Chris Stein

Christopher Stein (born January 5, 1950) is an American musician and songwriter known as the co-founder and guitarist of the new wave band Blondie. He is also a producer and performer for the classic soundtrack of the 1982 hip hop film Wild Style, and writer of the soundtrack for the 1980 film Union City, as well as an accomplished photographer.

Stein was born to Jewish atheist parents in Brooklyn, New York, on January 5, 1950. He grew up in the Midwood section of Brooklyn and attended Midwood High School in Brooklyn, but he was expelled for his long hair. His father, Ben, was a Russian immigrant. His mother, Estelle, had Armenian-Romanian heritage. When Stein was 15 years old, his father died of a heart attack at the age of 55.

In 1973, Stein became the guitarist of the Stillettoes and began a romantic relationship with Debbie Harry, one of the singers. In the summer of 1974, Stein, Harry, and the band's rhythm section left to start their own group which they eventually called Blondie. They soon became fixtures in the punk and new wave scene centered around CBGB and Max's Kansas City, and by the end of the decade achieved international stardom.

Stein was co-host of TV Party, a public-access television cable TV show in New York City, that ran from 1978 to 1982.

Blondie broke up in 1982, but reformed in 1997 and has been active off and on ever since. In addition to being the sole writer of the Blondie song "Sunday Girl", Stein co-wrote numerous hits with Harry, including "Heart of Glass", "Dreaming", "Island of Lost Souls", "Rapture", and "Rip Her to Shreds". Stein also ran the Animal Records label between 1982 and 1984.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.