Cowboy Junkies: Music Is The Drug - The Podcast

Taken from "Sing In My Meadow", the third album in the "Nomad" series, the song "3rd Crusade" is a reminder that those who ignore history are condemned to repeat it.

With Michael Timmins and Alan Anton, we cover the thinking behind the song, its parent album and the different light that this more raucous, psychedelic album shines on the band. 


To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest...

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from them, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "Sing In My Meadow", click here.

To order the new album, "Songs of the Recollection", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here. 

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

"Hunted", originally released on "Pale Sun Crescent Moon", remains one of the darker corners of Cowboy Junkies' discography to this day, nearly 30 years on from its original release.

In this episode of "Music Is The Drug", Michael Timmins talks about how he can to write the song and he and Alan Anton also trace its development in concert over the years, through to the point when the band released an updated version on "Sing In My Meadow", the third volume of the Nomad Series in 2011. We also look at how the live incarnation of the Junkies offers a different perspective on much of their recorded work and the way in which that too has evolved in recent times. 

To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest...

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from them, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "Pale Sun Crescent Moon", click here.

To buy "Pale Sun Crescent Moon", click here.

To listen to "Sing In My Meadow", click here.

To order the new album, "Songs of the Recollection", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here. 

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

You'll have probably heard Cowboy Junkies' new cover of David Bowie's "Five Years" by now - and if you haven't, click here - but the Thin White Duke wasn't the only guy that could write hymns to dysfunctional times you know.

From the "All That Reckoning" album released in 2018, "The Things We Do To Each Other" talks to the weird times that we've been living through these last few years, times which seem to be going on and on and on. Hell, maybe five years is getting optimistic...

In this episode, Michael Timmins and Alan Anton, co-writers of the song, talk about the thinking behind it, analogue keyboards, how the song has its roots in 1970s "classic rock", and throw some light on their songwriting process in this digital world that we now inhabit....


To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest...

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from them, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "All That Reckoning", click here.

You can buy "All That Reckoning here.

To order the new album, "Songs of the Recollection", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here. 

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

We have two songs to cover in this episode, both slow, sad waltzes from the same kind of period in Junkies history, both written somewhere around 1991.

"Five Room Love Story" was a new song that was being played on the "Caution Horses" tour, but which didn't quite make it onto the next album. Michael Timmins and Alan Anton explain what the song was about and why it missed out, before finally making it onto the "Rarities, B-Sides and Slow Sad Waltzes" record in 1999.

"Winter's Song" was on "Black Eyed Man", fitting in better with the overall theme of the album, both musically and lyrically. In a way, it was a goodbye to the signature "Caution Horses" sounds of mandolin, accordion and fiddle, and in this podcast, we'll hear why that was.

So settle down and get a glass or a mug of something warming as you listen in. It's cold where you brought me...


To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest...

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "Black Eyed Man", click here.

To listen to "Rarities, B-Sides and Slow, Sad Waltzes", click here.

To order the new album, "Songs of the Recollection", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here.

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

Following on from "I'm So Open" in the last episode, "Why This One" from 2004's "One Soul Now" picks up a lot of the threads from that song and finds us all three years further down the line and not a lot the wiser for it, but with plenty more questions to ask. As in life, so in art...

As well as discussing the song in proper detail, Michael Timmins and Alan Anton reflect on the limited edition CD-ROM (remember those?) that was released with the album. "Anatomy Of An Album" offered demos, early versions and outtakes of the songs on "One Soul Now". We even play you a few snippets that show how "Why This One" got from drawing board to CD...

To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest...

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "One Soul Now", click here.

To order the new album, "Songs of the Recollection", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here.

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

After leaving Geffen, Cowboy Junkies embarked on the 21st century as a newly independent band again, marking that with the release of the album "Open" in 2001.

"I'm So Open" was that album's rallying cry in many ways, as Michael Timmins and Alan Anton explain in this episode, marking a new start lyrically, sonically and in the way in which the band recorded.  The album also featured telling guest performances from Jeff Bird of course, and Linford and Karin from Over The Rhine.

To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest...

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To buy "Open" on vinyl or CD, click here.

To listen to "Open", click here.

To order the new album, "Songs of the Recollection", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here. 

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

Whatever day you're listening to this podcast, rest assured, it's Tuesday morning...

"Sun Comes Up, It's Tuesday Morning" has long been one of the best loved songs in the Cowboy Junkies' canon. A hit single from "The Caution Horses",  it was released as the Junkies were adjusting to the huge success of "The Trinity Session" and adjusting to recording for a major label for the first time.

Michael Timmins and Alan Anton talk through the difficulties in finding the right sound for the  album - and drop an exclusive on an exciting upcoming Junkies release that you won't want to miss.

To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider - Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, Deezer, Stitcher, TuneIn, Podchaser and all the rest. .

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To buy "The Caution Horses" on vinyl, click here.

To listen to "The Caution Horses", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist on Spotify, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here.

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

In our third look behind the curtain at the songs of Cowboy Junkies, we've picked out "A Common Disaster", a top 20 hit single in the US in 1996.

The lead single from "Lay It Down", the band's first album on Geffen, it saw the Junkies getting back to their roots of the "core four" after using extended bands over their previous four studio records.

Michael Timmins and Alan Anton talk about how the song came about, the writing and recording process which shifted from Rock Island to Athens, Georgia and just how it feels to have written such a hit.

To make sure you don't miss out on each weekly episode, remember to subscribe to "Music Is The Drug" at your favourite podcast provider.

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "Lay It Down", click here.

For the ever expanding "Music Is The Drug" playlist, click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here.

For tour dates, click here. 

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

Having opened this series with the first song Cowboy Junkies put on record, for our second episode, we've gone to to the other end of the spectrum with "Ornette Coleman", the final song on their most recent album, "Ghosts".

It's one of Michael Timmins' most obviously autobiographical songs, about the time he and Alan Anton spent in London in the early 1980s, playing in a band called Germinal and immersing themselves in a very different musical landscape.

Mike and Al talk us through those old times and explain just how Ornette Coleman helped them find a way towards what would eventually become Cowboy Junkies.

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band, click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To order "Ghosts" on vinyl, direct from Cowboy Junkies, click here.

To listen to "Ghosts", click here.

For more info on Cowboy Junkies, click here. 

Copyright 2022 Latent Recordings.

For this first episode of "Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug", a look through the recordings of Cowboy Junkies, where else could we start other than side one, track one of the band's debut album, "Whites Off Earth Now!!"?

Although "Shining Moon" was a cover version of a Lightnin' Hopkins song, many of the elements that came to define Cowboy Junkies were already present and correct in this recording.

With the help of Michael Timmins and Alan Anton, we'll be charting how that sound came about, why "Shining Moon" was chosen to be the first track on the first album, and the way in which the song has continued to evolve in live performance over the years.

"Cowboy Junkies - Music Is The Drug" is hosted by Dave Bowler, author of the authorised biography of the band. To order it from the band click here.
To order direct from Omnibus Press in the UK & Europe, click here.

To listen to "Whites Off Earth Now!!" click here.

For more information on Cowboy Junkies, click here. 

Copyright 2021 Latent Recordings.