YOU might not instantly recognise the name Tami Neilson, but a quick glance of her bio and you quickly realise she possesses serious gravitas in the music world.
As a baby she was photographed being cradled by Roy Orbison back stage, at 10 she sang with country pioneer Kitty Wells and by the time she turned 18 she was opening for Johnny Cash, in her pyjamas, no less.
The Canadian-born, New Zealand-based Neilson's brushes with musical legends continues on her fifth album Kingmaker. The album's 10 tracks were recorded at Neil Finn's Roundhead Studios in Auckland and features a stunning duet, Beyond The Stars, with the country outlaw himself, Willie Nelson.
How the 89-year-old Nelson came to sing on Beyond The Stars - written by Neilson and Kiwi singer-songwriter Delaney Davidson - is one of those miraculous stories created by the pandemic.
Neilson had been scheduled to perform at Nelson's annual Luck Reunion Festival on his Texan ranch in March 2020, before it was cancelled due to the worldwide explosion of COVID-19.
Luck Reunion then became one of the first music events to be shifted online. Due to her dodgy internet connection, Neilson headed into an Auckland record shop to livestream her three-song performance over her iPhone six.
Neilson initially feared the "stressful" performance was a flop, but it proved the complete opposite. Nelson and his wife Annie D'Angelo instantly became enamoured with Neilson.
Shortly after Neilson and D'Angelo became Twitter friends and frequently messaged each other.
"It was all these surreal and amazing steps and we were in lockdown," Neilson says over Zoom from New Zealand.
"This was the silver lining to my lockdown, having this new-found friendship with the Nelsons.
"Then 18 months later I got up the courage to ask him to do this duet."
Neilson's excitement quickly turned to despair when it got to 10 days before her album Kingmaker's deadline and she hadn't heard from the Nelsons. She was thinking she'd need to find another option for the duet when she received a text from D'Angelo promising, 'you're gonna love this.'
Shortly after, Nelson's haunting vocal on Beyond The Stars appeared in Neilson's inbox.
"It was like the heavens opened up and there was rainbows and sunshine and unicorns flying," Neilson laughs.
Beyond The Stars is the highlight of a powerfully cinematic and eclectic record from Neilson. The song was written as a conversation between Neilson and her late father. Ron Neilson was the leader of Canada's The Neilsons family country band that also featured his wife Betty and their children Tami, Todd and Jay.
"I'd lost mine seven years ago and we were talking about them and wanting to capture that missing and longing," she says.
"Everyone is always like, 'they're looking down on you and he's proud', which I know people are trying to be kind, but there's that part of you that's like, 'screw that, I want the real him tangibly in front of me'."
Ron Neilson was a massive fan of the Highwayman superstar and Tami says, "thinking who would be the voice of my dad, never in a million years would I have dreamed it would be Willie Nelson".
Tami Neilson left her hometown of Toronto, Canada in 2007 to move to New Zealand after marrying her Kiwi husband Grant. The couple have two sons, Charlie, 10, and Sam, 8.
She's since become the Kiwi queen of country through her acclaimed albums Dynamite! (2014), Don't Be Afraid (2016), Sassafrass! (2018) and Chickaboom! (2020), which deliver healthy doses of sassy country, soul, jazz and rock.
Kingmaker is no different and could be Neilson's most eclectic effort to date.
"The fact we did this during the pandemic and in and out of lockdowns, it kind of freed me mentally and creatively to go, 'well I probably won't be able to tour this album, so I can do whatever I want'," she says.
"I could make the album I've always wanted without the worry of not being able to replicate it. Of course now I'm completely screwed as I have to tour it (laughing loudly). So it backfired on me that way.
"I wanted it to sound like how a soundtrack to a movie feels like a story, and just like a movie soundtrack, is doesn't have to have the same sounds or genre every time."
