Stein on Madonna: ”She still works harder than anybody”

“She worked harder than anybody.

I just saw her perform in Berlin, and she still works harder than anybody.”

This great quote by Seymour Stein comes from a great article by BBC News music reporter Ian Youngs, who talked to the man who signed Madonna, The Ramones and Talking Heads, who now is one of the most influential record executives and talent spotters of the last 40 years, and who says he will keep seeking new stars until the day he dies.

Speaking of his greatest coup, when in 1982 a DJ called Mark Kamins suggested he listen to a new singer called Madonna, Stein brings hiw own version of their legendary “first date”, that as everyone know happened when he was recovering from a heart infection at the time.

“I was in the hospital, I had her come see me in the hospital,” he says. “We talked a deal in the hospital and we did the deal in the hospital.

“Within days, even before I got out of the hospital, she was starting to record what became her first single, Everybody, and we were off and running.”

Madonna’s desire to succeed “clinched it” with Stein, he says.

“I saw her staunch determination and I knew she would work as hard as I did and much harder, in fact. And that’s what you need in an artist.”

Click here to read the full story at the online website of the BBC.

Thanks to StellaSteven.