DICTATORS A&R Exec Passes Away
October 31, 2006HITS magazine reports that former Warner Bros. and Elektra/Asylum A&R and publicity exec Karin Berg, who signed acts like the DICTATORS, TELEVISION, DIRE STRAITS and R.E.M. to the label as a champion of many of the early new wave bands, passed away on Wednesday (Oct. 25). Berg was one of the first and most admired female talent executives in the business. The St. Louis-born Berg was an ardent baseball fan, a political activist and a civil rights pioneer in addition to being a groundbreaking music executive. She was a member of the Riverside Democratic club, before joining NY CORE. After years as a secretary, she began reviewing jazz for alternative newspapers, then was a West Coast-based publicist at Elektra/Asylum, where she helped convince label head Joe Smith to sign TELEVISON. Her latter years were spent as a consultant to Nonesuch, though she was confined to her Manhattan apartment, where she had to use an oxygen tank.
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