Tami Neilson Vinyl, CD & Tape 4 Items

With a soulful voice straight from the golden age of country and rockabilly music, Tami Neilson has been described as 'A red-hot honky-tonker, somewhere between Patsy Cline and Wanda Jackson with perhaps just a little bit of Peggy Lee sophistication.' ('Nick Bollinger, NZ National Radio).Singing her heart out along endless roads and stages, from her days as a young girl in Canada touring with the Neilson Family band, opening for the likes of Johnny Cash, to her full blossoming in New Zealand as a formidable talent in her own right, Tami Neilson has won the Tui Award (New Zealand Grammy) for each of her past four albums. Tami has been awarded the Apra Silver Scroll, New Zealand's most prestigious music award for excellence in songwriting, for her song 'Walk (Back To Your Arms)'. The award was previously won by Lorde for Royals. Dynamite! reached #1 on the NZ Music Charts, iTunes Country Charts and the New Zealand Independent Music Chart.Tami is thrilled to finally have the album come out in her home country: 'I am over the moon to finally have my album released where my life and my music originated, the home where my heart is constantly pulled like a magnet, even from the other side of the world. I've been hugely blessed to have New Zealand embrace my music and regard it with enough merit to include me among their esteemed musicians, but, have always hoped that someday I'd be heard by the people and the country who made me and shaped me and gave me the confidence to fly in the first place'

She's back, the gloves are off and she is coming out swinging. Tami Neilson won't be staying New Zealand's secret for much longer. For the past decade, the Canadian-born, New Zealand-based singer/songwriter has been the queen of her adopted homeland's country and roots music scenes. She has picked up a handful of Best Country Album awards at the New Zealand Music Awards and won the prestigious APRA Silver Scroll for excellence in songwriting. With her new album, Sassafrass!, Neilson takes a giant step forward. On this 11-track knock-out, she places a heavier emphasis on soul music without abandoning her country and rockabilly roots. Neilson conjures up a wonderfully retro style that sounds like it could be a lost gem from the late '50s or early '60s; however, beneath the classic veneer are frank, highly relevant lyrics. Sassafrass, a slang word for a sassy person who isn't afraid to speak her mind, serves as a perfect title for this album. The songs, Neilson divulges, reflect her developing a low tolerance for bullsh*t after years of encountering sexism in her life. They were also influenced by her being a mother of two young boys as well as by the death of her father, who led the family's band, the Neilsons, which was popular in Canada during the '90s. Neilson characterizes her new album as a mouthy lovechild of the current social climate and my own experiences as a woman, mother and daughter.

"It's the most personal album I've ever written, and it is very daunting to put such a raw, exposed, vulnerable part of yourself out there," remarks Tami Neilson of her new album Don't Be Afraid. Don't Be Afraid was nearly left unfinished. With two songs completed and six weeks left to write Tami Neilson unexpectedly lost her father, the patriarch of The Neilson Family band who Tami had toured across Canada with as a young girl opening for the likes of Johnny Cash. It was with her mother and brother's encouragement that she finished the record as a way of honouring her dad. "I actually inadvertently wrote the title track (without realizing it would be for the album) the week Dad died. 'Don't Be Afraid' was the last song Dad wrote, while in the hospital. He had written the melody, lyrics and everything, but he was on oxygen and could barely breathe to speak. He told me that it was driving him crazy that he had this new song stuck in his head, but had no way of offloading it. It's an awful feeling, I know, so I said I would bring him in his guitar so he could play it and I'd record it on my phone. He did a verse, so I got the melody, but then his levels dropped dramatically (that's the hidden track on the album, Dad's Demo'), but we didn't get the chorus, or the melody for the chorus." Don't Be Afraid finds the soul taking precedence over the country as Tami found herself listening to a lot of gospel around the time of her father's death and finding a kinship with the legendary singer Mavis Staples: "I've always been a massive Staples fan. I had ordered the new Pops album, it was released days before Dad died, and I ordered it in Canada so I could take it into the hospital for him to listen to. It arrived the day after he died, and of course I sobbed about that, but I will always be so grateful for that album helping me get through that grieving process." Recorded in Ben Edwards' New Zealand Sitting Room studio, the songs were again recorded live, the musicians all in the room playing together. The album features Delaney Davidson and all the boys that were on Dynamite! including harmonies from Marlon Williams on the soon-to-be classic 'Lonely'. The album features a Tina Turner throwback, 'Holy Moses', the swinging country of 'Only Tears', a bluesy swagger in `So Far Away' and the southern soul of 'Burn My Body'. The album is bookended by the title track, including the haunting hidden demo track sung by Tami's father. "There are a lot of reasons I chose Don't Be Afraid as the title, and one of them is that, musically, as an artist it's a departure for me. There are definite moments where I have had to go, 'Don't be afraid of this, this is who you are,- Neilson says. "This album is the guts of me. I guess 'departure' is the wrong word because it's all the same palette and same family, but whereas Dynamite! was a lot of light, bright colours, Don't Be Afraid is deeper, richer colours - still in that same family but a different level." Tami moved to New Zealand from Canada 8 years ago and has become one of the country's biggest acts. Tami is the most highly awarded artist of any genre in New Zealand, having just picked up NZ's highest songwriting honour, the APRA Silver Scroll, for 'Walk (Back To Your Arms)' off 2014's Dynamite!, which also won her (yet another) Best Country Album Tui in May this year. Don't Be Afraid marks Tami as a new soul staple. It's a raw, deep and hopeful album that finds Tami singing out her grief. "Last year was an insane year, I had the highest of the highs and the lowest of the lows all in one year," she recalls. "And I guess that is what the album is, it reflects that constant cycle of life."