Pat Reedy makes honest honky-tonk music for the modern world, mixing twang, blue-collar songwriting, working-class pride, and an unconventional backstory.

His songs — with their warm, rough-around-the-edges charm — sound different than the contemporary country-pop hits recorded in Reedy's adopted hometown of Nashville. In a city full of Hollywood cowboys and wannabe outlaws, Reedy is the real deal, more influenced by the artists who filled the airwaves during his childhood years — including Dwight Yoakam, Mark Chesnutt, and George Jones — than anything in today's mainstream.

Michelle Billingsley sings about a whole lot of subjects considered taboo for polite women. Though you might not catch it on first listen—she wraps her charmingly cutting lyrics in boisterous acoustic strumming, her dryly dark sense of humor and a (whip)smart-assed vocal delivery. It all sounds a bit like Emmylou Harris went through the looking glass.