Joe Scarborough isn’t just a onetime congressman turned cable-TV talker, nor even just a handsome face. No, he is a rock ’n’ roller, a singer, a guitarist, and a (more than) prolific songwriter. He is—if the publicity hoo-ha accompanying his new extended-play recording is to be believed—“this year’s most surprising debut artist.”

Don’t scoff! There’s ample precedent, not just for serious musicians with day gigs (modernist composer Charles Ives was an insurance executive) but even for television personalities with instrumental skills: John Tesh traded in Entertainment Tonight for a career tickling new-age pap out of the piano; Fox News correspondent Doug McKelway is a fine bluegrass banjo player; Walter Cronkite was an accomplished bassoonist. (Okay, that last bit was a joke—The Most Trusted Man in America actually played the saxophone.)