About Bob McNeill
Bob McNeill is a musician based in Wellington, New Zealand. His songs have been covered by artists in NZ, Australia, the UK and USA. Described as "timeless" by FolkWorld, they tell unusual stories in unfamiliar landscapes, set in his signature blend of folk and rock influences. New Zealand Musician magazine compared his songwriting to Bruce Springsteen and Mark Knopfler; the Dominion Post likened him to Jackson Brown, James Taylor, Luka Bloom and Dougie MacLean. His new album TWELVE DREAMS OF THE RIVER will be released on 1 December 2025.
Originally from Scotland, McNeill moved to New Zealand in 1998 after a stint in the US. He made most of his mistakes in other people's bands before releasing a series of solo albums, two of which won Best Folk Album at the New Zealand Music Awards ("the Tuis"). His collaboration with Orcadian fiddler Kenny Ritch, Ben the Hoose, resulted in the album The Little Cascade, which also won a Tui.
With Emily Roughton and Rob Henderson, he formed Spanish-American group Project Feijoa and released the album The California Tapes, a heartfelt ode to the golden state, in 2019. A band infused with love for the music of southern California, and beset by misfortune and incompetence, Project Feijoa remains one of New Zealand's great musical enigmas, a testament to how poorly three of NZ's most accomplished and best-loved folk musicians can fare when simply trying to play the music they love.
In 2024 McNeill released Lost Stars, a collection of songs written on the road while touring New England, Nova Scotia and Oregon. Originally recorded as a lockdown project in a makeshift studio, he and Dunedin-based musician and engineer Mike Moroney re-mastered the album in 2024 and re-released it as a deluxe version including bonus tracks that never made the original album, alternate versions and new versions of some of his best known songs.
Half Light, his duo with Melbourne-based flute virtuoso Rennie Pearson, tours regularly in New Zealand and Australia. They released the EP Air in October 2023.
McNeill's new album TWELVE DREAMS OF THE RIVER will be released on 1 December 2025. Recorded in Wellington, the album explores themes of life, age and identity, re-imagined as a trip down New Zealand's Waikato River, with side trips down the Manuherikia, in the South Island, and the Kelvin, in his native Scotland. It's his most intimate work to date, with some of his most beautiful songs. Playing all the instruments himself, he ventures into new territory on bass, piano, Mellotron and Rhodes, alongside his signature guitar playing.