You're listening to the downbeat on ninety seven more with the free I spent the
whole break looking at Google images of early flight attempts. You guys are right
on bicycle with a shoddy wing on both sides of it. How about you
remember the like six wings? Yes, internal collapse yes. Well, speaking
of the movie Air for the Middle, there was a dream sequence or a
flashback sequence where Striker is remembering his time over Macho Grande and it's like,
you know, World War whatever, two planes fighting, and it's kind of
like what he is thinking back on, and then it just evolves into the
birth of flight on times. That's where I know most of these I think
we all do. And then man with kind of wings on jumping off a
cliff and just straight down. Dudes had balls though, you know what they
must have really thought they were gonna work. Yep. But imagine like the
big gather around, gather around, you know, today's the day, and
some people of the village came to look and watched his idiot shatter his collar
bone. Is it a guy like hot Rod or are these engineers and like
well respected scientists, Because it would be so much funnier if They're a well
respected scientists and you get to see him just bust their ass. Oh the
collective amount of hubrists from their team. You figured it out this time,
mates, nine o'clock a demonstration in flight. Gather all, gather one other,
all Christal Columbus Park. Be that did the blimp come before this?
Wouldn't the blimp and balloon make far more sense than this? Yeah? I
think the blimp did, right, Okay, no idea. I love that
we talked about that for the uh all the like old guesses that the future
would be blimps everywhere and the blimp dock like at the Empire State Building?
Was that real too? I think would they almost build that? I might
be completely wrong. I might be thinking of a sky captain in the World
of Tomorrow. It's a great movie, by the way, one of the
first all CGI movies. I think you were able to dock there for sure.
Yeah, Like I think they you could dock a blimp at the Empire
State Building. So that was the plan at least. Isn't that funny that
we look back that's insane at the advancement and technology of one hundred years ago
and it's just flat out laughable, and we think, you know, you
see what we can do now with AI and how just incredibly different it is.
Well, we look back one hundred years from now, yeah, and
look at the technology of today and just realize what primates we were, Like,
do you think they will figure out how to just zap you to a
different place on Earth? And I know that seems like, well, there's
surely there's the cutoff, you know, like time travel and then that.
But transportation, right, transportation where you go to a port of some kind
and you get zapped to Europe or zapped anywhere in the world. Right,
that's how they How does that even work? Well I don't know, but
how does any well, how did it work in Star Trek Steve? Then
they believe it was molecular repopulation, where they're like, all right, we're
going to break down your molecules and then we're going to move them over to
this other poor and then your molecules have to be put back together. But
man, I would sign up instantly. I don't want to get up in
an airplane just scramble my molecules. And all it takes is one error in
molecule reassembly, and one is out of order, and then you've got like
a foot coming out of your forehead. You look like sloth from the Goonies.
The back kill it fire, where's the fire? Yeah, those are
the first guys flying. They're going to be rough. They're going to be
rough. Yeah, reassembly is our big issue. Yep. There's old Mikey
foothead, no foothead, but he's famous. He had balls and now his
balls are on his ear for all to see. But for real, like
in a thousand years, you might be like, wait, you guys used
to go to an airport and wait in line and board a big engine metal
thing like that's I don't know, it will yes, seem primitive for sure.
It'd be like, that's such an inefficient waste of time? How could
you do that? You just wonder where the ceiling is or if it even
exists. You just stop. It's like it can't get any better. Because
I thought that about HDTVs twenty years ago or however long ago it was when
you know, we had that big giant ass HDTV in the breakroom at Cumulus
that was like eight thousand pounds that Mark Cuban sent up there. And then
somebody tried to steal one night, right, I think it just disappeared and
nobody knew where it went. Yeah, but anyway, I thought, oh
my god, TV can never be better. And then there's four K,
and then there's eight K, and it just keeps. I mean, how
much more perfect can resolution be that your human eye can even detect, you
know, the clarity of something and not adjust within like a week. Because
that is what's frustrating, Like every time you buy a new good one like
this is the most incredible thing I've ever seen, and then after a week
it's commonplace. I'm like, eh, it's all right, Yeah, I've
seen better porn. I think I'm maxed out. I I don't even know
what I have. My TV's five or six, seven years old and it's
amazing. Yeah, and I don't even know what eight K is. I'm
still rocking ten eighty dpi. Man, about seven twenty was awesome? Seven
twenty isn't that? Though? How they shoot it, like they don't shoot
NFL games in eight K, I don't know. I don't know how any
of that works. I'm just like, exactly what you said. I'm like,
it's perfect. I don't need anything better. I certainly don't need to
spend a bunch of money to get ahead of anything unless we come up with
transporting us. Yes, molecularly, I want that. I would sign up
for that. Yeah, I'd do one of the first guys. I'd take
the earballs. You take earballs, earball. Steve pioneer it, so we
learned. Steve loves Star Trek. I watched the original way more than in
any next generation. So let's see, I had to go back to the
original series, so I've seen all those. Yeah, have you done that
recently? It was probably a decade back. I think about the same for
me, maybe a little less than a decade, because I think it they
all got acquired by it was either Hulu or Netflix. Yeah, I think
it was on Hulu or something and you could watch them on I remember starting
it from the beginning, and every night before i'd go to bed back in
the day, would knock out an effing Star Trek of the original. Yes,
incredible, and isn't there not many didn't it two years? Yeah,
it was not a bunch to get through, maybe fifty episodes in two seasons.
I believe it's weird. Yeah, it's interesting to go back and just
pick up reference points. You're like, oh, well, that's what everything
I've watched for the last thirty five years has been referencing, whether it's the
muck time, fight scenes, or just the types of music beds that are
used, Like oh well, okay, yeah, that's why fight sequences are
scored that way. And you talk about, you know, technology advancing,
and that was one of the first big shows that was filmed in technicolor,
you know, around that time where that was becoming kind of the norm,
or before it became the norm. So their usage of their outfits and the
and the backgrounds and colors that they use, like it was it was like
a production assistant threw up a box of crayons on every every scene. Everything
was so colorful because you wanted to show off, well we've got color,
so everything is going to be so many different colors. Awesome. Speaking of
different colors, wasn't that the first interracial kiss in television history? Believe you're
correct. I believe celebrate racial harmony every morning here on the downbeat when Kirk
frenched ohah, yeah, she was a babe. Yeah she still is.
Is that Zoe? What's her name? In the new ones, the Ohura
and The New Ones with Chris Pine. You never watched any those Star Treks
The New Ones? Donald? Yeah? Is that her? Is that her
talking about her character from the show I'm talking about from New Stars New Star
Trek? Whoever Heura is? Is that her name? You know? Let's
just play the open for most important thing in the world. It is Zoie
sel Dondie. Here you go. See I don't remember her name. Steve
like Star Trek. What else is Steve like? Let's find out about this
dude next? Lay it once in loop at Steve Man. The most most
important thing in the whole dang world today is our friend Steve. We were
blessed on this station with a new friend a few months ago, and it's
a Steve Shackleford. He's been with a Benskin show for how long now?
About four months? Now? Four months? It's going great. I need
to figure out how to take vacation days. That's one thing I need to
figure out how to do. If you've earned any technically, I don't know.
That's the thing. There was no paperwork given. We don't even know
if you officially work here. I don't think I do paycheck yet. Eventually
that did show up, as one of them has showed up for the bad
months. But no, it's it's going great. It was delightful driving in
this morning with zero traffic. And I hate to be traffic guy, but
man, I've been a work from home cat for years now, since before
the pandemic. Traffic's are real beating at eight am to nine am in the
morning. And where are you driving from? Alan, Texas? Allen Texas?
You Skin's an Allen kid, right, He's a West Sider. He's
on the the better off side where the east side of the tracks. Kind
of cats old school, Allen? Did you grow up there? I did
not. I grew up in Lake Hhlands. Okay, yes, excuse me,
died sorry ordered many of picassos years ago. Danny Burner. I was
a Lake Islands high school. I live Said Islands. I don't know why
I thought Richardson, so Lake You're part of Richardson, Yes, church,
and uh that's where you went to school. You know what I'm maybe thinking?
It is because I believe Lake Islands and Bergner's Shriff Stadium still we do.
And I have a hard time not rubbing that in Ben and Skin's face
every day because it is called Wildcat Ram Stadium. Yeah, so Lake Island's
high school. Completely different district. Yeah, still Richardson Independent School District.
It was very frustrated. It makes no sense. It makes none because it
is in the heart of Dallas. It is we are not in Richardson city
limits at all. Nowhere near each other. No, maybe what five seven,
ten miles from each other. Yeah, it's it seemed like forever.
Yeah, to get to Berkner back then, like, like I said,
fifteen miles twenty minute drive. They share a high school football stadium. That
is strange, but it seems smart, right, Yeah, you're gonna build
these monstrosities, why not share one. It is just weird in Texas for
sure. Like I even looked it up the other day as like, certainly
they've built their own stadium at Berner High School. It has been going on
for years too, like this. It goes way back, right, Oh
yeah, as long as I've been there, and it's a it's been in
a place where fights have occurred. I would imagine never in my time.
I was not much of a fighter. But they ever play each other occasionally.
I think they do in playoff games. The record books out for those
monkey. Yeah, I want to go Lake Island's kid. Did you and
you grew up in Lake Islands? I did? Yeah? What what neighborhood
were you in over there? I was right by the high school for most
really the street you grew up on, fair Crest Drive, Fair Crest Drive.
See that's my old pizza delivering stomping grounds. There's a chance, a
chance back in the day you were born in what eighty eight, eighty eighty
five, there's a real good chance that I delivered a pizza and little snutnose
Steve was the kid that the parents, Oh, this was a great move.
Go pay the pizza man and you get the money, and you give
the kid the change, and the kid supposed to let you keep the change,
and he just turns around and walks back to the living room. I'm
like you, little pecker. Yeah, that was probably stiff tip Steve over
there. Now. The fatal flaw and Picasso system was that they at one
point would say do you want us to keep that card on file? And
my voice dropped at a pretty young age, so at about twelve, I
was able to just order whatever I wanted, and hey, card on file
would be and They'll just send it over there, chicken tenders, pizza,
whatever you want. Me and my friends would go nuts and parents at the
end of the month to get their discover bill Boy. Early voice drop is
a treat. I had a late one, and I nothing more soul crushing
than being about twelve or thirteen and the person on the phone is like,
hang on, ma'am and you're like, ma'am ah, that's tough. Yeah.
Malcolm's mom has the opposite. She sounds like a little kid. She
said that even when like you'd get a whatever solicitor call, oh talking here
to my phone, She's like, uh, hello, Yes, is your
mommy there. She's like, I'm thirty three, I am, and I'm
mommy, I am thirty three years old. Yeah. But you guys both
got the growth spurts. I had like a best friend who was I was
always taller than my entire life, and I swear in tenth grade, I
went out of town for a week and that kid is now six foot three.
His voice never really dropped. He is now a six foot three individual.
And you're like, man, come on, come on, this is
not fair. So I got the voice Lake Island Steve, Yeah, and
did you go to college? No, No, I mean I attended some
courses. I am any colleges. Yeah, I have Richland. You I
need to know that I ever enrolled at Richland, said, I was more
Austin Community College. And then by the time I came back to Dallas,
I think I was just done with formal education. What were you? Did
you not have a real plan of life and mind when you left high school?
Or no? Actually quite the opposite. Yeah, we were at six
fifty here, So no, you'll hear me talk about how I didn't actually
graduate from like Islands. I stopped going to school at a certain point.
And you also hear talk up here occasionally that randomly came up that I had
some songs and movies at like fifteen. So no, my plan was dictated
by my folks, and they wanted me to go into the music business.
That's really that. Yes over education, yes, absolutely and abnormal for parents
that my father was an investor in publishing companies and that was a very lucrative
business in the nineties. So the Nashville country music scene where it's just hey,
no, we've got songwriters in rooms and they crank out like what you
guys are talking about, Hey, I got a guy who does lyrics,
and I got another guy who can put songs together. They could do five
songs a day in here and we'll we'll shop them to everyone and we'll make
cash. So that was legitimately the plan until you get kind of deep into
it and you get around nineteen ninety nine where I was, and the publishing
rates just start dropping and diminishing as CD sales start going away. So the
industry started to thin right as I was trying to get into it, and
then I was just never very good at the same time. So but you
said you had songs in movies at fifteen, Yeah, explain that. Yeah,
that was negotiated by the publishing company. Yeah. Yeah, like you
about scoring a film or like original like a half minute pop songs that was
just a pop song. Yeah. So again, if you've got decent managers
and you've got good publishers and sink agreement people, you're like, hey,
yeah, we can get your songs and movies and stuff, and there was
just original composition that you did. Yeah. I was always very good at
putting tunes together. I was not a great lyricist early on, so people
just hand me sheets of lyrics and say, hey, kid, put a
put a music to this and it was good at and you recorded everything on
your own or did you have to go up to Nashville? So I rarely
worked in Dallas. I worked out of Nashville and Los Angeles and was taken
there by my parents as a little as a teenager. Yeah, about fifteen
to eighteen is when I went in heavy on it. Then there was kind
of a fracturing where it's like, I don't really want to do country music
in Nashville anymore, and the business is hurting, so you bail and go
down to Austin and have some fun. Then you come back and try to
do it and the business is really crumbling. You then actually making like legitimate
income from the sync deals that you were rarely and up there. A lot
of the deals were like, hey, we kick people three grand a month
for quotas, and hey, you just turn in your songs and if one
of them pops, because they would pretty much sell album tracks to like country
artists, so hey they've got two singles, they come here for the remaining
ten tracks on their CD. Yeah, and hey, if one of them
pops, you guys make some extra cash and royalties. But no, we
pay you three grand a month and you turn in about twenty songs a month,
okay, And so that was kind of the income that those cats made.
I never took a quota deal and so yeah, I never really made
it in that business. But that's how my original plans shifted into just let's
go see what's going on in the music audio world and give it another go
when when it comes back around. Yeah, so your dad was an investor
in this, yes, but did he actually make music himself. No.
He would tinker and lyrics occasionally, but no, he was not a musician.
So he figured early that you were adept at this and good. Yeah.
He had contacts who had made a lot of money doing this and said,
hey, you know what, kid, you're not really good at sports,
like I was, yeah, exactly, Like yeah, sure, dads
are always like what is this he's going to be good at? And you're
like, you're not really good at this and your grades are bad, so
why don't you try to do this music thing that I've seen people make money
at And you're like, I give that a go. So no, that's
why I Moore got pushed into that. I think it was a this seems
like could be a good fit, and I've seen people do okay in this
industry, so you sort of casually sitting it. Did you not graduate high
school? I graduated from a charter school. By the time I had hit
seventeen, every member of my band had quit that school and they were like,
hey, we're gonna go to Nashville. We would rather you guys just
be available when we need you and just work on this stuff. So no,
technically you still graduated. I just did not hang through at Lake Highlands
because it was five days a week, eight hours a day, you know,
and charter schools three hours a day, and it's Taste Austin Community College,
and I assume that's an awesome Yeah, move down there instead of Nashville,
And I imagine that was still chasing the music dream. That was more
to have fun. I did not enjoy being worked a ton from fourteen to
about eighteen there where it was just right, right right, churn, churn,
churn, So then I just kind of eh, I'm done with this,
and you go play in dumb little bands and just have fun, and
then after a couple of years you're like, well, probably not much of
a play down here, was that, Austin. Was that the time that
you fell in love with smash Mouth? Yes? Absolutely, I love them
to pieces. My Steve Harwell, I remember his name, poor Harwell.
No, he was great and then came back to Dallas, made another run
at it. But you know, just one very good. When did you
decide, you know what, I need to start subsidizing my life with something
outside of the industry. Uh well, it always worked a joke jobs so
that you could keep it going. But then the moment Mikey and I are
doing right now, yeah, welcome the minute someone says, hey, there's
a pregnancy too here, You're like, oh, all right, well then
we're probably gonna need to get serious about earning more money. So yeah,
the hey, family planning is what led me into music. Probably not gonna
work anymore for me. Yeah, And so I just put to support you
know, kids and a wife and all that. Correct for sure, for
sure. So hung it up for a decade and then you know, got
back into it and little pieces here and there. Yeah, and a lot
of it was but you know, I guess probably participating with the ben and
Skin doing stuff for them. That was that just kind of just for goofing
off for fun. Yeah, that was just a weird muse kind of thing.
We're just like, ah, this would be fun to send one of
these things in and just kind of make it a joke. And then next
thing you know, Ben's calling you at home, Hey, can you get
this thing for me in like thirty minutes? Yeah? Sure, man,
Oh it's been for the radio. Yes, of course I can't. And
then a year goes by, another year, Yes, they've been great.
That's a throwing my call. Yeah, so how did that? What?
You just were a listener and stumbled on a bend and Skin ten years ago?
Is that how? Yeah? I stumbled onto him Honestly. When Kat
joined the show, they came over to a station and I kind of grew
to love the format of what they were doing there at that station, and
I hung with them when they left there and came over to the former station
here Eagle whatever. And then yeah, I had reached out to Skin about
Eastwood music stuff because I was trying to get back into music in any capacity
and I'd been working in corporate jobs. I was like, all right,
this guy's got great taste and he's doing this label thing. Hey, if
I can help him get organized, I'm chained to my computer all day anyway,
Hey man, you need some help, send an emails. I'd like
to learn more about the publishing biz. Let me know, maybe we can
work together. And he and I kind of formed a little partnership there when
it's like, yeah, just throw me your junk work that you don't want
to do, and I'll help you out with it. And then that kind
of coincided with yeah, i'll send in a tune here and not tell you
it's me. And then it took them a few months to figure out that
it was me sending them tuned, So it was me kind of screwing with
them the same time that I was working with them. So it's a fun
gag. Look at us now and look at us now hosting, and then
I got to do KT's pod and TV show and a bunch of that stuff,
and then the weekend thing with KT here, and then it's like screw
it, yeah exact. So he's just a ton of fun to work with.
I love his sensibility. So that's nut and we love it. Yeah,
so when did you become a huge fan of mine? Actually, thank
you so much. We like to go to break before things get boring.
Anyway, that's uh, strip mall Steve and here with us for three.
I know, fascinating dude. He's a funny dude, and I've heard a
lot of whispers and talk about your past and all that. I want to
learn a lot more. And we're happy to have you at the station here
and certainly happy to have you with us this morning. But that's probably still
tip of the iceberg, right. Plenty more to get to know about Steve
over the next few years. I'd imagine all right, Sports at seven coming
up next? How about this a new statue out in front of the American
Airlines Center. Who's that going to be? That's next? On ninety seven,
won the Free