mich erzählt. In meiner Welt sind das absolute Meisterwerke, die in Museen ausgestellt und auf den besten Soundanlagen der Welt gespielt werden sollten. Das ist No. 1 der „G-Stone Master Series”; weitere werden folgen. Enjoy. (Peter Kruder)

Peter Kruder Private Collection
G-Stone Master Series #1
G-Stone Recordings
GSCD036
Release date: 04.09.2009

Tracklisting:
01. Talk Talk – The Rainbow
02. Tortoise – On the chin
03. The Observatory – Waste your live
04. Milt Jackson with the Ray Brown Big Band – Enchanted Lady
05. Pierre Moerlen’s Gong – Adrien
06. Charles Webster – Sweet Butterfly
07. Tom Waits – Clap Hands
08. Jan Hammer – Darkness/Earth in search of a sun
09. Peace Orchestra – Consequences (Private Edit)
10. Kruder&Dorfmeister – Sleazy Rider
11. Stargard – Three Girls
12. Craig Armstrong – In my own words
13. Japan – Ghosts
14. Bernard Hermann – The days do not end
15. Jon Brion – Here we go
16. Chateau Flight – Superflight
17. Rokia Traore – Mariama

Comments Peter Kruder (Booklet):

Talk Talk – The Rainbow
The initial idea for this compilation came after I played a series of concerts that were called ‘The Listening Sessions’. Bringing people into great sounding venues with an amazing sound system and have them sit down and just listen to music for two hours. A rare feat these days as most people just don’t take the time to sit down and listen to music without any distractions.

I started my sets with this very song because it set the mood perfectly for all that might come for the duration of the show. Talk Talk were one of the rare examples of eighties pop music that started out as a Top Ten band with huge hit singles, which I loved as a teen, and drifted gradually album by album into their very own atmosphere and territory.
Legend has it, since there were no hit singles in sight, the album ‚Spirit of Eden‘ was rejected by the record company on basis of a clause in their contracts allowing them do so if the sound quality of the recording was not up to their standard. After a long battle for creative freedom the record finally got released. With hardly any promotion and solely by word of mouth it sold some serious numbers over time and became a firm favourite to those in the know.

Tortoise – On the chin
This came at a time when I could not bear listening to guitars. This track totally changed my mind. It’s a fine example of using distortion in all kinds of flavours on just about every instrument along the course of the tune, pushing the emotional content forward.
Studio trickery is always a two sided sword. When overused, the essence of a song gets lost in a wash
of technology. A little bit like cooking where too much flavouring takes away the original taste of whatever you are preparing and too little leaves it bland and boring. Here it is used in the way of the Master Chef de Cuisine.

The Observatory – Waste your Life
This came along my way at a listening session for a magazine in Singapore. The usual we-play-you-ten-songs-and-you-comment-on-them game which is most of the time embarrassing because you know only half of the selected tunes, and this hurts every collector like coffee on his freshly pressed white pants. When a different song from the Observatory than the one I selected here came on, I was intrigued by the strong production and just could not put my finger on where this might come from. To my surprise it was a local band and the cover of their CD „Time of Rebirth“ is one of the greatest I’ve ever seen. When the journalist saw my drooling face he gave it to me as a present and God bless him for that. On this compilation here I have just used about two minutes of „Waste your Life“ of what is originally a seven minute long journey. I apologize to the members of The Observatory but recommend all of their fantastic albums.

Milt Jackson with the Ray Brown Big Band – Enchanted Lady
… light as a feather but still deep as an ocean… originally bought the album for a sample I heard on it, only to discover this gem at home and loving it ever since.

Pierre Moerlen’s Gong – Adrien
In the beginning of the nineties when we released our first records as K&D we were invited by Gilles Peterson to play at the now legendary Monday night ‘That’s how it is!’ he had just started. The gig was fantastic and next day we paid him a visit at Mercury Records, then home to his ‘Talkin‘ Loud’ label. Just before we left he silently put in my hand a tape with a psychedelic cover but no track listing. Upon returning to Vienna the first thing I did was listen to that tape and I was stunned hearing something like the most amazing album ever, thinking this was a new ‘Talkin‘ Loud’ signing and also that I have to rethink my whole music career. The songs, one masterpiece after another, decanted from the speakers reducing my level of confidence to ant size. My despair continued for a couple of weeks until he played ‘Adrien’ and some other tracks from that tape on his radio show. I finally realized – it was a mix tape. Till this day it is the blueprint for the perfect album for me.

Charles Webster – Sweet Butterfly
Charles Webster is one of those rare species in music that can do everything well. Be it solid club music you can dance to until the break of dawn, or albums that touch you at home. This track is from his ‘Born on the 24th of July’ album which came to me exactly at a time when I was mourning that there are no albums you can listen to from start to finish anymore. He’s a master of ways to blend a soulful feeling with a production that is rooted in the future, always with a twist. What puzzles me, he can make the bit reduction effect sound like butter. Also the man is a great DJ who never disappoints.

Tom Waits – Clap Hands
This always takes me back to a time when music was like an open field. When genres were not important and artists had time and space to freely formulate their musical ideas. Just the rhythm section alone on this track is so outstanding and I’m wondering till this day what the actual instruments are? Then that voice! A voice that just cuts through everything like butter!
There is a saying, that when you like a specific voice very much, it would make you happy hearing it even if it just read the phone book to you. I want my phone books read to me by Tom Waits. I’m sure that even the most common names would sound like highly interesting people and evoke the most vivid stories about them in your head.

Jan Hammer – Darkness / Earth in search of the sun
I used to visit my friends with huge record collections for sample hunting back in the days when my own collection was rather small, as well as my knowledge about the good stuff to hunt down. At one of those sessions I stumbled across this Jan Hammer monster of a tune. I only knew the ‘Miami Vice’ theme and the ‘Beverly Hills Cop’ soundtrack he wrote and did not have him in my book of cool at all. It all changed once I heard this drum break coming in and the guitar solo that he rocked with a synthesizer. This is the farthest of any cool charts, it’s a league on its own.

Peace Orchestra – Consequences
People always asked me about a new Peace Orchestra album and the answer is always the same – “It’s in the works, about to be finished”. Truth be said, I lost my interest in producing downtempo tracks in this style right after I released the first Peace Orchestra album. My interest shifted more towards club music which is a science by itself and it stayed there for a couple of years. Only in the last three years did I find my way back into making deep listening music that is more for your home and what has made me want to do a new Peace Orchestra album. This is one of the tracks for the next record in a special edit for this compilation. The rest of the album “Is in the works”.

Kruder & Dorfmeister – Sleazy Rider
A tune we made as a compilation exclusive on the French Columbia/Sony label. We went to the studio with the musicians of ‘Count Basic’ for whom we did a couple of remixes before. After setting up we just had them jam until we heard something interesting. From that point on we directed the band into this song. For us playing in the studio usually meant working with samplers and spending days on drum loops and all the other stuff to make it fit, so it was a sheer blast to have a band immediately react to everything you say. Since then I think this is the perfect way of composing. Sly Stone worked exactly the same way, humming a melody and then have the band translate it into music. The Count Basic Band was christened ‘Team Legat’ on this session by Richard and myself, and they use this name to this day. The mix was done by four people, each having a couple of faders and some effects to work with on a big desk, and out of three takes we edited the master. Fun times.

Stargard – Three Girls
I was in Zürich with Rainer Trüby and Alexander Barck from Jazzanova to play at a club, and the day after the gig we all went record shopping. I always love to go shopping with two supa pros like this. After finding a couple of records that were OK but not amazing, Rainer came over to me and with the words “I think you might like that” and handed me this record. I put it on the turntable and was just blown away. Tripped out space funk with great vocals and a far out production. Rainer Trüby is one of those record diggers that have a sixth sense. I was once walking down a street with him in Rio de Janeiro when he abruptly stopped. We were standing in front of a huge shopping mall and he urged me to go in with him because he felt the presence of a record store.  Hidden away of course in the farthest corner of the mall we found one. Underneath CD racks with the commercial bull of today – huge crates of old Brazilian records. I bought about fifty albums of stuff that you would only see in the racks of serious collectors. So now whenever Trüby says “follow me”, I just shut up and do so.

Craig Armstrong – In my own words
Craig Armstrong first came to my attention as the string arranger for Massive Attack’s first album ‘Blue Lines’. Since then I’ve religiously followed his career and the music he’s released. I was once invited to a presentation of a short movie Baz Luhrmann had done for Chanel No.5. I arrived at the amazingly decorated place that had a cinema sized movie screen and spotted a pianist playing next to it. I was mesmerized by the sound coming from the gifted player and probably was the only one listening amongst all the people sipping Champagne and chatting away. On my way out I was told by a friend that Craig Armstrong was the pianist. I almost fainted. I so wished to have shook his hand, thanking him for the music.I love piano music and when the chords and harmonies go deep like in this piece, then it’s just the most radical and direct way into my soul.

Japan – Ghosts
This is a pivotal record to me for three reasons. First, this is one serious argument against people who were of the opinion that electronic music has no soul. Secondly, the lyrics meant something to me when I was sixteen, another thing to me when I was twenty-five, and a whole new thing today. The immaculate voice of David Sylvian leads to reason number three. He is an artist that quit the limelight fully knowing that it will hurt him economically, driven by the need to do his art and knowing that his true powers can only shine in a place far away from the mainstream. His work with Japan and more so his solo albums have a special place in my heart. I clearly see a constant progression and personal honesty in his music and art that is rare to find. I’d also like to thank him personally for helping to get permission to use this track from Virgin Records, who don’t usually license for compilations.

Bernard Hermann – The days do not end
Bernard Hermann is one of the superheroes in music, period.

Jon Brion – Here we go
I heard this the second I entered the ‘If Music’ record store (R.I.P) in London. I had just seen the movie ‘Punch Drunk Love’ and immediately recognized the sound. Jon Brion is one hell of a composer and producer and will eventually join the ranks of superheroes in music. The writing and recording of this tune is straight out of the Beatles textbook and perfectly executed for modern times. The whole soundtrack is brilliant and full of ideas and sounds you just would not expect. He followed this with the equally amazing soundtrack to ‘Eternal sunshine of a spotless mind’.

Chateau Flight – Superflight
Chateau Flight is the name for the outfit that the French music pioneers Gilb’R and I:Cube use for their more leftfield output. I’ve known the guys and their music for quite some time and they never disappoint in their quest for finding different ways of expressions in music, be it great listening music or something for the clubs. Their Versatile label is constructed accordingly, always a surprise whenever they release a new record. This track is just one of those moments when very different elements of musical heritage come together and create something new. The arpeggio of the vibraphone is like some old Tangerine Dream record. The flutes remind me of Hubert Laws or Gary Bartz, topped off with a fantastic bassline. The big musical blender that is Paris.

Rokia Traore – Mariama
I rarely check out the world music sections in record stores. I am not that much of a fan of esoteric record covers. They shade my judgment on what could be interesting. It was out of pure boredom that I found myself checking out the world music section in a Paris megastore. Rokia Traore’s stunningly beautiful profile on her record cover caught my attention. In a mass of earth, moon, stars, nature and ocean themed covers this stood out as something more personal and honest, and not just musical wallpaper. Surely the album did not disappoint and is one of the best sounding recordings I know of. Whenever I need to check out a sound system I use this track and it tells me everything.