Day Two of the festival was all about two men. Legends in their own right.. Seymour Stein and Wilko Johnson. Rich Denton followed an 'educational' day at Liverpool Sound City
Firstly Seymour Stein the legendary music impresario famed for signing Madonna, The Ramones, Talking Heads, Depeche Mode and Liverpool’s own Echo & the Bunnymen, enthralled the packed hall of delegates at the city's swanky Hilton hotel.
Stein talked of his beginnings in the music industry, as a thirteen year old visiting Billboard every week to look through the back copies of the charts before getting a chance to review and eventually work full time for the magazine. Later, how a chance meeting in the elevator of his New York office block with music producer Richard Gottehrer brought about the birth of Sire Records, a label that would launch many a successful pop career.
Ian McCulloch joined Stein on the platform but Mac was very much the side show as the New Yorker told the stories of how he came to sign some of the most influential bands and artists of the past 30 years. This included a trip to London to see the Bunnymen, signing them on the spot and creating a new label 'Korova’ in the process.
Although in his late sixties Stein is somewhat frail, yet he still manages a revamped Sire records among other projects and following the Q&A he still found the energy to tour the city to check out some of the bands on show at this year’s Sound City.
Meanwhile across the city at FACT , a UK rock legend was holding court. Wilko Johnson guitarist of 70’s R&B band Dr Feelgood attended a Q&A session following the screening of Julien Temple’s documentary 'Oil City Confidential’.
The film charts the history of the Feelgood’s, a band which at one time, had become the biggest in the UK but were almost forgotten as the Punk movement washed over the tail end of the 70s. The beautifully produced film describes how the band from Canvey Island took the country and half the world by storm before the excesses of fame and tensions between band members brought things to a premature end.
Temple, whose previous work includes the Sex Pistol’s 'Great Rock n Roll Swindle’, used modern day interviews of Wilko and the remaining members of the band mixed in with limited live/interview footage and his unique use of edits from old black and white movies to piece together the story. The result is outstanding with not just the tale of Dr Feelgood’s successes but sub plots of the strained relationship between the creative Johnson and frontman Lee Brilleaux and the band’s battles with drugs and alcohol.
Wilko later performed with his band at the O2 academy. Joined on stage by Blockhead bassist Norman Watt-Roy, who incidentally was playing some awesome riffs, it was clear to see in his performance that Wilko is still at his happiest when staring into space and making his trademark jerky movements around the stage. The crowd a mix of old and young were lapping it up.
Only half way through the festival and already it’s safe to say LSC 2010 is the best yet
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