“Peace And Tractors”: Topp Twins To Receive 2026 Country Music Honour For Contribution To Country Music

The NZ Songwriter’s Trust is proud to announce the undeniably iconic Topp Twins will receive the 2026 Country Music Honour for Contribution to Country Music on Friday May 22 at the St James Theatre in Gore – alongside the Country Music Honours for APRA Best Country Music Song, MLT Songwriting Award (unreleased songs) and a performance from special guests; The Warratahs.

Introduced in 2025, this Honour celebrates members of the country music community who have not only achieved great heights of their own but uplifted others and contributed to the past, present and future of country music in Aotearoa New Zealand. Recipients do not perform at the event but are given a tribute crafted by their friends and peers.

From discovering “Pinto Pony” on their neighbor’s wind-up gramophone, Dame Lynda and Jools have dedicated their lives to standing up and singing for what’s right and bringing joy to audiences in every nook and cranny of Aotearoa.

Country Music Honours Manager, Vanessa Harvey, shares, “It (the Country Music Honour for Contribution to Country Music) acknowledges the work that happens both on and off the stage. Dame Jools and Lynda have given joy and heart to every A&P show, theatre, city and town of Aotearoa – and held the door open for so many country acts coming up behind them. No-one is more deserving of this honour.”

Alongside Hall of Fame inductions, award winning albums and decades of sold out shows, the Untouchable Girls have remained the definition of walking-the-walk; fighting for homosexual law reform, Māori land rights, and a nuclear-free New Zealand. In 1986, when asked about cancelling Australian shows to ensure they could perform at the NZ Rainbow Warrior Music Festival, Lynda simply said, “making it big in Australia… it (commercial success) is not the priority. Peace and tractors are.”

Some of the Topps impact was demonstrated in marches and protests, while other times it came through their popular comedy characters, Ken and Ken, Prue and Dilly, or Camp Mother and Camp Leader. When asked about how they managed to create these characters in a way that connected rather than offended New Zealand, Jools told the Between Two Beers podcast, “amuse but never abuse... was always in our hearts.”

Last year’s Country Music Honour for Contribution to Country Music recipient, Tami Neilson, shares, “Without the Toppies taking me under their wings, uplifting me and bringing me around NZ on tour with them countless times, I would not be the artist or the person that I am today. They are the touchstone that grounds me and the standard to which I always strive.”

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