Cowboy Junkies - Biography
It may sound criticizing to say that a band's greatest trait is their ability to lull a listener to sleep, but when it is said in reference to Cowboy Junkies, its probably more of a compliment than a complaint. It is not boredom that a listener most often feels while listening to an album like The Trinity Session, their sound-defining second LP, but comfort and tranquility. This foursome, three of them siblings, approached Americana from the outside, being from Toronto, and that detachment may have served them well in their interpretations of American standards. Over time, though, the original compositions of songwriter Michael Timmins began to shape the band into something that sounds purely American. Even though they're Canadian.
About six years before Cowboy Junkies were officially formed, Michael Timmins played guitar in a band called The Hunger Project with bassist Alan Anton (who was originally born Alan Alizojvodic) in 1979. The pair relocated to the UK a bit later to find themselves in an all-instrumental group called The Germinal. In 1984, once that project's sound and choice of direction had grown tiresome for Timmins and Anton, they returned to Toronto, where Timmins' brother, Peter, had begun playing drums. The duo brought him in to round out the rhythm section, and soon added Michael and Peter's sister, Margo Timmins, in 1985. Then a social worker who was unused to people hearing her voice, Timmins concentrated more on tones and moods than on vocal range, and her voice became a big part of the group's trademark calm.
They called themselves Cowboy Junkies because they simply liked the sound of it, and started up their own independent label, Latent, on which they released their debut LP, Whites Off Earth Now!! in 1986. It was an album consisting mostly of old blues songs by John Lee Hooker and Robert Johnson, but it did contain one original, the Michael Timmins-penned “Take Me.” Timmins established himself on this release as a capable guitarist who's sound, as biting as it was at times, did not disrupt the overall placidity of the arrangements, or especially of his sister's voice. The album was only available in Canada upon its release, but it was a big enough underground hit to gain serious attention from major label RCA, who signed them to a contract and would eventually re-release the LP.
The band would introduce themselves to American audiences with the most critically lauded album of their career, the boldly realized The Trinity Session (1988 RCA). Like its predecessor, it was recorded with only one microphone, and the majority of it was comprised of covers. But it was miles ahead of its predecessor in many ways. First and most impressive was that it took only one night to record, and was done so in the Holy Trinity church of Toronto. Acting almost like the group's fifth member on the LP, the church's acoustics gave the music room to swell and echo beautifully. Also, the choice of covers agreed more with the group's lazily pretty sound, and the Timmins compositions were more assured, as the band even scored college radio airplay for his song “Misguided Angel.” The most popular cut on the album came to be their slow, somber reinvention of the Velvet Underground's “Sweet Jane,” which was met with praise by Lou Reed himself.
The group followed The Trinity Session with Caution Horses (RCA) in 1989. This release saw the band more heavily supporting the songwriting of Michael Timmins, who was finding more and more comfort in that role. The release helped them keep their commendable cult status, but it didn't gain them any new fans. The band were in a bit of a transitional period, as they would soon incorporate more rock & roll, but here they were still floating along in their tranquility, often to bland results. In 1992, they returned with Black Eyed Man, which deeply favored the group's country music roots. It is a notable release, if only for its two covers, both by the late folk singer Townes Van Zandt. The first of these covers, “Cowboy Junkies Lament,” was a song written especially for the band by Zandt, who they had previously toured with and befriended.
1993 was the year the group reasserted themselves as favorites among critics with Pale Sun, Crescent Moon (RCA). Here, they rocked a little harder and even covered a Dinosaur Jr. song, “Post.” The drums have a livelier sound, and, thanks to unspoken fifth member Ken Mhyr, the guitars sound like the guys playing them are having fun instead of performing a clinic on tasteful restraint. After this album, the band left RCA and moved to Geffen, making their new label debut with Lay It Down (1996). On this album, the group would lay down the rock as much as a band like Cowboy Junkies could, which is not to say that they ever really wail or that Margo Timmins tries to sound like a rock singer. In the way that Coldplay have never rocked to the point of sounding angry, neither have the Junkies, but this is a rock album nonetheless.
1998's Miles From Our Home (Geffen) solidified the band as reliably good, always putting out consistent material while never really shocking anyone. It ended up being their final release on Geffen, who dropped them in 1999 before merging with A&M into Interscope Records. Rather than sit around and wait to be picked up by another major, the band revived their Latent label and released the live album, Waltzing Across America, in 2000. Indie label Zoe, part of the Rounder Records group, picked them up after that, releasing Open, another consistent effort, in 2001. One Soul Now followed in 2004, and then the group attempted to recapture the magic of The Trinity Session, recording the mostly-covers album Earliest 21st Century Blues (2005 Latent) in the span of five days. It was well-received, but didn't come close to providing their near-masterpiece with a worthy sequel.
In 2005, the band collaborated with artist Enrique Martinez Celaya for the book XX, which was a celebration of the 20th anniversary of Cowboy Junkies. It featured original water color paintings by Celaya as well as photographs and handwritten lyric sheets. The first studio album of their third decade as a band would be At the End of Paths Taken (2007 Zoe/Rounder). In 2008, the band decided to celebrate another anniversary, this time for The Trinity Session. The trend for re-releasing albums is usually to simply re-master them, but for this project, the band decided to completely re-record it, heading back to the Church of the Holy Trinity and bringing guests including Ryan Adams, Natalie Merchant and Vic Chestnutt. The product of that session, which was also recorded in the span of one long evening, was released as Trinity Revisited (Zoe/Rounder) in 2008.
