Question:
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Clarkson Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child of Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Smith later had a tattoo of a map of Texas drawn on his upper arm and said: "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."
His first release, Roman Candle (1994), came about when Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of "the most recent eight songs that [he'd] recorded on borrowed four-tracks and borrowed guitar" to Cavity Search Records. Owner Christopher Cooper immediately requested to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record.  Regarding the record, Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular ... The thing is that album was really well received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately." Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the Northwest--Mudhoney and Nirvana--and going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."  The instrumentation of the recordings was primarily acoustic guitar, occasionally accompanied by brief electric guitar riffs or a small drum set played with brushes. Only the final track, an instrumental titled "Kiwi Maddog 20/20" (a reference to the low-end fortified wine), had full band instrumentation.  One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks. Soon after this performance, Smith was asked to open for Mary Lou Lord on a week-long U.S. tour. She later recorded one of his songs, "I Figured You Out", which he had discarded for sounding "too much like the Eagles".  The same year, Smith released a split 7" single with Pete Krebs, contributing the track "No Confidence Man" as the single's B-side.
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What else was he doing in 1994?

Answer:
1994), came about when Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of "the most recent eight songs that [he'd] recorded on borrowed four-tracks and borrowed guitar


Question:
Marvin Neil Simon (born July 4, 1927) is an American playwright, screenwriter and author. He has written more than 30 plays and nearly the same number of movie screenplays, mostly adaptations of his plays. He has received more combined Oscar and Tony nominations than any other writer. Simon grew up in New York during the Great Depression, with his parents' financial hardships affecting their marriage, giving him a mostly unhappy and unstable childhood.
Two years later, he quit his job as a mailroom clerk in the Warner Brothers offices in Manhattan to write radio and television scripts with his brother Danny Simon, including tutelage by radio humourist Goodman Ace when Ace ran a short-lived writing workshop for CBS. They wrote for the radio series The Robert Q. Lewis Show, which led to other writing jobs. Max Liebman hired the duo for his popular television comedy series Your Show of Shows, for which he earned two Emmy Award nominations. He later wrote scripts for The Phil Silvers Show; the episodes were broadcast during 1958 and 1959.  Simon credits these two latter writing jobs for their importance to his career, stating that "between the two of them, I spent five years and learned more about what I was eventually going to do than in any other previous experience." He adds, "I knew when I walked into Your Show of Shows, that this was the most talented group of writers that up until that time had ever been assembled together." Simon describes a typical writing session with the show:  There were about seven writers, plus Sid, Carl Reiner, and Howie Morris...Mel Brooks and maybe Woody Allen would write one of the other sketches ... everyone would pitch in and rewrite, so we all had a part of it ... It was probably the most enjoyable time I ever had in writing with other people.  Simon incorporated some of their experiences into his play Laughter on the 23rd Floor (1993). A 2001 TV adaptation of the play won him two Emmy Award nominations. The first Broadway show Simon wrote was Catch a Star! (1955), collaborating on sketches with his brother, Danny.
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Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?

Answer:
Max Liebman hired the duo for his popular television comedy series Your Show of Shows, for which he earned two Emmy Award nominations.


Question:
Thirty Seconds to Mars (commonly stylized as 30 Seconds to Mars) is an American rock band from Los Angeles, California, formed in 1998. The band consists of Jared Leto (lead vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards), Shannon Leto (drums, percussion) and Tomo Milicevic (lead guitar, bass, violin, keyboards, other instruments). The band's debut album, 30 Seconds to Mars (2002), was produced by Bob Ezrin and released to positive reviews but only to limited commercial success. The band achieved worldwide fame with the release of their second album A Beautiful Lie (2005), which received multiple certifications all over the world, including platinum in the United States.
Thirty Seconds to Mars launched a website, called abeautifullie.org, to provide information about environmental issues and ways to participate in environmental activities. People can make donations through the site to support the Natural Resources Defense Council. In 2006, Jared Leto created the cover art for The 97X Green Room: Volume 2, a compilation of live music that includes a Thirty Seconds to Mars song, which proceeds from the sales benefited The Nature Conservancy. During their Welcome to the Universe Tour, the group worked to develop strategies that would minimize fuel consumption to offset the impact that the tour would have had on the environment.  In June 2008, the band joined Habitat for Humanity to work on a home being repaired and renovated through the Greater Los Angeles Area's "A Brush With Kindness" programme. In advance of the build, the band organized an auction of "build slots" to give fans the opportunity to volunteer alongside them. In less than a week, six extra workers were enlisted and over $10,000 was raised to fund additional Habitat for Humanity projects. Thirty Seconds to Mars fans, termed as the Echelon, started several philanthropic organizations and projects with the purpose of supporting various charities and humanitarian causes.  After the 2010 Haiti earthquake, Thirty Seconds to Mars raised $100,100 for Haitian relief through a charity auction. The band has also supported the Haitian population through the Echelon project "House for Haiti" and Hope For Haiti Now telethon special. The group auctioned a quantity of items raising funds to help the Red Cross assist people affected by the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. The band contributed one dollar per concert ticket sold on the Carnivores Tour to the charity Music for Relief to support disaster relief and programs to protect and restore the environment.
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Did they donate any money?

Answer:
opportunity to volunteer alongside them. In less than a week, six extra workers were enlisted and over $10,000 was raised to fund additional Habitat for Humanity projects.