During the 1983-1991 period, Cowsill performed as a solo artist and with the band Billy Mitchell's Trainwreck, a Vancouver-based alt-country band presumably named after Billy Cowsill and Lindsay Mitchell. Band members included Lindsay Mitchell, (formerly of Prism), Elmar Spanier, Chris Nordquist and Danny Casavant. As a solo artist, Cowsill was typically accompanied by upright bass player Elmar Spanier and other side musicians, becoming popular in western Canada through performing what Cowsill described as his "Dead Guys Set"; country and pop songs by artists no longer living.