LOCATION: Irving Plaza, New York, NY
LINEUP: Karin, Linford, Jeff Byrd
REVIEW BY: BokononAOA@aol.com
Definitely a non-traditional show I'd say, it was just Karin and Linford and... Jack Byrd, I believe his name was, the Junkies' bassist... no drums, no guitar other than Karin on a couple songs, all Good Dog Bad Dog except for the opener, "Bothered." Still, all in all, I'd be surprised if there wasn't a whole host of Cowboy Junkies fans swarming to check out "that opening band's" CD after the show. Reception was very warm, especially for an opening act that wasn't even billed on the ticket, for an NYC show. Y'could tell there were hardly any showgoers there who'd heard of OTR before though, so for the most part any fans they had there were won that night. Speaking of which... have they ever played in New York City before? Hadn't heard of any OTR NYC shows before and that's one reason I went down even as sick as a dog as I was. Anyway, brief rundown: Started out with "Bothered," ending in a keyboard intstrumental probably a minute long; again, Karin seemed a bit nervous, but her voice still came through... only majorly noticeable problem with the nervousness was that sometimes she'd slur her words even more than I'd ever seen her do before, and sometimes she'd overcompensate on the accentuation. Plus, I'd call her stage presence that night perhaps a bit less sensual than usual. But otherwise, they were in good form. Then came "Faithfully Dangerous," and out of the seven songs this was the one that was a bit of a disappointment, due to Linford hitting all these circusy, goofy high notes throughout the song that sorta took away from the sweeping quality of it, and here Karin again slurred more than usual. After Faithfully though, it was all gold. Up next was "Etcetera Whatever" which Karin glided through with unimpeachable grace, and I'd say it was about halfway through Etcetera that the noises from the otherwise too-talkative crowd dimmed, and more or less the whole Junkies audience paid full attention. After the song Karin, who'd said pretty much nothing other than "thank you"s up until then, introduced the band, mentioned that they were a four-piece for a long time, then a six-piece, and for much of that tour had been a six-piece, and she introduced Jack (if that was indeed his first name), all of this very unpretentiously and soft-spokenly and warmly, afterwhich point they moved into "All I Need Is Everything," with Karin more than holding her own with the guitar. Now, for some backstory, I went to the show with my mother, who'd never been to a "rock concert" before in her life and will likely never go to another unless it's Over the Rhine, and two very cool twenty-something women from our church. The twenty-something women were up in the balcony. Me and mom were down up front probably about six standing rows from the stage. Mom had been wondering aloud all week about whether they'd play "Poughkeepsie" on request, if they wouldn't play it otherwise, and I said I couldn't know for sure, but we might as well try. There were plenty of requests I'd've had for them, but "Poughkeepsie" is one of my mother's all-time favorite songs so I'd requested that right after "Faithfully Dangerous," but just rather quietly, hoping mom would chime in. Mom was still too shy to for some reason (which really makes no sense at all; mom is a rather outspoken pastor and community leader who's surely the most naturally charismatic people you'll ever meet) so after "All I Need..." I shouted out twice again, rather loudly, "Play Poughkeepsie!" which, although I guess I don't know the strength of my own voice, apparently the whole club heard, and Karin said "hey, thanks, we weren't sure what to play next, you helped us make up our mind" and then said comically, to the laughter of the audience "this one's by request." So they went through that, very confidently and in full form, and it was met with extra applause. After that, Karin said "this next one's something we do for fun... not that all we do isn't fun, but, well, you'll see" and they launched into "Jack's Valentine"... which at first I thought was odd, always seemed to me like a song you'd be more likely to play to your already-devoted fans than to an unfamiliar crowd of New Yorkers, but then it was Karin doing Linford's part, which somehow made it immeasurably more accessible, and it was top-notch all the way though. I halfheartedly requested "Murder" (wanted to request "If I'm Drowning" but couldn't quite see Karin handling the guitar on that) but realised they weren't likely to fit in another request in just an opening set, and was pleased as punch anyway when they announced that their next & last song'd be "Latter Days," which they proceeded to prelude with an instrumental bit and then play perfectly to the end.