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Back in the mid-1980s, Margo Timmins, lead singer for the Canadian indie band Cowboy Junkies, adhered to extensive pre-show rituals to ward off her crippling stage fright. She prepared her cup of tea and brought it out on stage with her so she’d have something to do with her hands; she ironed the dress she’d be performing in; she arranged the flowers that would decorate the stage.
Now, more than 30 years later, Ms. Timmins has shed her rituals and her nerves as she—along with her brothers Michael and Peter Timmins and other long-time band member Alan Anton—perform their forthcoming album “All That Reckoning,” a work full of the reflection and experiences that come with late-middle age.
“We’re not old, but we’re not young anymore,” said the soft-spoken 57-year-old in a recent interview. “With my friends and the people close to me, we’re all looking at life, figuring out what to keep and not, what to fix and what to let be, what to regret and what to move on from.”
Of all the tracks on the new album—penned by the band’s songwriter, Michael—her favorite is called “Shining Teeth,” a tragic song about a dark time in a marriage. “I think it’s brilliantly written in that it captures that despair after an argument with a partner,” she said. “I love the arrangement, everything is well-crafted.”
Now, as she begins touring this new body of work—including a stop at the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center on Friday, April 6—she has come to appreciate the performances as an integral part of who she is rather than a terrifying trial. “Touring is more important to me now, in part for connecting with my youth, and because it’s part of who I am that’s only me,” she said. “I’m a mom, a wife and a daughter and you always feel torn when people want you and need you.
“I love being a mom, and caring for my elderly parents and spending time with them, and being a wife,” she continued. “But touring with the Cowboy Junkies is just mine.”
Hers—and her bandmates’ of three decades. Margo, Michael, Peter and Alan have been playing together since 1985, their first album “Whites Off Earth Now!!” debuting the following year. Their fame spread with their second album, “Trinity Sessions,” an atmospheric work recorded in 1987 in the Church of the Holy Spirit in Toronto. They produced “Trinity Revisited” to mark the 20th anniversary of the album, and fans still make pilgrimages to the site. The languorous cover of the Velvet Underground’s “Sweet Jane” became an especially popular track on the album.
All told, aside from “All That Reckoning,” the band has produced 16 studio albums—five of which have gone gold, platinum or double platinum—five live albums, eight compilation albums and two EPs. They were inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2015.
Aside from their accolades and acclaim, the band has achieved else something singularly amazing: the primarily family-dominated band has never broken up. “To share your life and adventures with three other people is amazing,” Ms. Timmins said. “You have three people who share all your memories.
“We have ups and downs obviously, we all have our moods,” she continued. “But where I am with the boys has an easier flow now.
“We work together, we tour together, we still bug each other sometimes, but we love what we do, and I’m amazed and really proud of that after so many years. We just enjoy being on the road together.”
At this stage of her life and career, Ms. Timmins is primarily grateful—to her bandmates, her fans and the experiences she’s gotten to have. “I’m always in awe that people come to our shows again and again,” she said. “I know when I get home, sometimes I don’t want to go out, sometimes it’s cold or rainy, you have to spend money on a ticket, get in your car.”
This attitude keeps her going, despite the repetition that comes with 30 years of touring and a handful of always-requested hits. “I hate rehearsing them, songs like ‘Misguided Angel,’” she said, referring to a popular track on “Trinity Sessions.” “But I never get tired of playing them.
“You start the opening line and can feel people reacting, going, ‘This is my song,’” she continued. “It’s such a nice feeling and I just decide, you know what, I’m going to play the best ‘Misguided Angel’ ever.”
The Cowboy Junkies will appear at the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center on Friday, April 6, at 8 p.m. Tickets are $35, $45 and $55. Call 631-288-1500 or visit whbpac.org.
on Mar 23, 2018