Seymour Stein, the co-founder of Sire Records, died on Sunday (2 April) at the age of 80.
The infuential record executive, who signed Madonna, Talking Heads, and the Ramones, had been treated for cancer.
Stein founded the Sire record label aged 24 and had a penchant for signing artists with an edge and a voice that refused to be silenced.
He found and nurtured an impressive array of new talent throughout his career, including The Pretenders, Ice T, The Smiths, Depeche Mode and Aphex Twin, before retiring in 2018 at the age of 75.
Born Seymour Steinbigle on 18 April 1942, Stein always had a passion for music, writing in his autobiography that he knew he wanted to be in the music business since the age of nine.
By the age of 16, he was working for Billboard, before starting his record label in 1966 with producer and songwriter Richard Gottehrer. The label was acquired by Warner Bros in...
The infuential record executive, who signed Madonna, Talking Heads, and the Ramones, had been treated for cancer.
Stein founded the Sire record label aged 24 and had a penchant for signing artists with an edge and a voice that refused to be silenced.
He found and nurtured an impressive array of new talent throughout his career, including The Pretenders, Ice T, The Smiths, Depeche Mode and Aphex Twin, before retiring in 2018 at the age of 75.
Born Seymour Steinbigle on 18 April 1942, Stein always had a passion for music, writing in his autobiography that he knew he wanted to be in the music business since the age of nine.
By the age of 16, he was working for Billboard, before starting his record label in 1966 with producer and songwriter Richard Gottehrer. The label was acquired by Warner Bros in...
- 4/3/2023
- by Gabby Colvin
- The Independent - Music
Seymour Stein, the legendary music executive who cofounded Sire Records where he signed the Ramones, Madonna, and Talking Heads, died Sunday in Los Angeles after a long battle with cancer, a spokesperson for his family confirmed to Variety. He was 80.
Stein cofounded the Sire imprint in 1966, where he also signed the Pretenders, Echo and the Bunnymen, and Soft Cell. Artists including Depeche Mode, Ice-T, the Cure, the Replacements, Everything But the Girl, My Bloody Valentine, Ride, and more released some of their greatest work on Sire. In 1983, he helped...
Stein cofounded the Sire imprint in 1966, where he also signed the Pretenders, Echo and the Bunnymen, and Soft Cell. Artists including Depeche Mode, Ice-T, the Cure, the Replacements, Everything But the Girl, My Bloody Valentine, Ride, and more released some of their greatest work on Sire. In 1983, he helped...
- 4/3/2023
- by Althea Legaspi
- Rollingstone.com
Seymour Stein, the esteemed music executive who co-founded Sire Records and played a pivotal role in signing legendary artists including Madonna and Talking Heads, as well as many others, has died at the age of 80.
According to Variety, Stein passed away on Sunday, April 2nd, following a long battle with cancer.
Stein grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and during his teenage years, he got his start in the music industry working for King Records and Billboard magazine.
In 1966, at the age of 24, Stein co-founded Sire Records with Richard Gottehrer. Initially, the label focused on signing and promoting British acts, such as Climax Blues Band, Renaissance, and Fleetwood Mac’s early blues rock lineup, but it would soon expand its horizons to include artists from various genres.
In the mid-1970s, Stein took notice of the emerging punk rock scene in New York City. At the forefront of this movement were bands like The Ramones,...
According to Variety, Stein passed away on Sunday, April 2nd, following a long battle with cancer.
Stein grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and during his teenage years, he got his start in the music industry working for King Records and Billboard magazine.
In 1966, at the age of 24, Stein co-founded Sire Records with Richard Gottehrer. Initially, the label focused on signing and promoting British acts, such as Climax Blues Band, Renaissance, and Fleetwood Mac’s early blues rock lineup, but it would soon expand its horizons to include artists from various genres.
In the mid-1970s, Stein took notice of the emerging punk rock scene in New York City. At the forefront of this movement were bands like The Ramones,...
- 4/3/2023
- by Consequence Staff
- Consequence - Music
Seymour Stein, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member who was the co-founder of Sire Records, the former vice president at Warner Bros. Records and, many years ago, began his storied career in the music industry at The Hollywood Reporter sister publication Billboard, has died.
His daughter, filmmaker Mandy Stein, told THR that her father died Sunday morning in Los Angeles from cancer.
Stein signed such music legends as Madonna and The Ramones at Sire. But when he was just a teenager, he began working as an assistant to Tommy Noonan, then head of charts at Billboard, where Stein sat in on meetings to decide which new records to review and helped to compile the then just-launched Hot 100.
“I was just 16, working at Billboard after school. From the time I was 9 years old, I knew I wanted to be in the music business,” he said in an interview published...
His daughter, filmmaker Mandy Stein, told THR that her father died Sunday morning in Los Angeles from cancer.
Stein signed such music legends as Madonna and The Ramones at Sire. But when he was just a teenager, he began working as an assistant to Tommy Noonan, then head of charts at Billboard, where Stein sat in on meetings to decide which new records to review and helped to compile the then just-launched Hot 100.
“I was just 16, working at Billboard after school. From the time I was 9 years old, I knew I wanted to be in the music business,” he said in an interview published...
- 4/3/2023
- by Ashley Iasimone, Billboard
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Blondie are set to release the first definitive collection of their work in the 124-track archival box set Against the Odds 1974 – 1982. The curated collection, remastered from original analog tapes and cut at Abbey Road Studios, features three-dozen previously unreleased recordings. It arrives on Aug. 26.
“It really is a treat to see how far we have come when I listen to these early attempts to capture our ideas on relatively primitive equipment,” Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry said in a statement. “Fortunately the essence of being in a band in the early...
“It really is a treat to see how far we have come when I listen to these early attempts to capture our ideas on relatively primitive equipment,” Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry said in a statement. “Fortunately the essence of being in a band in the early...
- 6/8/2022
- by Larisha Paul
- Rollingstone.com
The Go-Gos’ lips are very unsealed, thankfully, in the documentary named after the band that debuts on Showtime July 31. It’ll be all the reunion that anyone gets for now: a brief summer tour that was announced when the film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January is, of course, on hold until Go-Go music can safely make the world dance again. But the film from director Alison Ellwood (“Laurel Canyon”) will be a happy — if occasionally harrowing — occasion for fans of a band that has remained intermittently intact since “We Got the Beat” took the world by storm 40 years ago.
Variety spoke individually with all five members of the group about the film, their place in history and the perennial subject of why they aren’t in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame — something Ellwood’s film might finally joyfully cajole certain committees into making happen.
Variety spoke individually with all five members of the group about the film, their place in history and the perennial subject of why they aren’t in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame — something Ellwood’s film might finally joyfully cajole certain committees into making happen.
- 7/24/2020
- by Chris Willman
- Variety Film + TV
Seymour Stein is indisputably one of the greatest A&R men in music-business history: As chief of Sire Records, which he cofounded with Richard Gottehrer in 1966, he presided over a label that for decades had not only massive hits — from Madonna, Talking Heads, Depeche Mode, Seal and others — but also acts that may not have had multiplatinum sales but shaped the sound of the last quarter of the 20th century: the Ramones, Lou Reed, the Pretenders, the Smiths, the Cure, the Replacements, Aphex Twin and so many more. A well-curated mixtape of Sire releases from the ‘80s and ‘90s is like the soundtrack to an era.
Yet Stein’s career stretches back to the 1950s: He began at Billboard and soon moved over to Syd Nathan’s King Records — home of James Brown — and several other gigs before cofounding Sire. And he’s still at it: He remains Sire’s...
Yet Stein’s career stretches back to the 1950s: He began at Billboard and soon moved over to Syd Nathan’s King Records — home of James Brown — and several other gigs before cofounding Sire. And he’s still at it: He remains Sire’s...
- 6/14/2018
- by Variety Staff
- Variety Film + TV
It's been announced today that The Orchard, an American music and entertainment company founded in 1997 by Richard Gottehrer and Scott Cohen, wholly owned by Sony Music Entertainment and based in New York City, has acquired the worldwide distribution rights to an action-comedy satire entitled Espionage Tonight. The film boasts an ensemble starring cast comprised of Joe Hursley, Saïd Taghmaoui, Sean... Read More...
- 6/16/2017
- by Steve Seigh
- JoBlo.com
As is the case every year, I start reading year-end lists posted by trusted peers/journalists and discover I've missed plenty of deserving culture. With the glut of films, music, theater, TV shows, books, et al. on numerous websites, TV screens, bookshelves, and periodicals, it's fairly easy. Truth be told, in addition to P.J. Harvey's much-deserved kudos, other women singers/songwriters/bands really stepped up their game this year, making many top ten year-end lists, and I missed out on discovering some of them. With that in mind, here's some additions to my 2011 year's end list.
St. Vincent: Strange Mercy (4Ad) - Quirky alt pop with flourishes of art rock and off-kilter guitar hooks. This Dallas-bred artist and former Polyphonic Spree guitarist/singer released her third and most favorably received album in 2011. Annie Clark has the look of an existential art girl who has known plenty of emotional scorn for her empowerment,...
St. Vincent: Strange Mercy (4Ad) - Quirky alt pop with flourishes of art rock and off-kilter guitar hooks. This Dallas-bred artist and former Polyphonic Spree guitarist/singer released her third and most favorably received album in 2011. Annie Clark has the look of an existential art girl who has known plenty of emotional scorn for her empowerment,...
- 1/25/2012
- by Dusty Wright
- www.culturecatch.com
Blue Horizon, the blues label responsible for the release of early Fleetwood Mac material, is being resurrected for the 21st century. The British label was founded in 1966 by Mike Vernon but had stopped putting out albums by the early ’70s, and now, 40 years later, Seymour Stein and Richard Gottehrer (the founders of Sire, the label who signed Madonna and The Ramones) are bringing the classic imprint back....
- 2/3/2010
- Pastemagazine.com
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