Black Eyed Man
Black Eyed Man, an album that sounds like an aural facsimile of the parched earth in dead-heat summer, keeps the Cowboy Junkies' quiet, lonesome pop integrity intact. Michael Timmins's guitar threatens to cut loose from the band's low-key mooring, and "Oregon Hill" presents a touch of Southern blues. But it's all tempered by Margo Timmins's dusted-with-longing voice. The band is her pack and follows her voice, almost slowing to the vocal pacing. That facet marks the Junkies as a responsive, listenerly unit, touched by a unique rural-country-music bug, one that steers toward clear, patient guitar picking and a lot more to keep things moving with all deliberate quietude. Then there are the tributes that pair the Canadian quartet withTownes Van Zandt, which proves to be a fruitful musical handshake that takes the Junkies up a few notches in their speed (on Van Zandt's "To Live Is to Fly").--Andrew Bartlett