Matthew Rettenmund
Seymour Stein, the music-biz legend who signed some of the top acts of the ’70s and ’80s — most notably Madonna — died Sunday at 80.
Variety reports he died of cancer, which he had battled for years.
He described himself in his 2018 memoir “Siren Song” as a “hit man, a record business entrepreneur. What I’m not is a producer like Phil Spector or Quincy Jones. I can’t play any instrument. I can’t operate a studio. My exact job description is A&R, artist and repertoire, the old show business term for talent hunting.”
The colorful maverick was known for signing Madonna from his hospital bed, where the future Queen of Pop arrived in 1982 to seal her deal. Having been brought to Stein’s attention by DJ Mark Kamins, Stein told Variety in a 2018 essay of meeting Madonna, “As penicillin dripped into my heart, I lay there and listened to Mark’s first find. I’m sure I was going nuts in that little room, but I immediately felt an excitement. I liked the hook, I liked Madonna’s voice, I liked the feel, and I liked the name Madonna. I liked it all and played it again. I never overanalyze or suck the life out of whatever I instinctively enjoy.”
He called for a meeting, and Madonna proposed coming to the hospital that evening.
“She was all dolled up in cheap punky gear, the kind of club kid who looked absurdly out of place in a cardiac ward,” Stein wrote. “She wasn’t even interested in hearing me explain how much I liked her demo. ‘The thing to do now,’ she said, ‘is sign me to a record deal.’ She then opened her arms and laughed. ‘Take me, I’m yours!’”
Stein’s career was more than just Madonna. He worked in the industry from the 1950s on, starting at Billboard, working at King Records, and founding Sire Records in 1966 with Richard Gottehrer.
He signed the Ramones and the Talking Heads, and worked with countless household-name acts at Sire, including the Cure, Seal, the Smiths, the Pretenders, Lou Reed, Debbie Harry, Ice-T, Depeche Mode, and k.d. lang, who tweeted, “Swift rebirth my friend.”
His contributions to music led to Stein’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2005, three years before Madonna, who warmly remembered him when it was her turn.
Stein, who came out as gay in 2017, married and amicably divorced real estate executive Linda Stein in the ’70s. They remained close until her murder at the hands of a former personal assistant in 2007.
He is survived by their two daughters.
Stein told NPR in 2018, the year he retired, that he had never really given up his day job, saying, “I try to listen as much as I can to new music. But I probably don’t listen to enough. But the older you get, the more attached you also are to the past. But I try to keep current as much as possible.”