Cowboy Junkies

An appropriately named band if there ever was one, Cowboy Junkies specialized in country songs, and the occasional blues nugget, played at a languidly slow pace. Though the Toronto band's mainstream success outside Canada was largely confined to their second album (1988's The Trinity Session) the quartet maintained its original lineup, including the three Timmins siblings, for more than three decades. Michael Timmins, the band's guitarist and main songwriter, originally formed the band in 1985 with lifelong friend Alan Anton on bass; they drafted Michael's younger brother Peter to play drums. Last to join was sister Margo Timmins, then a social worker who had to be coerced into joining the band. Their original repertoire was largely blues numbers by Robert Johnson, John Lee Hooker and others; and their trademark sound, with soft-spoken vocals and brushed drums, was born when neighbors complained about the volume of their garage rehearsals. Their first album, Whites Off Earth Now, was recorded with one mike in the garage. Their first U.S. tour inspired the material on The Trinity Session, which like their debut was recorded live-in-studio with one mike, this time at Toronto's Church of the Holy Trinity, which they chose for its natural reverb. Though much of the material this time was original, it was a cover of the Velvet Underground's "Sweet Jane" that grabbed the initial attention. Its writer Lou Reed called their version his favorite (his quote appeared on a sticker with the original LP), and it later appeared in Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers. The album briefly put Cowboy Junkies in the media spotlight, with Margo being named one of People magazine's 50 most beautiful people. Around this time multi-instrumentalist Jeff Bird became a permanent auxiliary member. The followup album The Caution Horses-- their first to be recorded in an actual studio-didn't match the previous success, but got some airplay with a cover of Neil Young's "Powderfinger," once again done in spooky slowed-down style. They toured behind that album with one of their heroes, Texas songwriter Townes Van Zandt, who wrote "Cowboy Junkies Lament" for them; they recorded it on their next album Black Eyed Man. During the late '90s they signed with the Geffen label and made two studio albums (Lay It Down and Miles From Our Home), that leaned more strongly toward rock. In November 2006 they returned to the church where The Trinity Session was recorded on its 20th anniversary, and re-cut all the songs in one day with guest singers Ryan Adams, Natalie Merchant and Vic Chesnutt. It became their most popular album since the original, and the guest singers joined the band on tour. The band followed in 2010-12 with The Nomad Series, a connected set of four new studio albums within 18 months. The group appeared with the Boston Pops in Boston's Symphony Hall in summer 2017. The following year brought All That Reckoning, a conceptual album focusing on later-life issues of change and loss.