Cowboy Junkies

COWBOY JUNKIES

I recently picked up a second hand copy of “The Trinity Session” by Cowboy Junkies. I had had the album for years but had somehow lost it over time. The album was once hardly ever off my CD player, and since ‘re-discovering’ it, it has gone back to being one of my most-played discs.

I was astonished to see that the album had been released in 1988, twenty-one years ago! This prompted me to find out more about the group, and I had expected to find that they had long since broken up, but was pleasantly surprised to find that they are very much alive and kicking, and had in fact released a twenty-year anniversary edition CD, called “Trinity Revisited” with guest singers Natalie Merchant, Ryan Adams and Vic Chesnutt and the rest of the group revisiting the familiar songs from the original album, which was their second ever release.

The first album, the strangely titled “Whites Off Earth Now!“, had never achieved the commercial success of the second one. In fact success has been relatively limited for the group, with only the 1988 Trinity Session release being a hit in the USA. Seven other albums have made the Billboard Top 200 but have mostly peaked at comparatively low figures. In their home country of Canada they have fared much better, with 14 singles reaching the Canadian charts, the highest being a number 7 slot for “Angel Mine” .

I always like to see how a group chose their name, but all I can find about the Cowboy Junkies is that they chose their name ‘randomly’ on the way to their fist gig. The group personnel has remained unchanged since they first formed in 1985 in Toronto, Ontario. Three family members, Margo, Michael and Peter Timmins and Alan Anton. The three Timmins siblings are descendants of one Noah Timmins who founded the Canadian city named after him. Another musician, Jeff Bird, while officially not a member of the group, has played with them on many albums and on tours.

My favorite track on “the Trinity Session” is “Sweet Jane” a cover of the 1960s song by Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground and the single was featured in the film “Natural Born Killers”. “Sweet Jane” has also been played in the background music of many hit TV shows, such as ‘Cold Case’, ‘Crossing Jordan’, ‘Big Love’ and ‘CSI’ while “To Love Is To Bury” also from ‘The Trinity Session’ has joined ‘Sweet Jane‘ as being featured in episodes of the vampire series ‘True Blood’.

I recommend you give this eerie, atmospheric album a listen to and also explore the group’s other recordings.

• Posted in: Country Music ♦ Folk Music