(FORTUNE Magazine) – Everyone has a band that makes everything all right with the world; mine is Cowboy Junkies. Maybe it's an odd choice, since the Junkies are often tagged as slow and depressing. Well, slow ain't so bad this month. As for depressing, singer Margo Timmins, below, answers, "When I'm sad and I put on Leonard Cohen, I don't feel sadder. I feel better. There's a beauty in the melancholy."

Cowboy Junkies makes music that is subtle and smart and unbelievably pretty. Their new record, Open (Latent/Zoe/Rounder), is dirgier than past efforts but no less soothing for that. Timmins' voice floats over chord changes that last forever. Her brother, Michael Timmins, writes lyrics that often demand close listening and always reward it. They make what I call Sunday morning music--psalms, I suppose, for an atheist who needs reassurance that there's something out there worth believing in.

--Erik Torkells