Seymour Stein, the record industry executive who helped shape the sound of 20th century pop music by signing the Ramones, Talking Heads, the Pretenders and Madonna to his Sire label, died on Sunday in Los Angeles. 1 in 1964 — Red Bird collapsed in 1966, leaving Stein to partner with Richard Gottehrer, who had his own girl-group past as co-songwriter and co-producer of the Angels’ “My Boyfriend’s Back. Stein continued to work at Sire and at Warner — he became a senior A&R executive for the parent label in 2013 — until his retirement in 2018