Slipping quietly into a seat, I immediately clocked Steinski (or ‘Steve’, as those in attendance now like to call him) standing at the front, an avuncular figure cutting a dash in an orange polo shirt, combats and hybrid trainers/hiking boots:
Alongside a hand written message on a flip chart:
This sign somehow set the tone for the following two hours; Steve is not only an interesting man, passionate about music and its effect on people, he is also dryly hilarious.
The talk was organised as part of the Timecode Seminar Series, run by the Communications, Cultural and Media Studies research group at Bradford University, which aim to “explore the relationship between media, technology, culture and society” and last year had Dick Mills from the Radiophonic Workshop. Which I missed.
Anyway, Steve ran through a personal history- with many an aside- from discovering spoken word and musical recordings in a library aged nine; to attending college and dropping out; to living in the middle of nowhere; to moving back to New York and getting a job in advertising, which led to a deep understanding of the power of communication and how to transmit messages- skills he was to use with devastating effect in the early 1980s and beyond.
He also told of how he became a deejay of sorts (he worked at a food co-op that had the odd party and no-one wanted to be responsible for the music); tales of record buying; how he heard hip hop for the first time (via a radio station guest spot by Blondie that he happened to tape. Deborah Harry and Chris Stein (no relation, ifaik) had been to a party the night before and had so enjoyed the music they borrowed the deejay’s records to play on the show. Steve still seems a touch rankled that no information had been provided over the air other than “wasn’t that great” etc); how he found out this music was called hip hop (via The Family); on attending the Roxy; discovering what ‘breaks’ were (in a record store on Time Square, involving a kid in a ankle length fur coat and a gun requesting ‘the box’ containing 7"s which was kept under the counter).
Before moving on to discuss the entering of a Tommy Boy remix competition with the help of Douglas DiFranco, creating ‘Lesson 1’ and its consequences (walking out of a store after buying a drink and hearing the start of ‘Lesson 2’ come on the radio of a boombox owned by two young kids across the street, who immediately started singing along and dancing) up to the present.
He also spoke of his working methods, views on copyright, his favourite reggae record when playing out:
And more. Much more.
http://www.steinski.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Dee_and_Steinski
