Steve McKeever has spent 25 years discovering and nurturing talent that major labels overlooked. As founder and CEO of Hidden Beach Recordings, he launched the careers of Grammy winner Jill Scott and Kindred The Family Soul while creating the Billboard topping Unwrapped series. The Harvard Law School graduate turned music executive reflects on his journey from practicing entertainment law to building one of the most influential independent labels in music history.

How do you know what talent sounds like?

For me it’s always been more of an internal thing. You can see it visually on my arm which is what I’m looking for goosebumps in myself from what someone is able to do. Whether it’s great comedy, great music or great art, to me the funniest and most inspiring has the truth in it. That’s why we laugh so hard when we recognize ourselves in a great comedy routine. 

When somebody’s able to sing a song that may be their truth but they’re able to crystallize exactly how they feel in a way that’s relatable. Those who can take, sometimes, the most personal thing and put that emotion in a bottle. It’s not necessarily looking for notes or secrets. Obviously you want a great hook but the biggest thing is whether that person is able to capture the emotion of whatever they’re trying to express.

Where did the name Hidden Beach come from?

It was weird. I don’t know if you’ve seen the movie Jerry Maguire but that was my story. I ended up having to write a business plan to start an independent company after working at PolyGram Records and then at Motown where I actually started a label from scratch called MoJazz. When it came to getting the name I’d written this whole thing about what it should feel like and how artists should feel. 

I wanted it to be a place where artists could go and not be afraid to express things that may not be conventional, taking the road less traveled and exploring things that may not seem commercial. Getting rid of the commercial restraints as opposed to listening for what’s on the radio today and trying to mimic that. My time in the major label side was this experience of everybody being in this mad race for second. 

Since I wanted it to embrace the unconventional or things that didn’t sound like anything else I thought of a hidden beach or hidden cove. Someplace private like a private island where you could go naked, do whatever you wanted, draw whatever. No one’s watching. It’s really about you just expressing yourself.

Who were your biggest mentors and role models?

Berry Gordy is the best who’s ever done it. There’s nobody better who’s ever been in the record business who’s had the amount of success with the number of artists and the global impact to help change history. You can’t do the soundtrack of the 60s without a big part of that being Motown. 

From the Isley Brothers to Gladys Knight, Lionel Richie, Diana Ross, The Supremes, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Rick James, Michael Jackson and the Jackson 5, the Temptations. Each one of those stories is amazing. One of the most important things is the Martin Luther King “I Have a Dream” recording which wouldn’t be what it is without Motown’s distribution at the time.

Berry and I had lunch at his mansion in Bel Air where he’s the largest property owner. He said everybody does studies on what is Motown and what’s the secret. He said it amuses him how much has been written because the secret was so simple. All we did was try to put love in every record. We just wanted to make sure love was inside. The compliment was he saw that happening inside Hidden Beach and I left that meeting floating on a cloud.

Stevie Wonder was my biggest hero in life along with Berry, Muhammad Ali and Martin Luther King who was the North Star for me. To have Stevie who I idolized musically and politically now be one of my best friends and godfather of my kids, the things I’ve learned from him since grad school when we met have been amazing.

Sidney Poitier and I used to have monthly lunches and the lessons of class and dignity from him were incredible. Each one of those lunches was probably four hours. He was very proud of what we were doing. I didn’t realize until we became friends that at United Artists he was an African American owner of a film studio along with Steve McQueen and Barbra Streisand.

Michael Jordan was my lead investor. I was the biggest Michael Jordan fan on the planet like everybody else in Chicago in the 90s. The single best meeting I’ve ever had as an entrepreneur was just the two of us in his office. I was talking about mistakes I’d made and he said “Look, the moment I’m with someone who hasn’t made a mistake or failed at something I want to run out the door as fast as possible.”

Why are you still in the game after 25 years?

I think the need for what I set out to do when I wrote the business plan in 97 is greater. When I started there were the Big Six record companies and a whole slice of independent record companies whether it was Island, Def Jam or A&M. Over time they became the Big Three. Back when I started there used to be Black music departments where people learned. There were people who looked like us in positions to make green light decisions. 

It feels like that number has gone down really dramatically. While it’s true that anybody can pick up a computer today, make some beats and get it on YouTube, Spotify, Pandora, Apple, Amazon or any streaming platform, when an artist is doing that they’re joining a sea of 120,000 records that come out in a single day. 

It would take you over 40 years if you didn’t go to sleep to listen to the results of one day’s product. The consumer needs help finding what’s good. The need to curate the type of stuff we’ve done is unfortunately far too few and far between.

How should we protect and celebrate our legacy?

It’s interesting you talk about erasing success. One time I went to Berry Gordy’s house after a major billionaire record executive made a comment about a movie that had a Berry like character portrayed in an unsavory way. Berry was upset and said “I’m not upset from ego but there’s so many people who want to erase my legacy. My legacy is not for me. 

My legacy was for everybody in the world.” He bought back the rights to his book To Be Loved which is a must read and was determined to do the Motown play. I remember spending time with Jimmy Carter in Atlanta in his office on May 16, 2016. We were talking about the Smithsonian and where certain things should be housed. 

That day was the first day Trump was above Hillary Clinton in the polls. I said to him “You sir are an honorable man but can you imagine if somebody who’s saying all these different things is in control of the Smithsonian?” Right now you see the attempts to absolutely erase history. It’s not just Black people’s legacy. It’s the legacy that if you try to ignore or hide we’re unfortunately going to repeat. We have to protect our legacy and tell this story.