Legendary Seymour Stein is still cutting edge

He enjoys a drink, that Seymour Stein. And he enjoys one even more when he's dining out on his favourite food - Chinese.

He loves Chinese music too. This morning he found a 55-year-old Chinese recording - on an old 78 record - of the song Rose Rose, I Love You at Real Groovy.

"It's the ultimate Chinese pop song. It was a real surprise to find, especially in New Zealand because I can't see that there were many Chinese living here at that time."

I tell him that many Chinese miners lived here, especially in the South Island. He nods, then smiles: "When I get drunk, which I'm known to do at Chinese restaurants, I start singing that song. I can do it in English and Mandarin."

"The waiters usually join in," he smiles again, as he devours the last mouthful of a sandwich in the bar of Auckland's Hilton Hotel.

But it was not with Chinese music that Stein - something of a music industry legend, and Mr Nice Guy - made his name. As head of Sire Records, a company he co-founded in 1966, he is responsible for launching the careers of the Ramones, Talking Heads, and Madonna (more on them later), as well as acts like the Smiths, the Cure, Echo and the Bunnymen, Depeche Mode, Ministry, Aphex Twin, Wilco, kd lang and most recently the Distillers, the Futureheads, the Veronicas, and New Zealand's, Evermore.

The 63-year-old may not look like a music legend, and you can tell there are plenty of drinking sessions and long hours in the office gathered up in those big bags under his eyes. But the one thing Stein oozes is his love of music.

When you put it to him that he must have made enough money to retire on and get the hell out of the back-stabbing music industry, he stutters quietly, "What, what, what else would . . ?"

He says it is important to have friends outside the business and his other passion is art collecting. "But what I'm saying is there is still nothing to replace music."

Born in New York in 1942, he grew up with doo-wop music and that, along with early rhythm-and-blues like Fats Domino, Chuck Berry, Sam Cooke, and Etta James, is still his favourite music.

He also loves country, and confesses his "desert island disc" would be Hank Williams' Greatest Hits.

Stein started out in the music industry in the 1950s as a 13-year-old working part time for Billboard magazine in New York. His first music industry mentor was that magazine's editor, Paul Ackerman, who had revolutionised the music industry in the mid 1940s by renaming the music charts.

 

"The country chart was called the hillbilly chart, which had a little bit of a racial slur, but the ultimate slur was the rhythm and blues chart, which used to be called the race music chart," says Stein.

While at Billboard, Stein met Syd Nathan, the founder of King Music (James Brown's record label).

Stein moved to Cincinnati to work at King Music where Nathan taught him about the music industry and had him doing everything from paperwork to pressing records.

After a short stint at Red Bird Records, Stein formed Sire with Richard Gottehrer in 1966. The company had a few early milestones, but in 1975 - amidst the seething and thriving New York music scene - Stein signed the Ramones, and then Talking Heads in 1976. From then on Sire became one of the most cutting-edge record labels.

Stein's mantra of "great artists, great songs" has been a constant. He still loves finding great new bands. "This year has been an amazing year. We have signed some amazing acts," he says. He gushes about the 20-year-old twin sisters from Brisbane, the Veronicas.

"They remind me so much of my early meetings with Madonna - they are raring to go. They just want to conquer the world and that's the way she was - and this is Madonna times two; it's double trouble."

Madonna is easily Stein's most famous signing. Despite her seemingly prima donna behaviour Stein insists: "She was the easiest artist I ever worked with because she knew everything. Pretty soon it was as though we were working for her. She knew exactly what she wanted."

Stein's first meeting with Madonna was from his hospital bed. He was laid up with an infection, yet he was so desperate to sign her after hearing Everybody that he got her to visit the hospital. The deal was done.

He still hates waiting to sign bands.

"If I wait around, someone else will ... " he trails off, dreading the thought another record company will beat him.

He rates the "11-and-a-half months" he waited for Talking Heads to sign to Sire as one of the most "difficult periods of my life".

He first saw them in November 1975, at New York's famed CBGB.

Out of the blue he starts singing: "My love stands next to your love ... ". That song, Love - Building On Fire, was the first Talking Heads song he heard.

"I went to see them the next day. I said I'd never seen anything like them, I loved them, and I wanted to sign them." But he had to wait until November 1976, before they signed to Sire. "That was the longest courtship I ever had."

He's dedicated. But then again, this is the guy who forked out for a ticket on the Concorde, even though his company couldn't afford it, just so he could catch Depeche Mode in London.

"They were f***ing amazing."