Praise for Steve's CD: "...full of strange-yet-rewarding twists and surprises. ..It's a goofy treat that will leave you hungry for a second helping." (more) --Port Huron Herald Tribune 12/16/05 "Steve Amick's Words Shine on New CD **** Amick knows how to choose the best ingredients when he decides to whip up a 'Pie' such as this... 'Pie,' sliced into 12 tasty tracks, proves that dessert can be a nourishing meal all by itself." (more) --Ann Arbor News 1/21/06 "I guess I have to be doing all these things," says Steve, referring to his interest in music as well as other aspects of the arts. (That's his own drawing of the town of Weneshkeen you see as the cover illustration of his debut novel.) "Even the ones I don't do as well. They seem to sort of fuel each other, spur them on, keep the energy going…There's a fine line between Renaissance man and scatterbrain. And I think we all recognize which side of that line I'm tilting toward." From high school through college and even up into grad school, when he was supposed to be focused full time on working to deserve his fellowships, Steve played in bands with names like The Angry Neighbors, The Big Garage and Steve Amick & His Own Worst Enemies. Back when he was giving music an equal balance with his writing, there was a 45 single, some college airplay and a nice review in The Washington Post, calling him "a cheerful black humorist who is seriously askew." He couldn't help noticing that that could have just as easily been said about his fiction—and writing fiction didn't involve lugging a Fender Twin and a P.A. up and down apartment stairs at two in the morning. He stopped playing out, and though the songwriting continued— shifting slightly, infused with the mellowing that comes with both age and the lower volume of an acoustic guitar—it was, for years, for private consumption only. That began to change when he moved back to his hometown of Ann Arbor in the late 90s. Soon, he was a townie again in a great community of artists and musicians, and so monkeying with music again, on some level, became unavoidable as a source of social interaction. And with that came an unexpected thing: encouragement from a few well-respected musician friends. Now, he dabbles, continuing to write his original "goofy-sweet" songs, sit in with pals for a song or two, provide the occasional opening act or fills out a bill for the odd charity event. Public performance is a rarer thing these days, but now, he says, it's fun. "I can swing opening act these days," he says. "Maybe. That's just about enough for everyone. I'm just not a headliner guy, I now see. Along about the second set or so, they start to harbor outrageous expectations like wanting you to sing well or to play more than a few chords per song, and anyway, I've got stories that need writing." Still, it is fun. And definitely not your average fare. Click on the links above for information about Steve's new CD, There's Always Pie... and to listen to tracks from the jukebox in the Wobbly Moose in Weneshkeen, Michigan.