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Sing In My Meadow, volume 3 – Hunted

A few days after we returned from New York we re-convened at The Clubhouse to do some more wailing and gnashing. A few hours was all it took to finish off the recording. We’re going to give the tracks a rest and then revisit them in a few weeks to decide whether we need to go back in and re-work some things. We also decided to take a pass at Hunted while we were all gathered and our amps were set on stun. In many ways it is the template for much of this album. The song has evolved on stage so much over the last decade and a half that the studio version that we have on Pale Sun, Crescent Moon seems irrelevant at this point. I think we captured its current spirit and venom with this take….here is a board mix.

Make sure to check out the first blog post for Sing In My Meadow.

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Demons Canadian Press reaction

The press reaction to Demons has been pretty spectacular so far; we couldn’t have hoped for a better reception. Here is a skewed sampling of some of the comments from the Canadian pundits:

“The result is a celebration of both the Junkies and Chesnutt and one of the year’s best albums.” 4.5 Stars, The National Post

“Margo Timmins’ clear enunciation and Michael Timmins’ polished guitar mesh well with Chesnutt’s rough and uneasy style, contrasting rather than mimicking it. Demons is a respectful and intent tribute,  …a great blend of two talented forces.” 4 Stars, eye weekly

“Cowboy Junkies strike all the right chords with a performance that breaks through any tragic irony. Margo Timmins’ voice soars towards the heavens and the music swings in celebration of Vic Chesnutt’s life.” No Depression

“Unsurprisingly, Chesnutt’s forlorn balladry dovetails seamlessly with the Cowboys’ hazy slow-burn and Margo Timmins’ sunset vocals. “ 4 Stars, Sun Media

“…few bands other than Cowboy Junkies possess the sensitivity required to do justice to Chesnutt’s music, and Demons is essentially the wake that any Chesnutt fan wishes they could have attended. It’s sometimes difficult to grasp what possesses artists to make tribute albums, but Demons is a tribute in the truest sense: an acknowledgment of gratitude and admiration.” exclaim!

Most people, Chesnutt included, work hard to exorcise their demons. But the Junkies have embraced these Demons with excellent results.” 4 Stars, Chartattack

“Twenty-five years down the road and the Cowboy Junkies are more vibrant than ever.”
Here Magazine

“Demons is a revelation that shows the quartet to be savvy interpreters of a difficult songwriter, Vic Chesnutt. The Junkies’ trump card is singer Margo Timmins, who never attempts to imitate Chesnutt’s strange phrasing or vocal tics. Instead, she highlights the classic elements.” Vancouver Province

“It is a stirring and intense collection of songs, an unforced collaboration that sounds natural and destined to be.” Quick Before It Melts

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Tim Gibbons – an Introduction (Medicine Girl)

For the past couple of years I’ve been doing some recording with Hamilton based singer/songwriter Tim Gibbons, who I was introduced to by Tom Wilson (aka Lee Harvey Osmond). He dropped in to our studio one day with just his banjo and sang six or seven songs and I was hooked. There is naturalness to his singing and playing that is all too rare: when he starts to play there is an almost physical transformation that overcomes him, the song envelopes him, he becomes the song. I also love his song writing, it touches on so many of the styles that originally pulled me into music: the folk-blues vibe of Townes Van Zandt; the basic rock-n-roll-blues of The Stones, the soul/blues vibe of singers like Bill Withers. We have taken things slowly. Every now and then Tim would come in and lay down a few more songs, some old ones from his vast repertoire and some new ones, freshly minted. Once we got a critical mass of material together we invited Ray Farrugia (my studio drummer of choice and someone that has played with Tim many times over the years and who has an affinity for his style) to join us and we expanded some of the songs with bass and drums. Tim is one of those guys that can pick up any stringed instrument (and a couple of non-stringed) and play it (I hate those types of guys, but I love working with them), so he went back and forth between banjo, guitar, bass and vocals and backup vocals. We got most of the songs in a day. We then sent a few of the tracks west to Joby Baker in Victoria to lay down some of his soulful B3 grooves. I’m halfway through mixing the material and I’m approaching it with the same relaxed attitude that we took with the recording: squeezing in a song or two when my schedule opens up, going back making small adjustments, trying not to lose the energy and immediacy of the sessions. The entire album should be out on Latent in a couple of months. In the meantime here is a taste of one of Tim’s more beautiful songs, Medicine Girl, in which he channels all of the warmth, passion and weariness of Townes.

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Sing In My Meadow, volume 3 – Introduction

We started work on Sing In My Meadow, Volume 3 last Friday night. The live band, live-off-the–floor of our studio. Nasty and dirty and disturbing the cold winter night’s peace. The idea for volume 3 is to create an album of music based around the psychedelic, blues inspired forays that we are so fond of venturing off on, on stage. We are referencing Miles at the Isle of Wight deep in his Bitches Brew phase; Captain Beefheart and his Mirror Man psychoses; The Birthday Party live at the Electric Ballroom circa 1981; Neil and Crazy Horse in the back room at SIR….overdriven and thick with electricity.

Here’s a sampling of A Bride’s Price, which came about as we amused ourselves waiting for Margo to arrive and a version of Continental Drift, a song inspired by the Russell Banks book of the same name. These are playback-mixes, what you would hear if you were sitting in the studio with us listening to what we had just put down.  It’s an album about Sex and Violence…….

Jimmy Fallon tickets

We’re going to be in NYC all next week and, in case you are too, we wanted to alert you to something cool that you can participate in. Please read the blurb below from the Jimmy Fallon show and feel free to pass it along to anyone that you think might be interested….read on…

On February 9th, 2011 Cowboy Junkies will be performing on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Here is where you come in…

How would you like a chance to be close to Cowboy Junkies’ performance on the show?

Click on the link below and you will be directed to our “Band Bench” Sweepstakes entry form. Enter for a chance to win seats on our band benches and an opportunity to surround the stage during Cowboy Junkies’ performance.

Please make sure you include the following band code: COW, in your entry form.

http://www.fallonbandbench.com

We hope to see you there.

Please make sure that you also check out the Demons bundles if you haven’t already.

Joey’s Song

Margo, Jeff and I recently recorded an acoustic version of This Street, That Man, This Life and donated it to the album,  Joey’s Song. All proceeds go to epilepsy research and you can check out more about the project and how to purchase the album at the official site.

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