If this photo of Tami Neilson and Dinah Lee has a slightly uplfting feeling, it’s because they areand they’ve just hit that key change. The intergenterational duet was part of Tami Neilson’s Rock’n’Roll Revue. The show, in which Neilson offered a femalecentric take on the beginnings of rock, blasted through New Plymouth, Christchurch and (pictured here) Auckland’s Civic Theatre this month. Not only did Neilson recruit local 60s girl group tribute act the Up Doos to the cause, she imported Lee, the long Oz-based Modmother of Kiwi pop. The 80-year-old performed – the songs that made her a star at home in the 60s and propelled her across the Tasman. And Slipping had an extra poignancy. Lee dedicated it to the late Merritt whose band the Meteors had backed her on those 60s hits. And to finish, an encore of Ray Columbus and the Invaders’ Yeah, yeah, and indeed, yeah.
