Tami Neilson’s career is long and storied. The short version is that she began with a 1990s Canadian family band (opening for Kitty Wells, aged 10!), moved to New Zealand and became a country star there, then, over the last decade, has been “discovered by" and worked with all manner of US artists, ranging from Ashley McBryde to Willie Nelson. Her latest album is named in honour of the signage on Nashville Broadway, “the patron saint of heartbreak in downtown”, as she puts it. Less cheekily characterful than her output of recent years, it still has much to recommend it.
Where her last album, Kingmaker, was an object lesson in reinventing country to a feminist-percussive template, Neon Cowgirl, influenced by an extended US road trip, offers a steadier diet, mainly in variations of two styles. One is florid, old-fashioned, string-swathed country, big in heart and sound, the other a ramped-up barroom rhythm’n’blues, akin to Larkin Poe having a crack at Stax Records back catalogue. There are also twangy intimations of the Wanda Jackson-esque person Neilson adopted for 2020’s Chickaboom!.
Neon Cowgirl opens with “Foolish Heart”, a gigantic, lush ballad, then moves straight into “Salvation Mountain”, which has a ZZ Top-esque groove. Bluesy stompers such as the banjo-pickin’, call’n’response of “Borrow My Boots”” or the raucous “U-Haul Blues” (the latter possibly about her times on the road with The Neilsons as a child) would likely send venues wild in concert, but it’s the slower, smokier fare that stands out on record.
Songs in this category include the solidly tears-in-my-beer “One Less Heart”, the reverbed piano slowie about motherhood, “Loneliness of Love”, and the title track, a duet with Neil Finn of Crowded House. But best in this vein are the cinematic American gothic of “Keep On” and the twangin’ chug of “You're Gonna Fall”, another duet, this time with JD McPherson. The latter is a stand-out, redolent of Lee Hazlewood and Nancy Sinatra.
Overall, Neon Cowgirl is a likeable album which plays it broad rather than quirky, and hits enough highs along the way.
Below: Watch the video for the title track of Tami Neilson's Neon Cowgirl album, featuring Neil Finn of Crowded House
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