Press

Austin 360

New on ‘I Love You So Much’: Kimmie Rhodes on making music and a life with Joe Gracey

by Peter Blackstock

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‘Oxford American’ Waltzes Across Texas

A scholarly literary magazine is celebrating the music of Texas — but don't let that academic approach get in the way of enjoying it.

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Kimmie Rhodes: A Trip Through Time

Live Review: An evening with Bob Harris and Kimmie Rhodes to promote Radio Dreams

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Austin Chronicle

Texas Heritage Songwriter's Hall of Fame 2018 - Kimmie accepts the induction of Buddy Holly into The THoF for Buddy Holly, reading an acceptance letter at the request of Maria Elena Holly

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Kimmie Rhodes is Ready to Move Forward

The inside of Kimmie Rhodes's Austin-area home is more like a museum archive these days. Decades-old papers, photos, letters and reel-to-reel tapes occupy various nooks and crannies, material that the Texas singer-songwriter has been digging through for weeks that belonged to legendary KOKE-FM radio disc jockey Joe Gracey, her late husband, business partner, bass player and muse.

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The Irish News: Kimmie Keeps It Country

Texas Songstress tells Ralph McLean about her life in music.

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Austin Chronicle

The Crazy Quilt Career of Kimmie Rhodes

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Lonesome Highway

Interview With
Kimmie Rhodes
Cosmic Cowgirl

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Press Quotes

Native Lubbockite Kimmie Rhodes is just as deserving of mention in the same revered breath with fellow West Texan musical Legends as Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison and the Flatlanders.

Lone Star Music Magazine

A great performer in her prime, capable of really special work.

Sid Smith BBC Music Review

Those who admire talented creative songwriters should check tour dates and make every possible effort to attend one of Kimmie’s shows. They’ll be glad they did.

Maverick Magazine

A voice like fine dry wine and imagery as sharp as steel, this singer-songwriter is compelling.

USA Today

Best Country Music Albums of 2015 – Kimmie Rhodes was 61 in March 2015 and the Texas star is singing as beautifully as ever on Cowgirl Boudoir. The heartfelt Don’t Leave Me Like This (about the death of her long-time partner, Joe Gracey) is moving and the steel guitars, ukuleles and mandolins accompany her voice to subtle and tasteful effect throughout.

London Telegraph – Martin Chilton

Singers who write songs as good as Kimmie Rhodes are to be treasured: soaring on finely wrought melodies and words that linger in the memory they quietly morph into classics loved by anyone who chances upon them. Since 1981 Kimmie has been releasing marvelous critically acclaimed records and while she may have not enjoyed the commercial success of someone like Emmylou Harris, within the country music community her reputation is second to none. Cowgirl Boudoir deserves a place in anyone’s jukebox of the heart.

R2 Magazine – Colin Hall

“Kimmie Rhodes has to be one of America’s great musical secrets.”

BBC Music

Kimmie Rhodes’ COWGIRL BOUDOIR is a carefully-crafted work of pure Americana in which the accomplished Texas singer-songwriter presents tales imbued with nostalgia, hope, and yearning that celebrate the human heart in all its grit and beauty. . It’s not country music, not in the strictest sense of the word; it’s acoustic music, songs filled with genuine music, and several leagues above the majority of singer-songwriters plying their trade these days. While the songs are an intimate look at her past, they’re also a sign of her bright musical future brought fully to life by her whisper-to-cry-to-howl dynamic range and her absolute melodic control. Kimmie Rhodes … pure genius … she is phenomenal!

Alan Cackett – Maverick Magazine

Always Never Leave” and “Will You” have a dreamlike quality I’ve not heard since Nancy Griffith’s early recordings – It’s quite funny and a little bit ironic that a singer songwriter of Kimmie Rhode’s experience is such a breath of fresh air in this over produced and over hyped industry, but that is exactly how Cowgirl Boudoir comes across.

No Depression – Cara Gibney

Rodney Crowell once said that Kimmie has ‘the soul of a poet and the voice of an angel.’ A perfect summation of a great artist and a tremendous album! Texan, Kimmie Rhodes is one of the most consistently excellent singer songwriters ever to hail from that great state, not only as a talented writer and performer of her own songs but also as a terrific interpreter of other peoples work.

American Roots UK

Kimmie Rhodes is a name that may not be known to the causal Country fan in the UK but is an artist who, since the release of her debut album ‘Kimmie Rhodes & The Jackalope Brothers’ in 1981, has earned the reputation as one of the finest Texan singer-songwriters in the business. ‘Cowgirl Boudoir’ is an album that sounds equally at home in 2015, as it would back when Kimmie announced herself on the UK scene in 1985. Flavors of the music from all of the decades in between mix together with the traditional Texas Country sound to create a hugely appealing record, all sung exquisitely by a charming vocalist.

New Country UK

So why isn’t Kimmie a superstar? A good question. All the boxes are ticked. As a performer and as Willie Nelson’s protege and duet partner Kimmie Rhodes has paid her dues, as a songwriter this album highlights a talent for whom tossing off a Texas country song that is both memorable and interesting is taken for granted. This album is chock full of them. All of them beautifully realized by herself and the Sunbird studio’s house band in a production that is both subtle and full.

Americana UK

Despite having been a fan of Rhodes’ music since the mid 90s, I was astounded to discover that she has been in the music business for 34 years; her first released debuted in 1981! In that time she has become one of the most revered of Texas singer songwriters, having had songs recorded by such greats as Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson. You only have to listen to her sing, or spend 5 minutes in the same room as her to see why. You could be forgiven for wondering if, after such a career and by her sixteenth album, she may be re-hashing earlier material, as do many. In fact, quite the opposite is true. She has returned to her roots, in a collection, which, frankly, is a complete breath of fresh air.

FATEA – Helen Mitchell

Staying over to Texas, we have a really refreshing new sound from KIMMIE RHODES.

Country Music and Dance – Scotland

A performance running deep in a wealth of classic country and immaculate songwriting.

Three Chords and The Truth – UK

With “Cowgirl Boudoir”, you get a lot of bang for your buck. There are fourteen songs on the album and absolutely no filler; every song is there on merit. It’s fair to say that there aren’t too many cheerful little toe-tappers but the songs are well-constructed, beautifully played and sung from the heart.

Music.Riot.co.uk

The fragility of Kimmie’s voice belies a strenghth of character and an instinct for survival. Over the course of a long career she has rightly been feted for the plain spoken honesty of her modern country tunes.

whisperinandhollerin.com – Martin Raybould

I’ll say this, all you country lovers, or all you looking to begin your hard search into the stack of needles – to find one that doesn’t feel like it’s all about the dollar signs – Kimmie Rhodes album, titled ‘Cowgirl Boudoir’, offers you everything you need.

Giggingni.com

Listening to ‘Cowgirl Boudoir’ in a dim room with a glass of wine in your hand is like sharing a room with an old friend who’s telling stories.

folkandtumble – Jerry McNally

There has always been a certain innocence in Kimmie’s voice, even when the words are dealing with situations that are far from light. Don’t Leave Me Like This is about a lost love or even a much deeper loss. That sense of being left alone, or the fear of such, tends to be theme in many of the songs. The Sky Fell Down, with it’s distinctive electric sitar sound, makes that clear with its repeated title vocal refrain. However, as with all her music, Rhodes has a positive attitude and outlook at the heart of her songwriting that is underlined by her lightness of touch. This cowgirl seems ready for the next roundup, so saddle up and go along for the ride.

Lonesome Highway – Stephen Rapid

Like the wine, this Kimmie Rhodes with age keeps getting better and she proves that she still has nothing of her immense singer-songwriting capabilities lost through the past four decades. (Net als de wijn wordt deze Kimmie Rhodes met de jaren alsmaar beter en bewijst ze dat ze doorheen de voorbije vier decennia nog helemaal niets van haar immense singer-songwriting-capaciteiten heeft ingeboet.)

Holland – Rootstime – Freddy Celis

While there’s a department of it in Washington, D.C., one must really question if there’s any justice in a country that can’t recognize what Willie Nelson did years ago: that Kimmie Rhodes is an “undiscovered superstar.” Yes, he was probably smokin’ something the Feds would frown upon at the time, but the fact remains that native Lubbockite Kimmie Rhodes is just as deserving of mention in the same revered breath with fellow West Texan musical legends such as Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison, and the Flatlanders.

Lone Star Music Magazine

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