Tami n Aly

Our country musicians have been in the news a little recently. Aly Cook was interviewed by Vicki Anderson of The Press, where Cook slammed NZ On Air, noting her success in Australia while being ignored by radio and NZOA here.  

"... Cook has hit out at the NZ On Air (NZOA) funding scheme as having a ''bad attitude'' to Kiwi country music, describing the organisation as ''ageist''.

''My comment is about nationwide commercial radio airplay and the New Zealand music industry at large, and its bad attitude to New Zealand commercial country music,'' she said."

The discussion in the comments on that story is interesting, with Cook responding to various reactions. Vicki Anderson has written a number of articles/opinion pieces openly critical of NZ On Air, one of which won her an award at the recent Canon Media Awards.

Tami on the cover of NZ Herald's Canvas magazine. Story not online.

Meanwhile, I saw recent Tui award winner (3x) Tami Neilson deal with some mainstream malarkey on her Facebook page...

"I've been getting so many emails and messages of outrage from fans in regards to the male host of Good Morning making fun of country music in my interview that I thought I had better comment. (It especially confused my Canadian fans who watched, as the genre is mainstream over there and isn't treated with disrespect.) 

I would like to say that off-camera he was very nice and complimentary of my music, but I think it is just a general attitude towards country music in NZ that spurred him to joke like he did. I tried to dish it back to him good-naturedly, as I am now used to being confronted with these sort of comments and as an entertainer it's not a good look to retaliate. 

I've found the best way to change this mind-set is to just get out there and play my music. I can't count the number of times I hear, "I don't like country, but I LOVE your music!" If you love my music, you love country, baby!"

The interview starts with some weak joke from the male host Rod Cheeseman (after his lame outburst at the end of her song when he says "Thank god I'm a country boy!"), who compounds it with saying "What was wrong with the Western part of it, that's what I don't get."

Tami responds to these stereotypes (as the female host Jeanette Thomas labels them) by saying to the male host "do you want a cowboy boot up your butt, is that a stereotype as well?" which makes the hosts laugh. Well, the female host anyways. 

Tami says in the interview that there is a huge audience here for country music, but it's a challenge to get into the mainstream media. 

Watch clip from Good Morning here.