Current Nashville resident Emily Nenni was born and raised in California. She has a vocal twang that is bigger than that of the state of Texas. Where she got her accent is unclear, but odds are it came from listening to old records as well as her regional biography. From the first time Nenni opens her mouth on her new release, Drive & Cry, one knows this will be a Classic Country record with a capital C. A listener can hear the echoes of Hank Williams, Lefty Frizzell, and company in her voice. Her accompaniment, full of pedal steel and slide guitars, reinforces this impression.
But make no mistake, this is not retro. There’s something down and dirty about Nenni’s music that makes it more contemporary. That’s what makes it so much fun to listen to. So while she may sing about mama, honky tonks, double-wide trailers, and ice-cold beer on “Greatest Hits”, Nenni presents them as fixtures of modern day life—which they are—despite their timelessness.
Nenni began as a songwriter with little interest in performing. One can hear this in the snappy couplets that serve as her songs’ hooks, “Think I’m gonna drive / And cry I’m overdue for a tire rotation / And bloodshot eyes,” she sings on the title tune. Other lyrics reveal she shares an affinity with life’s misfits and oddballs. Nenni softly confesses on the intro to “Set on the Steps”, “I wouldn’t call myself damaged goods / To tell you true, I’m a little damaged for good.” She notes a person’s attractiveness is all in the eyes of the beholder rather than one’s physical attributes in “Rootin’ For You”, her ode to not giving in to social norms. Her self-penned songs are full of such lessons.
But it’s Emily Nenni’s voice that makes her stand out from her peers. Her twang is so pronounced that one cannot mistake her for anyone else. Now, a twang can serve a variety of purposes. It can make one sound more regionally authentic or just more rural. (Did you know that the population of greater Nashville is over two million people? That’s bigger than Boston, Las Vegas, Washington DC, and El Paso.) Singing with a twang amplifies the voice and can make it sound more expressive without having to strain. Nenni seems to use it both ways. On tracks such as “I Can’t Pretend It Never Happened”, “I Don’t Have to Like You”, and “We Sure Could Two Step”, her drawl makes her first-person narrator resonate with bona fides. She’s confessin’ the blues as well as singing them. There’s no false note or a wink on Drive & Cry that doesn’t sincerely scream country girl.
Emily Nenni belongs to the current crop of female alt-country singers (Whitney Rose, Nikki Lane, Elizabeth Cook, Tami Neilson) who empower themselves by using the classic country music of the past as a way of declaring their present authority. Of course, some men do this too (ask Tyler Childers), but the women’s subversion of past male tropes demonstrates how much has altered on a cultural level. Drive & Cry is an excellent example of how country music has evolved without necessarily changing. It all depends on who is singing.