Forever Five: Mama Kin

Waxx Lyrical
Sep 4
3 min read

Updated: Oct 10

Ever wondered what albums sit atop your favourite artists’ turntables? Forever Five is a Waxx Lyrical series spotlighting the five records that shaped the artists we love most. No rankings, no essays — just the albums that live closest to their hearts. Come for the choices, stay for the typically remarkable playlist that follows — woven from their picks and their own catalogue — culminating in a fascinating little mini music lesson every time.

Mama Kin

🎙 Singer-songwriter / Tommy Spender collaborator / Seeker of spirit and song

🔥 Earth, fire, and fierce honesty wrapped in melody.

💡 A storyteller, a truth-teller, and a conduit for connection

.🎶 From solo beginnings to her work with Spender, her voice remains her compass — raw, resonant, and real.

💚 Forever guided by heart, harmony, and the healing power of song.

Mama Kin has always sung with a voice equal parts earth and fire — a storyteller, a truth-teller, a conduit of spirit and song. Whether solo or alongside her longtime creative partner Tommy Spender, she’s built a reputation on raw honesty and the kind of music that feels carved out of lived experience. Their new album Promises takes that further still: a record of searching and surrender, wide-eyed hope and bruised beauty, stitched together with harmonies that ache and uplift in the same breath.

Her five forever records shine a light on where that alchemy comes from. They map out the inspirations and sonic touchstones that have guided her own path — albums that wrestle with truth, celebrate vulnerability, and bend melody into ritual. In choosing them, Mama Kin doesn’t just reveal what she loves to listen to; she reveals the fertile ground from which her own songs have grown. Like Promises, they are about connection, transformation, and the courage to follow the heart wherever it leads.

Forever Five mama Kin

LISTEN — MAMA KIN'S FOREVER FIVE

A trio of tracks from each of her choices, plus an essential five tracks of their own.

The resulting playlist flows like a short music history lesson.

Mama Kin’s Forever Five Albums

Alabama Shakes – Sound & Color (2015)
A modern soul masterclass. Brittany Howard’s voice roars and whispers in equal measure, a blueprint for emotional release. It’s a record that blurs rock, R&B, and vulnerability into one defiant, transcendent sound — an energy Mama Kin channels instinctively.
Gillian Welch – Time (The Revelator) (2001)
Sparse, unhurried, and quietly devastating. Welch’s songwriting strips everything down to the truth, where each note feels like a heartbeat. For Mama Kin, it’s a lesson in stillness — the strength that lies in restraint and the space between.
Blake Mills – Heigh Ho (2014)
A sprawling studio tapestry, Heigh Ho is subtle and strange, full of craftsmanship and soul. It captures that elusive balance between precision and wildness, the same balance that lives in Mama Kin’s own work with Spender.
Paul Simon – Graceland (1986)
Joyous and searching, Graceland radiates rhythm and reflection in equal measure. Its fusion of voices and cultures mirrors Mama Kin’s fascination with musical conversation — the way a song can be both personal and universal.
Sarah Blasko – As Day Follows Night (2009)
Elegant, cinematic, and tenderly powerful. Blasko’s voice carries both fragility and strength, qualities Mama Kin deeply relates to. It’s an album that proves emotional clarity is its own form of courage.