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Back in 1985, Calgary was an economically recovering oil burb of 625,000, New Coke was inducing nausea, and most people thought roots music was the soundtrack to a TV miniseries starring that guy who wore weird glasses in Star Trek: TNG. Thankfully, Billy Cowsill knew better.
Years from his Partridge-family-inspiring beginnings, he found himself opening a gig for k.d.lang in the Swanky Palliser. With a baby-faced guitar protégé soon to be known as Colin James in his band, Cowsill tossed all the branches of the American music tree – country, bluegrass, blues, rock and rockabilly – into a help and sparked it with his weathered voice. And there at the back was a cassette tape picking it all up.
Cowsill has since come to define roots music in Calgary, and as his health fails, recording such as this – which sounds remarkably vibrant considering its age and low-tech origins – become crucial cultural artifacts, Cowsill could see the connections between Hank Snow, Elvis Presley and The Clash, and, like Capt. Picard, he made it so.
Tom Babin
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