Exclusive Interview DJ Krush

The greatest hits compilation is beyond passé at this point, with record companies obligating their artists to release them early and often--hence such gems as Hilary Duff's Most Wanted compilation two albums into her tenure as a singer.

But not all artists see the hits comp as either a quick-and-easy revenue booster or an obligation.

DJ Krush, the Japanese turntable maestro who has released eight albums since making his debut in 1994, did the hits comp one better by digging into his entire catalog, pulling out his favorites and remixing every single track he picked.

That self-remixed double CD, entitled Stepping Stones: The Self-Remixed Best, features one disc of his work with some of the best MCs in the US and Japan, including the Roots, CL Smooth, Mos Def, Mr. Lif, and Company Flow. The second disc, dubbed Soundscapes, takes on Krush's instrumental tracks and collaborations with the likes of the Roots drummer ?uestlove, DJ Shadow, and Japanese jazzmen Kazufumi Kodama and Shuzan Morita.

Krush sat down with MP3.com to talk about Stepping Stones, his current US tour, and the impact of the film Wild Style on his career.

MP3.com: Let's start off by talking about the concept of digging back into your own catalog and remixing almost all of it. Seems like quite an undertaking. What spawned the idea of doing this? DJ Krush: It's simply because it's boring to release just a "best of" album, so I wanted it to reflect who I am right now, not who I was when these songs came out the first time. And how did you go about it? Did you look to tweak certain elements of the track, or did you tear down the songs and start from scratch, so to speak? I wanted to show that by changing the backing track how it could be made into a completely different track. What was your favorite track to remix? All of the tracks on this album are like my own children, so I adore them all, but if I had to pick one it would be "Kemuri." I found it really refreshing to go back to that track and put a modern touch to it. Remixing your entire catalog does indeed qualify as new material, but are you working on a new album anytime soon? I'm hoping to put out a new album next year, and I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of inspiration while I'm tour here in the America. When I get back to Tokyo after the tour, I'll digest everything I get from the tour and put it into the new album. Do you plan to do lots of record shopping while you're here in the states then? I used to do a lot of record shopping while I was on tour, but vinyl is really heavy, so I don't do as much of that as I used to. So on the tour, you're DJing, but are you playing all your own material or more straight-up DJ sets of all sorts of music. I'll be playing some tracks from the new record but most of my set is music from other people, as well as remix tracks I've done for other artists--music that's not on this album. I'm also playing a never-before-released track on this tour. You've worked with some of the best MCs in the US. What MCs would you like to collaborate with that you haven't yet? Well, I'm hoping to discover some new talent on this tour and pick-up a bunch of demo tapes as I travel across the country. And I read that you were first inspired to DJ from seeing the film Wild Style. What did seeing that movie for the first time mean to you? Everything I saw in that movie was just shocking to me. When I saw those guys dancing on their backs, I thought that there was a wheel on their backs or something. It was really wild. And I couldn't believe that people were making such beautiful graffiti with spray paint. And of course I just was really surprised that DJs were using two vinyl record s like that and cutting them back and forth. What are you listening these days? I'm not really listening to a lot of new music these days. I'm always listening to a lot of jazz though, particularly Miles Davis, and I listen to a lot of reggae music. Great, thanks so much for the chance to speak with you. Thank you very much.