Invitation to a Fix: Cowboy Junkies, Live at the Galaxy

Jason Thornbury

Not your usual Cowboys. "When the Cowboy Junkies are in a groove, as they were this night, they are in their own soul-exploring world." (photo: David Houghton)

For those unacquainted with Santa Ana's Galaxy Theatre, picture a vintage supper club --with tightly situated tables, clinking glasses and clanking silverware -- in a multi-tiered semicircle facing the stage. It doesn't exactly inspire visions of contemporary music. As Peter Cash, the talkative half of the singer/songwriter duo, the Cash Brothers -- who ably opened for the Cowboy Junkies -- explained: "This is a great club, but I feel like I should be singing Sinatra or something from the I Love Lucy show."

With its lethargic vibe, the Galaxy didn't readily offer the Cowboy Junkies the opportunity -- as the standing-room-only Sunset Strip's House of Blues did the previous night -- to defy the "languid" stereotype that some have placed on them. But the mealtime setting for the last of four Southern California stops might have actually played to the band's strength. At their best, the Cowboy Junkies conjure images of a band jamming alone in a garage somewhere back home in Canada, inviting the curious who poke their heads in to join and take in the overwhelming experience. Because when the Cowboy Junkies are in a groove, as they were this night, they are in their own soul-exploring world, unencumbered by the weight of an uninitiated audience that would drag down lesser musicians.

So, while some distracted themselves with dessert, the Cowboy Junkies paid no mind and invited all to join their personal experience. Those who accepted were fed better than anything the club had on its menu.

Junkies in their own Galaxy. "Those who accepted were fed better than anything the club had on its menu." (photo: www.cowboyjunkies.com)

The invitation was extended from the outset with "Miles From Our Home." In previous shows, the band built up to the energetic song, unleashing it at just the right moment on a craving audience. But leading the set with "Miles" signaled that they weren't conceding anything to the venue. And midway through the night, with the gritty "A Common Disaster," the group was in its rightful groove, engaging the audience in familiar Cowboy Junkies story lines and themes.

But the show was unique too, in that, unlike previous shows on this tour, it bypassed material from last year's album, Open, their latest original offering (a dual DVD/CD of last year's concert tour, called Open Road, is currently in stores now). Instead, the band reached back to earlier albums, playing Junkies classics like "Hunted" and "Seven Years" from Pale Sun, Crescent Moon; "This Street, That Man, This Life" from Black Eyed Man; and "Cause Cheap Is How I Feel" from The Caution Horses.

The band's late hero, Townes Van Zandt. Performed live, 'Blue Guitar' becomes the standard bearer for the band's blues influence." (photo: www.cowboyjunkies.com)

The show was also decorated with a handful of treasured gems, including "Dreaming My Dreams," which proved that lead singer Margo Timmins was on the top of God's list when He distributed vocal cords. Same goes with the full-impact sadness and reverence of "Blue Guitar," a tribute to the band's late hero, Townes Van Zandt; that song's weight can truly only be experienced live. Michael Timmins, one of Margo's two brothers in the band, fused Van Zandt's lyrics into his own, while adding utterly mesmerizing guitar licks. On Miles From Our Home, "Blue Guitar" holds its own, but performed live it becomes the standard bearer for the band's blues influence.

As with many of its tours, the group was accompanied by Jeff Bird, a multi-talented musician who leads his own band when he's not adding to the Cowboy Junkies' texture and flavor with his skilled mandolin, guitar, harmonica and tambourine work.

More Music That Matters

Pick up the Open Road DVD/CD on the Cowboy Junkies very cool official site.

"That stuff is just marketing. I don't give a fuck about it..."

"And that's where some of the roots of this are: bizarre delusions in the minds of people with too much time on their hands that somehow I deprived them of being major label rock stars..."

"It's a trend, it's a fad, it's a fashion, and it will be gone. And we didn't come to build walls, we came to knock 'em down."

If anything, the White Stripes are doing their best to clean up the dumb-as-a-post Caucasian streak soiling Detroit's good name...

Although the JSBX have left splintered punk behind in favor of standard blues rock riffs, these wolves still have teeth, and they bite real hard.

The audience also was treated to the Cowboy Junkies' first live performance of Neil Young's "Tired Eyes." While admittedly nervous, Margo, accompanied on stage by only a single vase of colorful flowers, pulled it off to the crowd's roaring approval. And the uplifting "Anniversary Song" was dedicated to a couple celebrating their 22nd wedding anniversary. The encounter was classic Cowboy Junkies -- strangers sharing intimate moments.

By night's end -- despite annoying if necessary shushings from the audience during the dramatic pause between the final words of a beautifully rendered "Misguided Angel" -- most were thoroughly enwrapped by the performance and some enticed the band to play on, shouting pleas for extra songs. Though flattered, Margo and her mates stuck to the set list, but left the crowd privileged with two outstanding encores.

The first, "Helpless" -- a Neil Young tune from Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's seminal Deja Vu -- was their most forceful (and perhaps best) song of the night. The second was a remarkable rendition of their well-known hit, "Sweet Jane," which opened with an extended guitar intro by Michael and Bird that foreshadowed a mid-song solo. Hunched over his guitar in his trademark wooden chair, Michael brought an unimagined, intense reworking to the Lou Reed cover featured on the band's 1988 album, The Trinity Session. Margo's sultry singing added a healthy amount of allure, her voice sometimes barely more than a whisper but still doing just enough to convey a desperate, emotional longing. The rendition no doubt sent die-hard fans scurrying to the band's Web site, CowboyJunkies.com, in search of bootleg copies.

It also left fans thankful they accepted the Cowboy Junkies’ invitation to explore the night’s musical experience.