Backroads is made possible by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund with money by the vote of the people, November 4th, 2008.

[Music] Crossroads which way to go.

Go to the new or do you stay with the old.

Crossroads which way to go.

Follow your heart or do you chase the gold.

You take a job, work your life away, to save up some money for your dying days.

You never feel oh the wind through your hair.

Never drive through the desert or smell the salty air.

Yeah yeah the crossroads.

The crossroads, we've all been there before.

It's cold and it's windy and nothing there ever is for sure.

Yeah at a crossroads, ones above ones below.

Don't you dare count on heaven if you sell your soul.

Yeah at a crossroads which way to go.

Get busy living or just sit there and grow old.

The sun will rise ohhh and the sun will fall.

Crossroads which way go.

Follow your heart.

We're Forge North.

Kind of gave up on music in a way and then we found each other and the spirit has been rekindled and we've had a lot of great times.

Immediately when we first started playing we could just feel it inside of us that we were all on the same wave length or whatever you want to call it but we clicked immediately and it just fell into kind of this Americana folk rock style of music.

I moved up here and I met Tristan Schultz, he's the bass player, he has an excavating business and I was doing tree work and we started talking.

It was one of those deals where you're like oh you play music too, like, yeah I play music, what do you play, and Tristan's like I play bass and oh okay I play guitar and oh we should get together sometime, yeah yeah okay, you know, a year goes by and I finally call Tristan like let's get together and hang out and so we played together and then Matt's wife Dana, met her, and she said my husband plays guitar and it's like oh yeah okay somebody who plays guitar and so we ended up hanging out with Matt and it turns out he's like a really good guitar player and very intuitive guitar player and so the three of us were practicing at my place and I said you guys I got these guys, they're brothers, these the Radditz brothers, they're out of Laporte, Grant is the drummer and Garrett is the keyboard player and I said it's going to be pure magic.

You can tell by the way people play that they're playing so much using their ears and listening to everybody and blending and you know getting louder and softer as the emotions come through with the songs it's amazing.

There's a respectfulness.

I've played in different bands too where the lead you know what guitar player or somebody's like too loud or somebody's trying to run with the ball or trying to take you know everyone's just very humble, we're all working together, like there's a synergy, there's an understanding, there's a respect and a common thankfulness because we're not spring chickens you know like we've done and played in different bands and done different things and we all were just sort of ready to just be done chasing that dream, you know, the singer/songwriter, you know, at the coffee shop by yourself is sort of a kind of a tortured soul, you know, you're like oh you know sometimes you liven it up a little bit but the stuff I do on my own solo is just nothing compared to what we do as a band you know it's just not the same animal.

Whoa boy you're moving too fast.

Whoa boy you're going to lose your breath.

Whoa boy the ice is too thin.

Whoa boy you better put down that bottle of whiskey.

And find me a better way of living and help me to do a little less sinning and show me a bright star on this cloudy night.

Remind me all the rhyme and reason for doing it right.

And whoa boy catch up with your feet.

Whoa boy stop to listen to your heart beating.

Whoa boy your days they ain't slowing down.

Whoa boy you better find yourself some solid ground.

Whoa boy Whoa boy When I write a song I got a whole bunch of chord progressions and stuff and when I sit down I do it by myself and all sorts of different times of the day in the morning or at night or some times wake up in the middle of the night and you get a thought in your head and you can't go back to sleep it's like I got to write this down and then it just carries off into something and I don't write to write a story I write I get a verse and then that verse carries into the next verse and that verse carries into the next verse into the next verse and you let it flow through you and come out effortlessly.

If you start fighting the words and start trying to rhyme stuff or start trying to create a picture that isn't true to the moment then for me it kind of falls flat like I can't start a song, walk away from it, come back and finish it, I need to sit down and capture the moment, write it, hammer on it, like obsess on this song, like that's all I play for like couple days and I keep working it and messing with it changing some of the inflections and whatnot and so then later, months down the road, when I play that song I go back to that spot and that's how I remember these songs.

I can I have the pictures in my head, I have the emotions in my body, and that is for me the reason I do it is just to get that feeling out, that emotion out, and it is such a release.

It is just like when you get the right words for exactly how you're feeling or with a band when we're playing and it just the pedal steel comes in and just like tears at you, just digs into your soul like and the drums are just steady.

And I Did It Again for me as a song that was kind of it was I woke up one morning and I was so hung over and it was just like that, 11 o'clock in the morning, and I'm like why do I do this to myself, you know, like we've all been there like maybe not alcohol maybe something else but it's like things have to change, you know, this isn't and it was always such a sort of a depressing song and I never really played it and then with the band it just gives it so much energy and so much understanding everybody like people they like the song which makes me like the song and I don't know I guess it's a song from a disparaging place but good things come out of those times, in those moments I guess that's I guess that's where the songwriter goes is like think about those those hard times and then when you're in good times it's a reminder that there will be more hard times, you know, you're going to have more hard times.

Other people are going to have hard times and you can get through it and good things come of it so I guess I Did It Again I'll probably'll do it again.

I did it again, my head is spinning.

I need to go home and find my feet.

This life that I'm living, it just ain't no damn good.

It's years of drinking, knocking on wood.

I need to get home My body it aches reminds me of the stupid things I've done.

My heart it breaks for the loved ones come and gone.

Can't seem to figure it out, it seems so simple in my head.

It's 11:00 now and I'm just getting out of bed.

I'm a long way from home.

Searching for reasons this life is pleasing, it's pushed me a long way from where I want to go.

Here I am now, an older man now, more lost now than I've ever been.

I've just been looking for a home.

When you don't care what people think and you don't care if people are listening and you just give it, that's when people start listening, that's when they start listening, that's when people start.

All of a sudden when you look up and people are looking at you you're like sometimes shocked you know, but if you go out there trying to be like I'm really trying to say something here, this is really important, to me people everybody listen this is really good music, they all just kind of just wander off or go get another beer or whatever but it's like you create this bubble of emotion or intensity and then the people come to you, you know, like feeding a wild animal or something like that, it's like you can't you gotta can't put your hand out with the corn expect a deer to come eat it out of it you know or a chickadee you know you got to just be patient, just put your hand out with the seed, like come on chickadee come on.

Yeah and in my experience playing up on stage while you know Charlie is singing these words that have pretty powerful lyrics to them, and you look out and you'll see you know people getting emotional about it and then that just reverberates right onto me and I just feel that warmth in my chest and my stomach and you know my eyes tear up sometimes, it's so powerful feeling that is not something I have experienced before being in this band but.

Sometimes it's there, sometimes it's not.

You could play the exact same thing the next night and it just falls flat and then the night after that man you've got everybody is on hook you know like I don't know what the I don't know what the secret is but if I did that would be helpful, yeah.

I can see your eyes my darling, your gentle voice soothes my ears.

My life it seems so simple and so clear when my life is filled with love instead of fear.

And I can see your eyes my darling, your gentle voice soothes my ears.

My life it seems so simple and so clear when my life is filled with love instead of fear.

Whoa woo Sunshine your kiss can melt a cloudy day.

Just want you to know I've been thinking about you and I thank you for warming up my cold cloudy day.

I can see your smile so clearly now.

I can feel the warmth of your soft touch.

I can hear your laughter echoing in my head.

I can see your hair softly blowing in the wind.

And I can see your smile so clearly now and I can feel the warmth of your soft touch.

I can hear your laughter echoing in my head.

I can see your hair softly blowing in the wind.

Sunshine your kiss can melt a cloudy day.

I just want you to know I've been thinking about you and I thank you for warming up my cold cloudy day.

Whoaoo Sunshine your kiss can melt a cloudy day.

Just want you to know I've been thinking about you and I thank you for warming up my cold cloudy day.

Covid, I was out doing shows for free when it started like coming out like get me out of here help I need to get out of my living room and other people need to get out of their living room so it kind of sprouted up but I think it's really taken off.

I think the music scene has gotten strong, I think the bands have gotten stronger, the musicians.

There's these groups of people that want music to happen and they're really rallying it like as volunteers you know to get grants and to get the monies to make it happen so I think it's just really opening up.

I don't think that people took you know live local music for granted previously but you sure feel it when it's gone and you miss it and I think people have just harnessed on to that that's something that people don't want to go away, and you know it's just brings it up to here every time they go out to see some live music.

Yeah I think people have been a little bit nullified with the covid stuff just listening to recorded music and that's all people were listening to for a long time and getting back into the wow of live music, things happen that you can't capture on any sort of medium, you know, like even today like this is going to be I'm super excited to play this is a beautiful building and meeting you guys and I'm excited and cool things are going to happen today.

Only the people in this room are going to really feel, you know, so.

And this is just another part of northern Minnesota music is a setup like this where you know a station is willing to support that and put it out there and you know just keep things growing.

What a beautiful day it's been.

Sun shining in, feel that warm summer breeze.

Dragonflies fly across a never ending evening sky, choir of the critters sing.

Tree leaves chattering in a soft southern breeze and sticky with humidity.

This song found me as a way to set me free.

And drive for better days ahead.

Yeah drive for better days ahead.

And a hall of doors standing in front of me.

Each door a thankful opportunity.

In the hall I stand a gentle kind hard working man waiting for the right one to open for me.

Yet the past holds me back and after I've been attacked with painful and sorrowed memories and I try to distract instead of fighting back with booze and tobacco and weed.

What a beautiful day it's been sun shining in.

Feel that warm summer breeze when dragonflies fly across a never ending evening sky.

A choir of the critters sing the tree leaves chattering in a soft southern breeze sticky with humidity.

Yeah this song found me as a way to set me free and drive for better days ahead.

And drive for better days ahead.

Backroads is made possible by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund with money by the vote of the people, November 4th, 2008.