Cowboy Junkies’ Small Changes Lend a Dynamic, Engaging Edge

Anyone who tuned in briefly to Cowboy Junkies 10 years ago when they were the celebrated new darlings of the pop critics’ establishment would be astounded how far incremental development can take a band.

The Junkies, heard on the celebrated 1988 release “The Trinity Session” (famously recorded for $250 in a church in their hometown of Toronto), were musical somnambulists whose songs dwelled on the cusp of an unsettling dream. On stage, singer Margo Timmins was a static, retiring figure, a beautiful but delicate flower who seemed in danger of wilting should a bright stage light fall on her.

The thoroughly engaging, musically dynamic and even outgoing performance that Timmins and her band mates gave Wednesday at the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano was the payoff of persistence, not a radical make-over.

Clad in a long, red floral dress and a shyly winning smile, Timmins didn’t shrink from the bright lights that went with the brighter, more pop-accessible musical hues that have gradually entered the repertoire written by her older brother, lead guitarist Michael Timmins.

She wasn’t flustered by some boisterous between-songs interjections from the crowd, but bantered easily through the evening, mainly on the subject of Canadians’ bemusement over that odd American custom, the Thanksgiving dinner.

That increasing comfort with performance allowed her to bring a warm, assertive erotic glow to “Misguided Angel,” a country ballad from “Trinity” that was equaled by highlights from the current album, “Miles From Our Home.” The Junkies continue to probe Doors-like psychedelic realms, including an epic, spooky cover of Robert Johnson’s “Me and the Devil Blues.”

Balancing the dark were luminous folk-rock songs like the new album’s title song and the lovely “Darkling Days,” which Timmins infused with a sense of contemplative richness and timelessness.

* Cowboy Junkies and Over the Rhine play tonight and Saturday at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano, 8 p.m. $27.50-$29.50. (949) 496-8930.