Songwriter Michael McDermott has a big name in his corner: novelist Stephen King calls him "one of the best songwriters in the world and possibly the greatest undiscovered rock ‘n’ roll talent of the last 20 years.” The anthemic, arena-filling “Scars From Another Life” (from his album "Hit Me Back") paints the a picture of how far Michael McDermott has come: “I was so down .. I had completely lost my way / When I hit Broadway I began to realize / That all they are are scars from another life.” His life since becoming a recording artist—full of myriad highest highs, gutter-skimming lows, and absolute rock bottoms of the past two decades—could read like a screenplay, but with stories so ridiculously outlandish that they couldn’t possibly be true. All of it—the addiction, the failed relationships, the financial dramas, the career hurdles—has left plenty of scars, but Michael McDermott is moving on, moving up, and taking charge. He makes no excuses for his past—it has made him who he is today—but sings to everyone listening (and to himself): “Don’t run away, they’re scars from another life.”

A self-described late bloomer in songwriting, Amy Speace landed in New York City after college to pursue a life in theater. In her early 20s she picked up a pawn-shop guitar, wrote her first songs, and found herself with steady gigs at such storied venues as The Bitter End and The Living Room. Judy Collins signed Amy to her own Wildflower Records label in 2006, releasing "Songs for Bright Street" to critical acclaim. That record included a duet with The Jayhawks’ Gary Louris and spent months at the top of the Folk and Americana Roots charts. NPR noted that Speace's "velvety, achy voice recalls an early Lucinda Williams.” In 2010, John Platt of NYC’s premiere AAA radio station WFUV named Amy’s song “The Weight of the World” #4 in his list of the “Best Folk Songs of the Decade,” a song that Judy Collins herself would record and call “one of the best political folk songs I’ve ever heard." Since moving to Nashville, Amy's writing has taken on a country flavor without losing any of its earlier layers. She comes to Michigan with "That Kind of Girl," a new album of country post-breakup songs.