Country Queen Tami Neilson at Her Imperious Best

“She’s laden with every music award her adopted homeland New Zealand can muster, but the queen of Kiwi country [Canada-born Tami Neilson] deserves a wider audience,” The Observer’s Neil Spencer writes in a review of Kingmaker. “This fifth album may help locate it, boasting a duet with Willie Nelson on Beyond the Stars, a waltz full of tumbling guitars and sweeping strings with Neilson soaring effortlessly above.”

“Strong-voiced 50s divas such as Patsy Cline – of whom Willie is reminded – remain a central strand of Neilson’s work and she handles a potentially saccharine number with brio, its accompanying video exhibiting Neilson’s impressive way with gothic frockery,” Spencer writes.

Original article by Neil Spencer, The Observer, June 25, 2022.