#280 – Bobby Talks to Scuba Steve About His Crazy Life and Radio + Bobby and Eddie’s Music School: The Day The Music Died + Don McLean on the 50th Anniversary of American Pie + New Music Top 5

Bobby brings on Scuba Steve who is the executive producer of the Bobby Bones Show. They talk about how he got into radio, past relationships and how he got the job on the Bobby Bones Show. We learned about ‘The Day the Music Died’ in Bobby and Eddie’s Music School. The tragic plane crash that claimed the lives of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and “The Big Bopper”. Bobby also talks to Don McLean on the 50th Anniversary of his song “American Pie”.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Mmm, Hello and welcome to episode to eighty. Coming up,
we will talk to Don McClean. He sings bye bye
Ms American Pie, draw a Chevy to the levee, but
the levee was dry. Come on the Larry he was

(00:23):
singing by by this American Pie. Chevy to leven was dry.
Didn't you want to hear Bob do that song? Bye bye,
Mr American Hi, drow my chevy to the levee and
it wasn't dry. I talked to Don McClean coming up.

(00:43):
He is a he's a sassy old man. I like
him because I know what I'm gonna get from him.
But he's definitely as he wants you to know more
than just American Pie. But we were talking to him
because it's the fifty at the anniversary of the song
Mark Pie. The day the music died was actually in

(01:04):
the sixties, right sixties, Yes, that he wrote that was
what he wrote about. But the song came out in
seventy or fifty years out. Um so, But that's on
the way. We'll talk to Scuba Steve, who is my
executive radio producer, who I just I am slowly finding
more and more out about him, such more to put
him in here talk to him. Eddie will be here

(01:25):
to go to interview with Scooba Steve. Maybe you guess
can know him a little better. Maybe I'll get to
know him a little better. I mean I know him
a little bit, but he moved here in the pandemic
all I were hanging out a bunch. We see each
other at work and I walk in and I'm like,
all right, what's playing? Got it? Here's what I'm doing?
Got it? All right? Go in every second. There's rarely
a free minute from when I get there until time
to go home, because I do feel like I'm extremely

(01:47):
efficient with time. Even if I have a minute in twenty,
I'm gonna do a minute commercial in that minute in twenty.
So we're not just hanging around chumming it up. But
I do like Scooba Steve. He's come up with my basketball.
Before we'll talk to him him. We'll also do Eddie
and I'll talk about the day that the music died
as a kind of Eddie and Bobby's music school. As always,
we'll get to Tuesday's Top five songs. No No, No No.

(02:11):
As always, the New Music Top Five at number five,
this week's songs I'm most excited about. Temecular Road has
a new song out called Everything. I Love Everything At
number four. Brook Eden, who I like a lot. Who's

(02:32):
a great singer, who came out and opened some shows
for me and the infancy of my comedy days. Yeah,
that's when I first started to tour comedy. She came
out and did some shows. She's fantastic. It's our first
song in four years. It's called No Shade. Here's a clip.

(02:54):
Who Fives have a new album not called Medicine at Midnight.
It's their tenth full length studio album. It feature is
the number one shame, Shame, Shame. And here's a new
song called No Son of Mine. Our guy Matt Stell

(03:17):
has a new song out called that Ain't Me No More.
Who's a clip of that Songbody's gotta in their shirt,
somebody's texting her and words, somebody's gotta picture on there,
Somebody's gone fishing with and the number one song that
I'm looking forward to This week. Dan and Shay have

(03:38):
a new song out called Glad You Exist. Here you
Go Say Hi. I'm just so bad. Albums out this weekend,
Well the weekend. It's a new compilation the web, their station,

(04:00):
Nancy Sinatra, What do you know, Nancy Sinatra from Frank Sinatra.
I mean, sure, these boots are made for walking, and
that's just what they'll do. One of these days, these
boots are going to walk all over you. I'd google that,
but I'm almost positive not a lot doesn't. People are
putting out a bunch of records. Hey, Eddie just walked

(04:22):
in turn his Mica there. I would have said the
same thing. Frank Sinatra is daughter, daughter of Frank Sinatra.
Does she do Yeah, she does that. These boots are
made for walking. I'm positive looking at it now, she's
number one called something stupid signature hit. You got scared

(04:43):
there for a second. Well, I just feel like I'm
wrong a lot so when I am, at least like
to acknowledge it now rather than get beat up in
my d m s because that happens to it when
it does, I deserve it. And music News well, the
Morgan wall In situation. No, I didn't hear about it.
What happened? If I don't at least acknowledge it. We
talked about it a lot on the show. I've talked

(05:04):
about it a bunch. Um. Yeah, it's a terrible situation.
We'll move on from that one. Uh. T J Osborne,
lead singer of Brothers. Osborne opened up about being gay
and country music same day those stories. Well, the Morgan
Wallen story had come out the night before. I remember
reading it and going, oh, that is bad, and then

(05:26):
I watched the video and went and then I talked
about it on the show. I don't have any notes
people think I wanted their There was a caller that
asked me and I was like, well, let me talk
about it. And it's always a slippery slope to go
down because if you talk about race, sexuality, religion, there
are these things you can talk about with opinion, but

(05:47):
it doesn't matter what you say, you're gonna get beat
up from a side. And I took, I took some likings,
but I do still stand by everything I said there.
And my point is we finished the show and then
I saw the t J Osbourne story come out right
after that, and I thought, dang, t J can't even
really have his full day because he's being overshadowed by
a different story. And maybe he didn't care about that.

(06:09):
But there was a lot of love for t J.
Because I've known t J for a while. I've known
he's been gay. I'm super pumped that he's able to
be out and be himself and he's just he's just
the best, and that has nothing to do with the sexuality.
But I just want the people that I know, they're
good folks, to be able to live their their best
version of their life. So that is freaking awesome. Told

(06:30):
Time Magazine, I did not know they. I just saw
pop up my Twitter feed and I was like that
as I'm talking about, and he even posted a message
to kind of follow up on I didn't see that.
I mean I saw it, but I never I didn't.
Just the smile on his face and you can just
tell how relieved he is and you can't help but
feel so happy for him. Over to the Morrigan Wallent
thing real quick, his recording contract with the Big Loud
Records has been indefinitely suspended. That was nothing is going

(06:54):
to happen there for a long time, if again, but
for a long time. He's got a lot to work on,
get right, a lout to learn, and if he doesn't,
it'll never get back. So what a waste that would be.
So hopefully he gets better. The weekend is staying in

(07:14):
style ahead of this Sunday super Bowl halftime show. He
rented a six bedroom mansion with a pool and private
doc places worth nine million dollars. He's paying a hundred
thousand dollars to rent it. M how much is getting
paid for the performance? You don't get paid for You
pay out of your pocket. If he paid seven million

(07:35):
production cost. But yeah, you don't get paid Yeah, no, no,
that's all promo. That's interesting, that's the promo act promo.
Super Bowl perform Rodeo Houston has been canceled last year.
I think they got off a couple of shows before
this cancel it all the way through Stagecoach canceled. No
new dates have been announced. I think this has a

(07:57):
shot to happen in the fall. But you're gonna see
can to speaking of palsas you will see concert Palooza.
Oh yeah, happening as soon as you can get back.
Give me ten shows. The sit Go is gonna have
guard playing because there are gonna be enough venus for
every marathon. Gas gonna have MC girl doing the hits
over there because they don't have enough stage, and everyone's

(08:19):
gonna go by five five different tickets for five shows
that night. You know they do pub crawls, who do
concert crawls. Maybe they'll schedule some stuff earlier on weekends,
like a three pm show that just for you. Well,
no on weekends so you can get in multiple shows.
When we used to do double shows because we would
sell out of theater as the raging it eats and

(08:41):
we go, dang, we sold out the show and three
minutes there's a two thousand theater and we were gonna
do a Saturday at seven pm. We were like, we
can get to town early and do you want it
to dude, there's no doubt we're gonna be that thirsty
for live music, no doubt. It all transition into it.
You know they're not. There's not just gonna be a
day where they lift the damn and the water compushing in.

(09:01):
That would be bad. But there will be a day
when they just a little, just a little, just a little,
and then eventually we'll get back there. Garth Brooks Vegas
shows rescheduled again. God love Garth. He just continued to
kick it back a little bit. Uh, Silento has broken
his silence. Crazy watch me whip watch me Nay, did

(09:21):
he murder. Somebody did just come up with that. I
was a terrible one. Scooba. Steve's going in and he's
texting me right now. He may be outside if I
saw I let his truck in. If you want to
just leave that down, I'll just keep talking. I'll tell
him right now. Okay, Mike, he's gonna walk in there
and get you coming in in a minute. There he is,

(09:42):
Scuba Steve um oh yeah, yeah, Silento breaks his silence.
He's asking that fans continue to support and uplift him
while he remains a suspect in the murder of his cousin.
So still an ongoing investigation, but they've named him a suspect.
He's being held in a Georgia jail without bond. How
old is he now? Because he sounds really young in
that song. I would imagine he's twenty five or so. Okay, oh,

(10:04):
Mike left, sorry, no our fingertips. I feel like Linto
and they sang that song. They were like little kids.
So m hm. And if you did it, and they
think he did, he'll spend his life in jail, all
of it, especially it was his cousin too. Huh. That's

(10:26):
what you just said, okay, Eddied to walk in Bobby
and Eddie's music school coming up. Obviously we're going to
talk to our guy. Wasn't he a treat? You know?
I enjoyed that. I mean, definitely a legendish kind of
person where you just sitting you don't give a crap
about what anyone says to you, for sure. I mean

(10:47):
it's kind of just someone who's lived a full life. Man,
that's how they act. It's coming up the day of
the music died, Mr Bye Bye American Pie. He'll be
on just a second in our studio at home with
Scuba Steve. It's Eddie, Scuba and myself. And for a while,
when I first started to do this podcast, I was

(11:07):
putting people on the show Radio Show one, and now
I just put them on so people could get to
know them. It's really before we dialed into just being music, right,
we're putting anybody on. Just ConA to Bobby Kick I
did one, yeah, but people like to get to know
members of the show better. And then I thought I
was talking to Mike about it. I said, you know,
Scuba moved here during a pandemic, so nobody really hangs

(11:27):
out like you come over to play basketball. Have you
ever hung out with Scuba? No? Not outside of work,
That's what I'm saying. Your Christmas party? What last last year? Oh? Yeah,
not pandemic, but right when he moved. I guess you
moved here right before the pandemic, like two three months
before the pandemic. Yeah, and then it just all shut down.
I guess we're from the hanging out with He was situated.

(11:52):
You're gonna taking one of these days too, right, Yeah,
that's coming. Um, So I thought, why not have Scuba
in Eddie. I can ask some questions, we get to
know you a little better, alright, cool, and move on
with our lives. He's very interesting. So, like I would say,
as soon as we're done recording, you know with the
Bobby Bones show and everything, everything we do for the

(12:13):
rest of the day, it's usually just me and Scuba
left for like two hours after everyone's gone, so we've
got to know each other pretty well. What have you
been doing for two hours? Videos? Man? I got a
list of videos that I need to do. And then
when I'm done with that, I go home and then
school is there for another four hours. So sometimes school
we haven't been the afternoon at work, and I'm like,
you go back to work is not having left work? Yeah? Um,

(12:33):
so let's just by the way Scooba Steve as our
executive producer on the show. He's the guy pulling all strings,
line things up, making decisions. He's the guy that is
doing the work that you don't know who's doing the work.
I get all the credit, and I should, but there's
also scuba and I'm totally fine with that. That's the Yeah,

(12:53):
I'm totally not kidding. But so you are the executive producer,
how would you describe your job? Like, like you said,
jack of all trades, managing the team behind the scenes,
making sure everyone's in line, put booking the guests, dealing.
One thing I didn't realize this is part of my
job that I didn't get into until this happened, was sales.
There are so much sales involved with this. You get

(13:15):
the emails daily of sales request. Uh, there's a lot
of things you don't get because I handled before it
even gets to or just cancel it before it even
gets to request. Ridiculous request. What's a ridiculous request? Without
saying anything exactly like, what is something? And I'm putting
you on the spot here, So I'm gonna vent for
a second while you think, Okay, I know you get
a lot of things sent to you, or a lot
of asked from local sales or local sales from all

(13:36):
over the country, and you go, I'm not even gonna
take that to Bob because I know he's gonna say, no, nice.
Can you give me an example. Well, I won't say
the brands, but there's some brands that just don't fit
you and your personality, like which wouldn't sell you cigarettes,
like something like that pills. No, those go straight to
you and then want you to post about it on
social and do a video about it, and like they

(13:58):
we're not going to do that. Or before the pandemic
was a lot of travel and we don't have time
to travel because we're doing the show daily. Um, a
lot of those kind of things or or low ball
offers that don't fit what you should be paid for it. Yeah,
I like that. Yeah. Do you know though, I don't
get paid for national spots. Yeah. I don't think anyone does.
I don't. Did you know that I knew that? Yeah,

(14:19):
there's there's there's a percentage of like a pool somewhere
that gets pulled sort of. But I don't get paid
per commercial or if I go yeah, I'll take it,
don't only come to me. It's more for the company
than anything. I mean a company guy. By taking the large,
the national spot, I'm being a show guy because if
our show makes money, they can pay these fat salaries
like eddies. Yes, yeah, that's really what it is. Like,

(14:41):
the more money the show makes, the better we all look.
The local spots is where you make the money in
your pocket. Correct, Yeah, but it's always like in a
small market, it's like thirty bucks. You know. I can
do the same spot in three different places, and depending
on how big the city is, it's a different rate
for each spot. So if I do Tuscaloose, Alabama, I'm
gonna make thirty dollars for that. I'm just making up

(15:02):
numbers here. Um, if I do Madison, Wisconsin or Little
Rock kind of a middle lish market, I can make
eight or ninety. Or if I do Seattle, they can
maybe three hundred bucks for a sixty second read. So
Tupelow could get Bobby Bones American Idol Bobby Bones, and
I do them. That's legit. It's per market size. Basically,

(15:23):
there's a rate for each market. You're you're also in
that rate card to you lunch box. They really don't
want to be honestly, it's usually first and then Bobby
says no that still My point is, wouldn't get me.
That's good there. But I don't say no to small

(15:47):
markets just because they're a small market, not at all. No. No,
I'll say no if it doesn't fit. Like we talked
about earlier. So I'm kind of the bad guy in
this so and I don't mind being that bad guy.
I'll play the bad cop and handle that side for
you so you don't have to even ever deal with it. Um.
There's a furniture store in Auburn, Indiana that I've been
doing for like four years. I think I might pay
them to do it. I'm so loyal and they came

(16:11):
on early and I'm like, let's go. It's fans furniture
yet yeah, yeah, they're still around. They love you, right,
I'll stay road a baby. That's funny, but I know
all about it. But people, they're great people. Though some
small markets are, they're good, genuine people and they just
like to be a part of the show. And I
can't hate on that. If I got into this for money,
I wouldn't be here. That was true that there were

(16:32):
there were times when we would do raising idiots and
we do meet and greets, and somebody from those small
markets would come and they own the furniture store and
would be like, oh my gosh, you're Greg like it's
really funny, and it would I would kind of I
gotta treat them like they were celebrities because to me,
I'm doing their commercials and never see their face. I

(16:53):
remember that. Or I would go somewhere and see someone
I would do like a real estate commercial in like
Virginia Beach, and I'm like Lonnie Books. Yeah, this is
a lot of guy's geeking out, geking out of me. Um. Okay,
so that's your job. But let's go back way back, um,

(17:14):
and I'll say this, I got you, and we'll get
here in a second. I end up ended up hiring
you from Ryan Seacrest. Yes, that's where you were before me.
We will get back around too there. Okay, but first
let's start with Scuba Steve's life. I grew up in Orlando, Florida,
a small town called Ovido in Orlando. Is that considered Orlando, Well,
like It's like when you live anywhere else like San Francisco,
you're not really from San Francisco, You're from a suburb

(17:35):
of that. So Orlando is the largest city, but Ovido
is where I was born and raised. We'll take turns.
Let's let's um back and forth on questions, try to
stay in somewhat line. But if you don't, that's okay. Okay,
you want to go and now me another one? You
know now where ahead where I'm from? No, No, I
don't care about the round table. I love this about Scuba. Yes, yes, yes,

(17:59):
I met right now. Okay, when was your first girlfriend?
First girlfriend? Was kindergarten? Not what? No, it's a real girlfriend.
First real girlfriend then that would probably be Stacy in
fifth grade? Bones. Okay, So you grow up in Orlando. Yes,
As you were getting older, what was it that you
wanted to do for your life, like when you're sixteen seventeen,
having to start to make those decisions. Um, I think

(18:21):
at that point I was Okay, I definitely to do
something in entertainment. Did Yeah, because I grew up in
Orlando where Nickelodeon was huge. Nickelodeon Studios was located right
there on Universal lot. I wanted something to do with
acting or producing directing of some sort, always television, always film.
From even to this day, that's what that's still what
my long term goals is that. So I wanted to
go for that. I wanted lee Orlando, moved to Hollywood,

(18:43):
UM but that didn't work out. For a while. I
got into like a bunch of, you know, mediocre jobs,
landscaping things like that, and then eventually made the move
to come out to California. So you're hustling in Orlando,
not in media, but just trying to make enough money
to pay rent, yes, and the bills. And you hadn't

(19:05):
at least dabbled in the Orlando media world before you
went to l A. Yeah, Because so I was about
eighteen nineteen I started getting into radio. But so I
met somebody at a club event in Orlando being fishy
about this. You met somebody, did something happened where he
just clicked and said I should just saw the smile,
did you. Well, there's a couple things that happened. One

(19:28):
I went to when I went to this um this,
I tried it out, this radio school called Connecticut School
Broadcasting part of it, and it's literally the biggest load
of crap. And I don't know that that's true. But
you did it, and you didn't like it. I didn't. Yes,
you can see on the news of some things that
have happened at that school. Anyways, See, I went there
and it wasn't in Connecticut. It wasn't in Connecticut. It

(19:49):
was located in Orlando. They had locations across the country,
but Connecticut was where it was originally based. And they
promised you this whole Hey, if you come here, we're
gonna you're gonna learn from the all stars in the industry,
and they're gonna hook you up. There were no all
stars in the industry that were there. It was a
bunch of people that didn't really make it themselves either.
And they taught you on equipment that wasn't really what
they were using at the radio stations and in television

(20:10):
in general. Um So I went there for a few
months and then I met somebody out and about So
let me pause. You went there, that was your very
first step. You knew you wanted to do it. You
go and you pay money. Yes, how much money it was?
I think it was a thousand dollars a month, and
it was It was an ad that I heard on
on the radio because I was like, I was listening
to the radio, like, Oh, I want to get on
the radio. This is how you do it. So I

(20:32):
figured this is my chance, my shot to get in.
So I went there and paid that fee for per month,
and while I was there, learned the tools and met
somebody along the way who was like, hey, I worked
for a radio station locally in Orlando. Here I think, uh,
you know, you've got some chops. Let's bring you in
meet the host. What chops did you have at Connecticut

(20:52):
School of Broadcasting. I guess the I was always on time,
I was there earlier. That's the choppiest of chops. Honestly, Yeah, okay,
you want to do that? Do you have a hape?
You gave them? Um, he heard me record some stuff
in front of him. He was one of the guys
that was it came in every once in a while.
Wasn't one of the main teachers, like an adjunct professor
at Connectical School Broadcasting? Yeah, yeah, exactly, And go ahead, Sorry, no,
I'm just trying to walk through this with you. I know,

(21:13):
I just got nineteen questions like what's your favorite color? Ahead?
Go ahead. That was one of them, So go ahead,
We'll save that one for later. So you're doing what
at this school? Do they give you sheets to read?
And are you trying to be a newscaster or they
going you're gonna do commercials? It's both so that there's

(21:36):
a radio side and a television side. The radio side is,
you know, showing how to work their board and how
to talk up a song and how to record a commercial.
And the people that were teaching you were just DJ's
that didn't work out most of them yet. And I
say DJ's like, I don't feel like I'm a DJ.
And in either way, I don't mix music and I
didn't get into his business to play music. Will there
be a few songs to play while I'm on the air, Yeah,

(21:57):
but I don't care like I like the music format.
I picked to be in with country because I felt
like that was the livestock group I can most relate to.
But if they were like, hey, come to Polka, you'll
never hear the song. We're just gonna put some polk on,
I'll be like, great, let's go. As long as I
can be me, I'm fine. So you were working with
DJs who talked up music songs, yes, and that was

(22:19):
your goal, and that was what they were trying to
teach us was how to do that okay, and how
to record basically the basics of radio. Do you still
have that hit? Might get a song up? Let's Scooba
can hit a post from Connecticut School Broadcasting. All right
here he is. Hold on, let' let's give me a second.
You know what hitting a post is, right? Yeah, we
we hit it right for the vocals come in. Mike
has given you the hardest song. That's like a thirty
seven second intro. You can tell your whole background. Is

(22:44):
that what you want to do? All right? Go and
three two one. So when I hear the song, it
reminds me of my father and we used to hang
out by the pool lot and he would be hey, son,
grabbed me that beer over there, So I grabbed the beer.
He's like that screw driver next to you. Take that too,
all right, I'm the count of three. I want you
to pop the bottom. So I popped the bottom, throw

(23:04):
it to him. He'd drink it as fast as he can,
and he's shotgun it. And that was the first time
I learned how to shotgun a beer at the age
of nine. Yeah, and then, by the way, we have
some tickets to give away in ten minutes. It was
right out of time. What I really have to say.
I get that a solid sea plus though, and you

(23:25):
came in raw. Yeah you still you hit the post.
You had to rush it a little bit. Story story.
I like that. Good. Good. So you learned how to
do that? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, who did you meet? What person?
I met a guy named Alex who was the who
eventually got me into the building at Clear Channel in Orlando, Florida.
Was he on the air? He was the morning show

(23:46):
producer for the morning show at XL. Is he still
producing there? He is not. He got cut No. Nine
when they had all those massive cuts, So he's not
in radio anymore. He's in radio, but he's doing smaller
roles within Orlando. Okay, so you're now in the building.
What do you do at XL in Orlando? So at
first I was an intern, so I had to use
that CSB that I had as my paperwork for going

(24:08):
to school? Did you graduate? I left before graduation, which
really pissed them off because they didn't they didn't get
credit for me getting this internship. There's a lot of
a lot of because they they basically the whole goal
was to get somebody in there and then get credit
to say, hey, x y Z went to the school
and look at them now, and they were really piste
that I left before graduation, didn't fulfill the curriculum because

(24:28):
I was like, I don't need this. I met this guy,
He's gonna get me in. I got an internship, see
you later. This is what I needed. Huh. So they
want you in so they can say look what we
did and get more money from the next person. Yes,
so they can get through and say look what we did,
and to keep that going, keep that bio on the
website of like, these are all our people that go
that went to the school, and here they are. Now
are you on the website? Now? Now they hate me.
They want nothing to do with me. You. So you're

(24:50):
an intern, and you have you have to have some
way to prove that you're in school when you're an intern. Yes,
I need for Connecticut School of Broadcasting. Yes, okay, I
used that. Michael Brian was my p D who was
the p D at the local local affiliate Nashville when
I moved here. Yeah, he was the PDS. My first
run into him, and I was the intern there at
XL and I did that for about a good four

(25:10):
or five months, kind of played the sixth man on
the show that all the behind the scenes. Was it
crazy to be on the air though, even even though
you weren't getting paid, Like, was your life a little different?
Because people started think you were kind of famous. When
I'd go downtown to Orlando as an intern, you go
to the club and they would go, oh, it's Scuba
Steve from the Johnny JA Morning Show. And it was
the coolest thing for me because I was in my
hometown and I was a small local celebrity. So for me,
I got a lot of cloud with my friends, free drinks,

(25:32):
free entrances the clubs. So well, let me mention Scooba
Steven because it sounds like that was already your name. Yes, yeah,
as an intern, they named you Scooba Steve. Yeah, birth
named Stephen and then Big Daddy was a popular movie
at the time, and they just named Scooba Steve and
I just rolled with it. Ever been scuba diving? Never?
Never in my life? You have an interest? No, My
my wife's father passed scuba diving. So I have no

(25:53):
interest in scooba diving. What's your wife's father died while
scuba diving. Yeah, on they were on some vacation that
and she was a kid and he went scuba diving.
And I've just had fear. I've had a fear of
it in general. But when she told me that, I
was like, I'm definitely not scuba diving ever. The irony
for her and not think about this. And by the way, lovely, Yeah,
I think your wife is a lovely Thank you. She's

(26:14):
got this dad. He goes scuba diving, unfortunately passes away. Well,
it's time for her to live our life now as
an adult, she meets a guy his name is scuba
and has to think about that every day. Everything was
manifested in some weird way. Wow, that would be like
your grandpa getting hit by a train. You meant named

(26:36):
cho McGee, Like, I'm gonna marry you too, man. It
was a very weird coincidence. Okay, So you're interning there.
When does it turn into a real job? And what's
the real job? So I'm interning there. They do all
those massive cuts in two thousand nine, and I was
one of those. That was because I got brought on
part time for a little bit after the internship. They

(26:57):
cut me because they cut all part timers. But then
I met a guy my way out and named Rick Everett.
He's the PD at the rock station there, and he's like, hey, look, man,
just hang tight, I got something for you in the works.
You know, we'll get something on the books for you
in the next couple of months. So I kind of
just I took his word. I waited a couple of
months he had been back. During that two months, I
was applying at every radio station across the country from
Canada down to Mexico. Were you also doing a job though,

(27:20):
to make rent? No, that's when I was living with
my ex wife who was paying rent, who was paying
rent and paying for everything, And we found out on
the radio show cheated on him and he found on
Ashley Madison go listen to the Bobby Cast. No, go
listen to the bibone show on Thursday. That was when
that was y man, I feel bad about that one. No,
I don't know. It's not at all great story though.
I can't believe he's Scuba Steve. I want to dropped

(27:43):
that when I met your wife, I would have been
like stunning Steve, our spatula, Steve. I just wanted to
stay with scuba Steve when your wife's dad died scuba diving. Yeah, yeah,
she was. I guess she was fine with it. She
doesn't have a problem. So have you ever asked her that? Um,
she's funny with it. I've never really brought it up.
I mean, it was mentioned to me that that happened,

(28:03):
and oh my god. Yeah, I don't know, man, I
think that's probably something you need to change. Does she
ever call you scuba? Never know? I'm just I'm just
is she comfortable with you're talking about that? Yeah? Totally.
So I think the people on the radio show would
be blown away at that story, and not in like
a funny way. But then, you know, isn't it ironic?

(28:26):
Could I bring that up on the show next week?
It's fine, Yeah, I don't want to. I don't want
your wife to be upset. No, it's been a long time.
Her father passed when she was twelve, so it's also
been a very very long unbelievable Yeah. Wow, Okay, So
you're working part time at the rock station. Is that
they hired on to do so then he brings you
back and then that's what it is. It's two things.
One he needs help launching a sports station. So that
was pretty much my main priority was to help get

(28:48):
the station launched, run it, do everything for production, run
the board for all the shows, get that off the ground,
and also help out at the rock station, which my
goal was, Oh, I want to be on this rock
station in some capacity. And then I also started working
for Johnny again on the morning show. So I was
doing morning show from about four until about one, and
then one over to the sports station, did that to

(29:08):
the afternoon, did the rock station in the evening, went home,
and did all over again for seven days a week.
And I'm not even gonna go wow because I did
the same crap because she just got to I think
it's great, but you know, I'm not gonna be like, Damn,
I can't believe you did that. Didn't too? Yeah, you
have to do it. We've all done that crap. Waddy
hasn't he kind of got brought in. Uh So you

(29:28):
were working with Johnny, was it Johnny and Jade? Jade? Yeah, Jade,
I think you know who she is. I know Jade
pretty well. She now she lives in Nashville now and
works for Apple Music. Yeah, and but I know Jade
through a couple of different things. But yeah, so Jade
and I are were you guys cool? Yeah? Very cool? Yeah,
we still talked to this day. Well I like her. Yeah,
if he didn't great. Yeah. When she was here in
town a year ago before she took the gig, we

(29:50):
went lunch and everything. So she was one of the
hosts while you were what position? She was the co
host when I was intern, but then also became a
person on the show up our time personality and producer?
You were you a producer on that show? Yes? What
did you produce? So? I was the associate producer? So
I would do kind of like what Abby does? Screen calls,
edit audio, get some audio on the streets, put together

(30:12):
you know, one sheets, all that basic stuff. Okay, so
you're doing that for how long? I did that for
about about a year year and a half. And then
are you going I gotta get out of here and
go somewhere bigger or did you kind of get pushed off?
I wanted a full time position, and they dangled that
care for years. You know, we eventually full time. I
was working seven days a week but only logging twenty

(30:32):
nine hours um. And I was fine with that. Like
you said, you have to you have to grind, and
I'm totally cool with that. And then I got to
a point where I wasn't going to get that full
time position anytime soon. My ex wife at the time
got the opportunity to move to San Francisco, and I
knew nothing about it. I just knew it was a
bigger city, was California. It's an opportunity. Let's do it.
So I quit my job. And before I quit my job,
I remember the moment where we were driving. We had

(30:54):
the U haul packed the car ready to go, everything
to hit the road, and I went back to the
Clear Channel building before my email expired, and I emailed
all the pds in San Francisco and the operations manager
and said, hey, this is me resume. I'm heading that way.
Even if we can just have a conversation, coffee whatever, UM,
I have no job. I'm willing to do whatever you need,
I'll do it. And then I got some responses in

(31:15):
the drive to San Francisco, and then we apologiate for
a second. What's the question you wanta ask him? I'm good.
I'm listening. I wanted blue and green. Thank you. There
you go. You don't have any like side questions. This
is a good story relief. I'm good. Okay, left out
of it. You made fun of my first question. I'm
scarred by that. You're driving. You get emails back, emails

(31:35):
back saying hey, when you come to town, hit me up.
I would love to talk to you. By the way,
there almost isn't a further drive. Oh, it's super far
because you're going from the bottom right basically to the
upper left. I mean you could have gone to Seattle.
I guess I'd have been further, but Seattle Portland. But
other than that, that's about as far as you can go. Yeah.
I'm in with the car with somebody that I sort
of hate at the time. So it was a fun
three to four day drive. We mean sort of. Hey,

(31:56):
because you weren't divorcing then, no, but we were our
relationship was sort of on that verge of things weren't
going right and you still thought you wanted to move
with the or even though things weren't going right. Yeah,
because I saw this as an opportunity to change me
as a person and take me out of my hometown,
which is I love Orlando, but I wanted to grow
and for me to grow, I have to go somewhere.
So so what were the emails saying as you were driving?

(32:18):
They were just basically just like, Hey, when you get
to town, hit us up. And I responded, say, no problem,
I'll be there in this date. Let's lock in a
date when I get to town. And and then that happened.
I talked to three different people. One of them was
Cat Collins, who's a p D over there uh At Wilde,
who was like the top forty station in San Francisco.
H Andrew Jeffreys was another one. He was just a
p D at the time for Star like a hot

(32:39):
a C. And then Don Parker, who is the operations manager,
and they're all like, hey, we don't have any gigs
the moment, but we'd love for you to come in
and just just, you know, just talk. I talked to
Cat for like two hours, just talking about radio and
life and the move, and everyone seemed to be pretty
interested in me taking the chance of quit my job
and moving out here with this girl and hopes that
things just happen to work out. And what job did

(33:01):
you get eventually. So eventually Andrew Jeffreyes was like, hey, man,
I got something for you. Um it's not a morning
show producer or anything that you were looking for, but
it's an end of the building and if you get
in and as you know, that's you know, that's the ticket.
You just want to get into the building, get that email,
get that key card. And so he's like, hey, I
have a producer position where you basically take the Seacrest
show in the local end and you localize it, inserted

(33:24):
into the system and watched the board, which is kind
of funny because later in life and I'm working for
secrets doing the opposite sending the stuff exactly. Yeah, So
how long did you do that? So? I did that
for about three to four months, and then there was
a morning show opportunity with a guy named Don blue
Uh at Star one O one three, and I became
his morning show producer from that, and then from that
did that for about a good two years. And then

(33:46):
the in the building was the JV show. He used
to do this show called The Doghouse, and him and
Rico needed a executive producer because they were gonna start
taking on affiliates and they just had they didn't have
any organization within their show, and they needed someone to
kind of help that out and in the day and
do all the day to day stuff. So I went
on did that and that was a wild ride for
a good three three or four years. What it um

(34:09):
the fact that those personalities I've ever met them before,
order them. Um. J V is a great guy, but
he's from that old school radio era of I'm gonna
piss you off to the absolute brink and watch you
break for content. So he would like push my buttons
and push my buttons and push my buttons and just
wreck me. I mean literally ripped the flesh off my skin,

(34:30):
not literally, not literally, but figuredively to get a reaction
out of me for whatever was going on. Like basically
I was the butt of every joke for everything, no
matter how hard I worked or did whatever, which at
the moment, I was like, gott I hate this guy.
This is so ridiculous, But it made me who I
am today, gave me the thick skin and gave me
the tools to take it on to the next level. Ever,
getting an off air screaming match with him on air

(34:50):
and off air, but in the off air those extremely
intense on air you can at least a little bit
ago that's for the show, like I turned it up
for the show. Sure you ever getting an off air screaming? Well,
the problem to a lot of our offer screen matches.
He'd press recording the box crow and they would turn
into an on air match without even realizing or he
or flipped the mics on. Like I cursed in the
air three or four times, said the F word, the

(35:11):
S word, not knowing it. But just because I didn't
know I was, we were alive on the radio, he
flip it on and all of a sudden, I'll be
telling to go f himself and uh. And then there
it was. Why did that relationship end? That ended because
of money and the dying need to come to l
A at some point. So you weren't getting paid enough
for what you were doing? Oh not at all. No,

(35:33):
Now you've established yourself as a producer. But are you going,
I'm a talent, Why am I producing? Or are you
like dang this producing is? Who knew where it's at? Well,
I was thinking it was a combination of both, because
then when I went to as I was leaving in
San Francisco, I made relationships in the all format, uh,
and I was like, look, I want to track. Can
I do some tracking the side to kind of have

(35:54):
my own creative thing. That's why I tracked like Stockton,
Bakersfield small markets outside what shifts? Uh? Mid day? Well,
first it was filling shifts, and then when I got
to the Seacrest Show, then I was full time midday
on a all station. So I would basically wake up
super early in the morning track that midday shift and
then go over to my desk at the secret studio
and do my job there. Did you know fun fact

(36:16):
pop up videos poop that when we were doing this show, Uh,
it really started to gain some steam. Probably had about
a hundred affiliates. Eddie and I were also doing afternoons
on a rock station under fake names, and we never
said it. Really Yeah, it was pretty cool. I was
like a Mexican dude had like a bad accent. Really
is mr their bones? Yes, yes, it was me and

(36:38):
at the time my assistant and Eddie and it was
Slappy the Wonder Boy in Zeus and Eddie would was
Slappy the Wonder Boy, and Cruz was Zeus and Eddie
was Chico. Yeah, that is so, and we did it
forever and we were just doing it. We're just going
to my office for there's a studio and out in
thirty five minutes. We were yeah while doing the Bobby

(36:58):
Bones show. Yeah, oh yeah, we just did after the
shift we walk in and we thought it was hilarious
and we would play this is a good one. I
like this one, it's the one. This one was really good.
Your Chico. Oh yeah, yeah, I like boo, that's pretty rad.

(37:21):
That's really cool. So we did that for a while.
Just can pop up videos over. Um, so you want
to go to l A. Do you have a job first? No?
So I quit that job as well. Um. And at
that point I was with my wife, I want to
say current wife, but my forever wife, my my soul mate,
and she had seen what this job had done to me,

(37:41):
the hours that I put into it, versus the compensation
I was receiving and the way I was being treated.
She's like, look, I support you. You want to go
to l A. I'll stay here in San Francisco with
my family. And she had a good job in the
city paid really really well. It's like, look, you go
ahead and go and if it works out, I'll come
down there and meet you. If it doesn't work out,
then at least come back here and we'll figure it out.
So I moved down to l A. And within a

(38:04):
few days I had a connection and I got a
job by Dr Phil Show where I was running and
doing p a work um and that. While I was
doing that, I got a phone call from my guy
named Denis Clark, who I met in San Francisco, and
he's like, Hey, I know you're in l A. I
heard you left. He goes, uh, he goes, sit tight,
I got something for you. Do you ever meet Dr Phil? Yeah,
a couple of times. Yeah, thumbs up, thumbs down, thumbs
in the middle, good and bad. I mean, I always

(38:27):
hate to say about people because you just never know
their mood that day. And he always seemed like he's
very busy and his goal was to get in and
get out. So I can't really say I didn't like
the guy. I just can say that he was just there.
You're not saying you dislike him, but you are saying
you didn't like him. Yeah, it was it wasn't different
on it. Yeah, he seemed like he was just trying
to get do his job and go home. It sounds
like you didn't have a lot of time to get

(38:48):
to know him that too. Yeah, just what it got
to know. But he was living up in a Barrely
Hills mansion, like we had a different lifestyle. I was
a runner and he was the host of the show.
So Dennis Clark, who I know as well, hits you
up instead is we got a job for you. What's
the job? And then as the supervising producer for Seacrest
National Show, and I was like, holy crap, this is
really cool. I'll entertain this. So it started off and

(39:10):
I built onto. It was basically it was very bare minimum.
You basically took the local show and you had a
team of editors and a writer and stripped it down
road pickups approved the edits and they shipped it out
and then dealt with some affiliates. Very basic, very easy,
good paying job. It was much It was much better
than Dr Phil show and working in San Francisco, So yeah,

(39:33):
it was fine. It wasn't the greatest, but it definitely
paid much better, So I was cool with it. Would
you say you were thriving or just starting to do
better than surviving? Um, I would say starting to do
better than surviving expensive. That's the thing too. If if
I made the salary anywhere else, I'd be great, But
in l A. It was very expensive with rent and
just the cost of living was really high. Drugs, drugs, Yeah,

(39:56):
Hooker's process. So you are working with Ryan. Did our
paths ever cross before you came here? There was a
couple of times. There was I think one time when
you were doing down but I didn't know you. So
there was one time you came by. I recognized you

(40:16):
because they're like, oh, it's Bobby, and I was like, oh,
it's Bobby, And then I googled and figured it out
and uh, you were what was it? What was I
doing working in the building? Well, you were, I think
in the building tracking or doing something because you were
doing Dance with the Stars, I believe. And you came
over and I think you're looking for Tanya Um, which
that's a funny story too about their producer Um. And
you were you came to the black Glass room looking
for somebody, and I guess that we were tracking and recording,

(40:37):
and so you like waved and left. But I knew
that there was a moment on that show that we
were trying to connect Tanya with you. That wasn't that
wasn't gonna happen. Yeah, it wasn't gonna happen. But but
they but she was trying to and they were trying
to not saying you reached out for it or anything,
but they were trying to make it happen. But and
I was gonna put it on the National Show and
the local producer, who I think has a crush on her,

(40:58):
he got really but hurt about it, and he was like,
I take that off. We're not airing that, And I said,
f him. So I put on the National Show anyways,
because him and I didn't get along. We butt heads
a little bit. Interesting. Yeah, So that was our first
run in first run, in the second run in was
it was actually right before I took this job, very
very close to it. We're at a hotel. I was
at the bar, and um, it's this hotel that's in

(41:19):
Hollywood at the corner of right near the mall, you know,
the what's that big mall, Beverly Hills Mall. Whatever. Anyway,
there's a hotel cross street from the mall. And we
were over at that. We were at the bar, and
when I was in the interviewing process. Before I had
actually even got to you or anyone. It was just
kind of behind the scenes of I may make this move.
I said, the bar with some friends and um, and

(41:39):
you were sitting in another area, just chilling by yourself,
and to look over and they're like and then my
friend John Maniel was like, hey, it's Bobby. And I
was like, look over, oh, because that's a weird coincidence.
And I was like, yeah, you should go and say
hid And I was like, now I'm not gonna I'm
not gonna say anything, and he goes all right, and
then we end up walking sort of together toward the
elevator to go up, and you win another elevator. I
went another. All that happened, you didn't even say hello.
I didn't say anything because I was like, didn't know,

(42:00):
you can lose it, just stay hi. But I didn't know.
I was by myself, just chilling somewhere by yourself. And
then I think I think it was maybe Jessica at
some point came over, Uh my system, your system, yeah exactly, yeah,
and she came over and and did something and you
like went away, Uh, yeah, I'm chilling at a hotel
by yourself weirdo, Scooba. Steve didn't even say hi. Well
I wanted to when I felt weird. I'm by myself

(42:21):
all the time, but not not as much anymore. But pretty, Caitlin,
they're just chilling on your phone. You give me a
look like who the hell is this guy? And I'm
just kidding. I'll probably get you look like, please a friend, anybody,
anybody be my friend. Actually, you had that thing, and
I had this like gut feeling you probably just happened
all you before we were sitting there. You want to
say hi to somebody, could be anybody of any capacity,
and you just have this feeling you should say it,
and you should say it, and you don't say it,

(42:42):
and I just almost like threw up and I was like,
I'm not gonna do this. I'm just gonna leave it.
So I didn't know Scooba, but he was recommended by
a couple of different people that I trust, and I
was like, okay, great, So Scooba flies in. We interview
was fantastic interview, like three or four people that all
were highly recommended, And because I had always just hired
people that I knew or trained, and I was like man.

(43:04):
For me to grow, I need somebody that knows things
other than what I know, because I only know what
I figured out myself. And so offered to Scuba. He
was like, I need more money. But also on the
on the quiet side, I was like, Scooba just telling
me you need more money. I was like, don't don't
take the first deal, like hold out because I knew
we were going to get him, but I also wanted

(43:24):
him to squeeze him for as much as he could get.
But was he available or how No, but that was
a whole other thing. He wasn't. He was working with Ryan,
and so I reached out to Ryan and was like, hey,
I would love to talk to Scuba, but Ryan's team
loves Scuba so much they didn't really want to get
rid of Scuba. And so there was this whole month
or so. I was like, I'd like to have Scuba
and they were like, we don't want you to have Scuba.

(43:46):
And finally I was like, it would mean a lot
to me because I want to elevate him. This will
be literally the biggest position. Finally, Ryan call was like, Okay,
you can have Scooba, but it's a little type for
a bit. It was. Yeah, it was almost a good
month and a half, two months going back and forth,
and I had to wait for Ryan because Ryan was
on vacation of the moment, and then when he came back,
and then we eventually had to have the conversation over
the phone, which wasn't what I wanted. I want to
talk to him face to face because I have a

(44:07):
lot of respect from him, and he really helped me
out with my career at that moment and did a
lot for me and I learned a lot from him.
It was pretty cool to work with Ryan seacrest Um.
And we had that weird conversation on the phone where
I kept cutting out and I would say something, go,
What's that? I had all planned out, like bullet points
of what I wanted to say, and I had to
keep saying it over and over and over, and eventually
I was like, God, he's not gonna get what I'm
trying to say. But at the end he kind of
understood what He's also what I'm trying to hear. He

(44:28):
is that you want to grow, You're looking to move
your family to a different location and increase your pay.
I'm like, hey, he goes, I'm totally cool with that.
I hate to see you go. I love you, you
work hard, You're one of the best employees on my team.
But if this is what you want, I give you
my blessing. And I was like, perfect, coolest what I
was looking for was his blessing. And then he called me.
I was like, yeah, fine, you know, I was like,
thank thank you. Yeah. So I moved over um and

(44:52):
here you are. Now, how do you feel a year?
And this last year has been weird though, so it's
kind of hard to It hasn't been extremely normal, but
it hasn't been for anyone. But you've almost put your
entire existence here abnormal it has been it's if the
abnormal has become normal. It's been weird because you come
to the city and it's a fun, cool city to
go out and do things and check things out, and
you really can't. And my wife, we have a kid,

(45:12):
and she was pregnant throughout this pandemic, and so I
was also very paranoid about going anywhere and seeing anything.
And you meet labels and people and everyone's wearing a mask,
so you don't know what anyone looks like. You meet
him six seven times. It's been a really weird year,
but it's been a cool year and it's helped me
grow a lot as a person and as an employee.
So it's been weird, but it's been cool and I'm
down with it. Another kid, get two kids now? Yeah? Um,

(45:33):
And you talked about Dr Phil, I talked about Ryan
Secret What about me? Thumbs up? Thumbs down? Now you're
great your thumbs up. What's the hardest part of executive
producing my show? About me? What's the hardest part about me?
About you personally? About me as a talent? Like what's
the what are you constantly like, oh my god, I
don't know how I'm gonna get this or get him

(45:53):
to do this, or like, what is the the thing
that you go to your wife and complain the most
about me? Well, I don't complain to her because this
is the one job I will say I haven't complained
about anything because I finally found a position where I
feel like, Okay, this is like you talked about, It's
a great position, it's a growing position. It's a show
that's thriving. There are a lot of people when I
got this job, like damn, dude, you got the position,
Like that's the show to be on because that show

(46:14):
is growing and the company believes in it. And I've
noticed that through my conference calls and meetings. This is
the show the company is backing and believes them, which
is great. So I made the right decision. I think.
One thing, Um, and it's also my problem too, is
because you're someone who has done a lot of it yourself,
and because you've you know, you've even told me we
had meetings before in the past, like, hey man, there
was one time I had seven commerses and I was

(46:35):
running this and doing this whole thing and figuring out
everything on my own. You have. It's that kind of
personality where you're like, look, this is me, this is
my baby. It's tough to let go. But you even
preface it when I had the interview, like, hey, look man,
this is a group of people that we've been together
for a long time. This is it's gonna be tough
to jump in. Somebody knew everyone's been together for ten
plus years. You know, you're the new guy. You got
to kind of find your way in, and I found

(46:58):
my way, and I feel like with pretty much every buddy, Um,
I would say everyone, Yeah, except for Mike. Mike doesn't
seem really like it doesn't. Yeah, it's okay though, Um,
so it's been the control that yeah, me going, I
still need control, yes, and I but I but I'm
also a personal understands that because I'm also the exact
same personality type. So if I didn't have that type

(47:19):
of personality, I'd be like, man, what the hell do
why does he just give me a little more control?
But I understand that, And I also understand this is
a long term game and it's a building the relationship
and getting you to trust to me, which I feel
like that has grown over this last year of gaining
some sort of trust and also just letting you know, like, hey, look,
I would never crap on the show. I would never
ruin it. I would never do anything that would jeopardize
you or this show. So I hope that over this

(47:42):
next few years that we continue to grow and build
on that so you can get more trust to me.
And I understand that. I get that. I'm totally fine
with that. I do feel I've got a little better
at it, though you have a little bit, yeah, yeah,
a little bit. In the beginning, it was I was like, damn,
I pitched ideas or things or say stuff for even
just like little things like within the show content, and
I'm like, okay, all right, and I would beat myself
down on like I get it. This is show, this

(48:02):
is your show. It's got your name on it. I
respect that a hunter and ten percent um. So I
just for me, it's it's a it's a it's a
process to to kind of just get you to really
trust me to where we can have that relationship to
where all right, cooy, you got it, this is your thing.
I want to do like Maddie the Morning Mike and
just walking and everything's done. Yeah, I think I want that,
But then I can never do you can't do that.

(48:23):
It's tough. And I understand that maybe it'd be cool.
There are a lot of personalities that have that where
they walk in and there's a stack of papers and
it's all organized from top of show dan to show
and they literally look at it, read it and just
go from one to the next, one to the next.
But then those shows don't have the life that this
show has. So I've also come to understanding that that's
okay that it is in that way, because this show

(48:43):
wouldn't be where it is if if you weren't more
in control of it because this is your brand, this
is your product, and I feel like the way we
do it is is actually it's okay and it's fine,
and it works. That's better than okay and fine, you
know what I mean. I mean it is a mediocre.
It's fair, you know, milk toast, it's pretty good. It's

(49:04):
pretty good. Well, okay. On the opposite, what's the best thing,
the best thing? Um? I would say that this show,
it has been inclusive and they have invited me in
and not on the personal level like teach me to shotgun, Eddie,
but I don't hang out, but at work, I would
say this team has been more inviting and more welcoming
and more open to me coming onto the show being

(49:26):
the guy that's the newest of this show, and that's
been the coolest. And everyone has been accepting of me
and and has allowed me to come in and work
with me and work well with me, which has been cool.
We're gonna end this on one Eddie question. Okay, Eddie,
what's the one question that you'd like to ask Cooper Steve.
It's Friday night, you got nothing to do? What are

(49:47):
you ordering to eat? And what are you gonna watch
on TV? Wow? Okay, he starts to cry. All that
other stuff doesn't do anything. Now he starts to get emotional.
My mom wants um, but if I'm in this city,
I don't know what I'm eating. But if I'm eating
in a city that has my food that I want,
I'm eating at Little Taiocha and Vanys, California. What is that?

(50:07):
What is that? It's Thai food, Um, Thai food Vanuys, California.
They got this amazing orange chicken. They got this pork,
this fried pork belly with buck choi and Chinese broccoli
dipped in this like amazing black sauce. I don't know
what it is. That's some sort of like soy sauce
mixed with Hoiston sauce. A couple of other things. Uh
they're hot drops soup. Uh they're Vietnamese coffee or tea,

(50:31):
whatever it is. And probably watching I would say Law
and Order, um, Special Victims Unit or Criminal Intent. Brothers, sisters.
I'm the oldest of four, twin brother and sister and
little sister. Parents still alive, Moms alive, Dad passedway recently,
but we didn't have a relationship so step dad. I

(50:51):
have three stepdads. Wow, that was cool. No, it wasn't.
On the next episode. Yeah, I've been married twice. It's
signed with your forever wife, correct, my soulmate. Okay, I
feel like Edd, you learned something here. Yeah. Man, I'm
telling you, this guy's full of stories and and we're
gonna go on and on and like in a few months,

(51:14):
you're gonna find something. We would be like, what, Oh
my gosh, we gotta talk about this, more about this,
because that's what it is. Dude. He's got all kinds
of stories like the man, the mansion he lived in,
things like that, and then like like even my wife
the other day was just like he really found dead
bodies in his house. Were not bodies, dead people. Yeah,
this up. You can't make it up. Though, I just

(51:34):
found nine dead bodies, a monkey and a talking dog.
Stop it, Like how I just made that up? Though?
I came here in a spaceship. Okay, all right, scool Steve,
Thank you. I follow Scooba Steve on Instagram, Instagram, Twitter, Yes,
but you don't know my handles at at Scuba Steve Radio.

(51:56):
I did see the b team Facebook page. Now people
follow you the other day. Yeah, yeah, they're cool. I
don't do facebooks. I don't check that out. No, no,
they were. They have a Facebook. I don't do Facebook.
They have a Facebook group. It's actually the only good
Facebook group with our show because our show page is evil.
But um, they were like, better go follow scoobasve on Instagram. Cool, awesome,
Thank you much followers. All right, that's it, Thank you
very much, Scoobasy everybody. Bobby and Eddie's music school is

(52:19):
now in session, up in the morning and out coming
up in a few minutes. A really cool interview that
I did with Don McClain, who wrote American Pie, Bye,
American Pie Room, Shift to the Living but the Living
was drying. What a jam. I wonder if kids now

(52:40):
know it, because we weren't alive when it came out,
but we still love it and learned the words for
most of it. And like after he called in or whatever,
I talked to my brother on the way home and
I was like, dude, we talked to Don McClean today
and he goes, uh, who is that? And I'm like,
my brother knows music like we do, and he's like,
oh right, right, American Pie Man. I haven't heard that
a long time. I'm like, dank, dude, and you're a

(53:00):
music fan. Maybe with another big movie to come out
and kind of put it back in there. Maybe, Well,
so before we talk to him, and it's the fifty
anniversary of the song, the day that music died that
song was written about is February third, nineteen fifty nine.
It was a plane crash that claimed the lives of
Buddy Holly, who I love and even have mimicked my

(53:20):
esthetics as my look Buddy Holly and weez are two nerds.
I was like, man, they're cool, they're nerds. I'm gonna
look like them, Richie Balance, the big bopper, and the
pilot Roger Peterson, which you I guess you don't hear
about because he wasn't famous. This year marks the sixty
second anniversary anniversary of that tragedy, which means the best
twelve years until the song was written. Doing the math here,

(53:41):
so the date was coined the day the music died
in the lyric to that song from Don McClane. There
you heard that deep inside the music. So the Winner
Dance Party was a tour featuring and let's play a

(54:01):
clip of each of them, Buddy Holly, but you may
know that would be the day when you say good by.
Richie Valen's LaBamba for sure, the Big Bopper, Hello Baby,
come on, Hello Baby, and Helsto on the tour, Oh

(54:29):
Dion Waylon Jennings, Whalen Jennings, Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
so Whyland It's all four of those. But he was
part of the crickets. He was part of He was
there right, he was in the plane, he was in
the whole situation that happened here. And so the tour
was happening. Things were not going great behind the scenes.
The musicians route had been poorly designed. They were going
far out of the way to get to a show

(54:50):
then having to go back. They were playing as many
shows as they could. They did twenty four shows in
twenty four days, and again not routed right. Thinking about
a concert now if you try to roun in order
because you don't want to go California, then Florida, then
Texas than Maine. But this show was routed terribly. About
a weekend to the tour, the heating system on the
bus broke. A bunch of them that were just the crew,

(55:13):
the band. They had to be hospitalized because of frost bite.
So this is happening the Big Bopper, you know, hello
babe and Richie Valens, a little little bomba got flu
like symptoms and so they were like, oh man, this sucks.
Everything was like in a bad spot. Shows weren't going great,
nobody was feeling good. They played a show in clear Lake, Iowa.

(55:35):
Buddy Holly, who was cold and frustrated, was like, I
ain't taking the bus because they were going Iowa, Minnesota.
He for sure was the most successful out of everyone,
the almost money out of everyone, not taking the freaking bus.
So it reached out to Dwire Flying Service and he said, hey,
then in an airplane, so okay. Twenty one year old
pilot Roger Peterson was like, all right, let's do it.

(55:57):
And I think it was about forty bucks a person
on this flight back then, probably very expensive. So Whiteland
Jennings was initially supposed to fly, but gave up his
spot to the Big Bopper because the Big Bopper was
starting to get sick. The next one, Richie Valens and
this other guy all stop, all sup, Tommy yo, right,

(56:18):
flipped a coin Ritchie Vallens one, but not really because
the plane crash. So before heading to the airport, Whalen
Jennings tease buddy Holly saying, I hope you're all plane crashes,
because he was just going being funny, like you're getting
to go on this. I'll meet you back. I'm gonna
be cold, but I'll meet you back. But an illness

(56:40):
kept Jennings from getting on the plane, and then a
coin flip put Ritchie Vallens on the plane. Ritchie Palonen
was a teenager too, so shortly after midnight February three,
at the airport they gathered their their crap. They hurried up.
There was snowing like crazy. At approximately am, they took

(57:00):
off from Runaway seventeen which is now Runway eighteen, and
Dwyer watched from below as the plane lifted into the
dark wintry night and away it went. Then three minutes later,
the plane's tail lights entered into uh kind of a
bad spot, vanished from sight. They called no response, So
there you go. That was it and whenever it got

(57:23):
light because they couldn't find it when it was dark.
This Dwyer the plane guy, right, Jerry Dwyer, the guy
that the Dwyer Plank service. The company. He got up
on a plane tried to retrace their route, hoping he
would see nothing, because if you see nothing, maybe it
got somewhere. But in a corn filled less than six
miles northwest of the airport, he saw the wreckage. Debris

(57:44):
have been scattered more than five feet across the field. Um,
the music, as they now says, died. I haven't seen this,
but I've heard that in the Rock and Roll Museum
in Seattle, I believe, uh, they have Buddy's glasses that
were found there, and then there are a lot of
artifacts that they took from kind of the plane crash
site whatever they still have. But um, I mean, dude,

(58:07):
I have I've just kind of of course, I'm a
music fan. I've looked in a lot of this stuff,
and I've seen autopsy reports pretty crazy, just like just
reading autopsy reports looking at the time, like plane crash,
It's it's just available. I think through the years, people
have just been wanting to know more about the plane
crash and what had happened and all that and what
they found when they when they got there. So I've
I've definitely read a lot about this stuff. Buddy Holly

(58:29):
released three albums in his lifetime. He had one number
one song that will be the Day what You're here
right here? He had a couple of them were top
three hits, like Pig su Pig every Day from Buddy Holly,
Here you Go. That's probably my favorite day. It's a

(58:50):
little closer, Oh boy, this is a jam you don't
Know what You being and missing Oh boy, oh boy.
That reminds me of Obama the movie Crying Wait and
Hope and was so good Wait Hope and you Come Back.

(59:14):
Do you know these songs? The songs? Also, it's the
forty two anniversary of Richie Vallen's death. Yeah, so I'll
tell you a a little bit about just kind of going
down memory lane of Richie Vallen's Obviously I wasn't alive,
but uh, you know, I didn't realize that his career
only lasted for about two years. He got signed really young.
I think he was fifteen when he signed with Delphi Records.

(59:36):
And it was tricky because his name was Ricardo. Ricardo
Valenzuela was his birth was his birth name, and they
were like, you know, hey, dude, we're gonna have to
change your first name one to Ritchie because they're just
a lot of uh, you know, Richie's right now, Like
I guess a little Richie was around, was around at
that time, Yeah, a little Richard, but there are any Richie's,
a lot of Richards. So so we're gonna go with

(59:57):
Richie on that one. And then Valenzuela they shortened to
Valence to not really so they can take away his demographic.
They feared that if he came out as a Hispanic
American it would be the kind of the violence weela.
Only the Hispanics and the Latinos in America would like him.
So he's like, let's get everyone to like you, and
we'll just change your name to Richie Valens. And from
watching the movie you Know, which was really big in

(01:00:19):
the eighties, uh, it seemed like he wasn't cool with that,
but he went with it because he knew he had
to do it if he was gonna be a rock
and roll star, but as good dude. So he signed
with him, and then of course he had his first song,
come On, Let's Go. That was his first hit. Oh
yeah that one, right? Yeah? What else you got? They
he wrote Donna after a Girl, which was baller. Dude,

(01:00:43):
You write it, you write it after a girl that
you like, you sing it to her and then that's
that was his girl, his last girl from it. Yeah,
that's a good one and obviously his biggest one. Obviously
the biggest hit La Bomba, which was huge because he
took a a Mexican folk song and turned into a
rock roll smash like there was. This isn't the version.
The version of Labama that everyone knew at that time

(01:01:04):
in the fifties was very folklodical is what they call it.
And it's just very acoustic guitar Labama, you know, like,
so he made it a rock and roll jam in
America loved it and it was awesome, dude, and he
was really flying. And it's just so sad that he
died at age seventeen when he was really on a
roll to just becoming a big star. Obviously, we don't

(01:01:26):
know what he could have done, how long that he
would have been a star, but sad to see him,
you know, with these three songs that had some good
success and then nothing. Well, I'm obviously a big Buddy
Holly fan shout out Lubbick, Texas obviously, uh, and you're
a big Ritchie balance. I wish we had somebody to
speak up with a big bomber here, I know, Mike babe. Alright,

(01:01:48):
So that's music school. It's just good to know that
in case you didn't know that, because when you hear
Don McClean talk about stuff is a point of reference there.
One of the things Don talked about that was really
surprising to me was that, uh, buddy as kind of
has been at that point, like he hadn't hitten We'll
let people hear it if the interview hasn't even happened yet.
I thought it was before this. Well, when you're listening

(01:02:10):
to listen for that part, you've been shocked to. This is,
by the way, check out the store Losers. That's Eddie
Sports podcast. Yes, this week we have Chris from Low
Cash on. He's actually going to the super Bowl, so
he talks a little bit about that how he gets
to go to these cool games, uh, amazing athletes that
he's met before in cool stories. And when I asked him,
I said, do you would you freak out more with
famous musicians or famous athletes? And he's a musician, goes

(01:02:33):
no athletes for sure, And I'm like that's crazy, you're
a musician. But he loves athletes. He loves sports. So
check out the store, losers. That's what's up, all right,
Thank you, glad. That was Bobby and Eddie's music school.
He don, How are you fine? How are you hey?
Pretty good? Big day celebrating fifty years. I mean when
you look back at something obviously that is so iconic

(01:02:54):
with with your song, But does fifty years seemed like
yesterday or does it seem like literally for ever ago?
Both of those things. It's uh, it's forever and it's yesterday.
There you go, yesterday is forever. You just wrote another
one down fifty years from now. I'm gonna be singing
that back. How do you spell your name? B o? Any? Okay,

(01:03:15):
I'll make this sure you put that on there? Yeah yeah,
I put that on that. Hey, So to me, I
talked to a lot of songwriters and a lot of
songwriter friends, and some songs they can literally remember when
they're in the room, and some songs that are big
hits they can't. And they're like, you know, I wrote
so many songs I don't quite remember that with American Pie,
can you still see yourself in the room, you know,
coming up with ideas, putting pen to paper. Yes, I

(01:03:36):
have a very good memory of a lot of stuff
like that, almost like a child. Um, I know exactly
what I was doing. I was sitting in a little
chair that had rockers on it, and I used to
rock in this little room and it was a school
room chair made out of oak. And I have a
little typewriter and I type on it. And so that's

(01:03:57):
probably where I typed the song up in the little
room in cold Spring, New York, where I wrote a
lot of songs. Do you finish and go? I think
we got something here that is gonna have a heavy
commercial appeal. Where do you go? I don't ever think that.
When did you first get that feedback to where they're like, man,
there's something to this, not just commercially but culturally. I
time passed, but I can tell you from the very

(01:04:20):
beginning the song was a phenomenon. Um I had. I
had a year which where I was almost like the Beatles.
Everywhere I went, I was on the news, UM audience
were would swoon, girls would pass out. I had. I
really had that sort of teen idle thing for about

(01:04:42):
a year, I would say, because of the song. And
then there was a sort of backlash against it. Um
Rolling Stone wrote a lousy review and started to destroy
my career. But they couldn't stop the song. It kept
going and going and going, and it I kept going.
And fifty years past, I've had a lot of ups

(01:05:05):
and downs. I've had several comebacks. This is one of
them right now. Yes, and I'm glad to be a
part of a don I always love a good comeback story.
I've got quite a few. Um. The song comes into
a little a little more than eight minutes, and I
was looking at some some chart data here. I'm always
impressed by people that that kind of set standards and
break records. And that's the longest song to ever hit

(01:05:26):
number one of the pop chart. Now with it being
eight minutes, did you guys plan to fully go all
eight minutes in or did you have a shorter version
in case it wasn't getting played on radio. I just
I told you already I don't think about commercial things.
I just did it and I presented what I do,
which every real um. Most groups that are important or

(01:05:52):
singers that are important really create what they do and
either the record company likes it or they don't. Uh. Um.
So in my case, I do a lot of different things,
you know, and I love you. So it is a
very popular song, the most recorded song I ever wrote.
A lot of people don't even know I wrote that song,
my version of Crying, which was number one, and people

(01:06:14):
hear that a lot probably don't even know it's me.
Um So I do a lot of different things, but
the song artistically had to be the length that it
was in order to completely satisfy the story that I
was telling. So I gave the album to them. They
love the album, They loved the song. They immediately didn't
even ask me. They cut it down to two and

(01:06:35):
a half minutes, put it on the radio, went to
number one, and then people bought the album, and then
they started to play the full version and that went
to number one. Back February three is the date. That
is the day the music died after you know what,
Buddy Holly, who I'm a massive fan of, obviously the
big bopper Richie Ballence, can you vividly remember that day?

(01:06:57):
I know you talk about in the song, but do
you remember that day? And only? Man? I really should
do something with this at some point. No, I never
thought about doing anything with anything. I just I'm all
hard that's all I am. I I'm very sentimental. It
was a painful thing for me. I was thirteen years
old and it was the first, you know, personal death

(01:07:20):
I had ever experienced, except maybe for a cat or
a dog. And um it stayed with me and for forever.
But I remember that nobody really cared. I went to school,
I said, buddy, Holly died and they said, now, so
what you know, he hadn't been on the charts in
two years. It wasn't a big deal now, of course,

(01:07:43):
you know, if that story was a big story in Texas,
the old different thing, he was there, boy, you know.
And but in America, we didn't look back in those days.
If somebody died, that was it, you know, and you
moved on and you didn't spend this time mourning and
remembering and going back and over and over. But American

(01:08:07):
Pie is the ultimate song of mourning, really mourning the
country mourning him. And that's partly what's resonates with people
in this country now and also perhaps even created part
of the reason why the country is the way it is.
I don't know, but there was a need to hold
onto things. Uh, We've been through a war and a depression,

(01:08:30):
and there's a lot of things that were lost. So
you didn't hold on to the death of a rock
and roll star who was off the charts for two years.
We didn't hold on to things like that. You moved
forward and you sucked it up and forgot about it,
like they do in Israel. But you know, all of
a sudden, now we're always talking about Elvis in Maryland.

(01:08:51):
And you know, I even have a song about George Reeves, Superman.
You know, he's one of the secondary deaths. You know
that now and then get talked about. But no, I
had somebody called this Day and the third of February
the day that music died, and that stuck. And I'm
so happy about that because to have my song and

(01:09:14):
something that I did be part of this monumental the
day and it's the death of this monumental singer. And
let's not sell short Richie Valence, who was seventeen years
old and was already making hit records. And we have
a lot of um Spanish people in our country now

(01:09:34):
that come from Mexico and South America, and they're terrific,
terrific hardworking people. And he's there guy, you know, and
those records. Linger on Donna is really one of the
great hit songs of the fifties, unforgettable once you hear it.
So you know, Buddy was the template for all the
rock bands that came later. It wasn't like Elvis. Elvis

(01:09:57):
had a choral group behind him in the form of
that weird in Theirs, But Buddy had the double guitars
and the whole thing the Rolling Stones do. And he
wrote sixty songs maybe, and every one of those is
a hit. And I don't think John Lennon, Paul mccarton,
or anybody else has done that. Two more questions for you.
I'm just very appreciate to be talking with you. I
read this online, and I know everything online is not true.

(01:10:19):
Some things about myself get written not true. But I
read that you make half a million dollars per year
and just royalties on this song. I make a lot
of money on all my music from all over the world,
and I don't know how much money I make from
that song. If it's used in a major advertisement of
the sync license, it would be more than that. UM

(01:10:42):
It's I have two hundred songs that are played in
UM ninety two countries every day. It's a lot of
songs and a lot of places. I'll be honest with you.
One other thing. You know, growing up as a kid,
I was a big weird al fan. When he parodies
your song, do you get to her at first? And
do you get irritated with it? Well? No, I love

(01:11:03):
these things when they're done well. And altos everything well. Um,
and he's a terrific guy. Um. I loved it. And
I couldn't believe what a great recording it was and
how funny it was. And he's he's you know, he's
just a good guy and a and a good hearted guy,
and he does a something that is just purely entertaining

(01:11:25):
and uh and fun and I love him. I mean,
I was very happy and I was honored that he
did that. I mentioned a few things that you have
going on here. The feature length documentary The Day the
Music Died, the story behind Don mcclean's American Pie, set
for release at the end of He'll be featured on
a new recording of American Pie with the country group
Home Free. And then tell me about this new stage

(01:11:45):
play that because you have so many great songs, um,
so what's happening with that? And what's that going to be. Well,
the same people that did the Carol King Broadway show
I have a contract with now and they put money
into this. They're gonna do this and it's gonna be
one of these kind of songbook shows, you know, with

(01:12:07):
a lot of my songs and a storyline supposedly and
probably about my journey. Um as this children's book is
also about me as a child. Um. So everything I
do is personal. So no matter how much you might
like any song of mine, it was always comes back
to some event in my life. And in the case

(01:12:29):
of American Pie, of course, it starts with me being
a paper boy and I it's the only job I
ever had in my life was as a paper boy. So,
um that's the personal part that's in this song. Don McClean,
one of the most respected songwriters in American history, thank
you for sharing your story. Good luck. Sounds like you've
got so much going on. Hey to countries right now
jamming and Don McClean hits. Can't get enough of that

(01:12:50):
baby swing it all right, Don gonna talk to you Bud,
all right. Thank you