Steven Paul Smith was born at Clarkson Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska. His mother, Bunny Welch (née Bunny Kay Berryman), was a music teacher at an elementary school, and his father, Gary Smith, was a University of Nebraska medical student at the time. His parents divorced about a year later, and Smith moved with his mother to live in Duncanville, Texas. Much later in his life, Smith got a tattoo Read more...

Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years," he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance Read more...

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 only expecting a deal for a seven-inch Read more...