Stevie Van Zandt, known as New Jersey's most famous consigliere to Bruce Springsteen and Tony Soprano, takes center stag | dG1fZUppdmQtekR0RUk
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Short filmTranscript
00:00When you're overseas, people don't look at you like a guitar player or a cab driver.
00:04You're an American.
00:05I never thought of myself as an American.
00:08I'm from New Jersey.
00:12He was a great performer, great songwriter, great producer.
00:16I love his enthusiasm and encyclopedic knowledge of music.
00:21He's a businessman. He's a philanthropist.
00:23He really is a renaissance man.
00:24I'm losing my balls over here!
00:27Miami Steve was a character that I was playing in the E Street Band.
00:31The Dean Martin in our Rock and Roll Rat Pack.
00:34We were so close. I just wanted him near me.
00:36He just became my rock and roll brother instantly, you know.
00:40But he did need to take his shot.
00:42Fifteen years. We finally made it.
00:45Then I quit. The night before payday.
00:47I went from artist to activist.
00:50I married this fun rock and roll guy and all of a sudden he's in South Africa.
00:54Steve got together different genres of music.
00:57The amount of artists that were involved.
00:59Rockers, rappers, R&B stars.
01:02Steven understood rock and roll owed a debt to the continent of Africa.
01:06There's this guy who was so well read and so politically astute,
01:10but dressed like a dervish or a pirate.
01:13He's nothing less than revolutionary.
01:15But I was spiritually exhausted.
01:17I said what I wanted to say and no record company wanted to sign me anymore.
01:21So I walked my dog for seven years.
01:24I wanted to be very different.
01:26As different as I could be.
01:27Thinking I'm never going back to music again.
01:31Steven, the second act, it's amazing.
01:33All of a sudden he's in television, radio.
01:35He's building a record label.
01:39Rock and roll kept him alive.
01:41And I really do believe it's his religion.
01:44One of the great horses in rock and roll.
01:47And one of the great horses for Justice Little Steven.
01:52Steve's a true believer.
01:56There's something about rock that's unique in the way it communicates emotion,
02:00inspiration and motivation.
02:02This is what it's all about.
02:21© transcript Emily Beynon