When James was relocated by a work transfer from Madison to Minneapolis, he unfortunately had to leave the successful Madison music collective he collaborated with, A Catapult Western. But as fate would have it, the other principal songwriter was in the process of relocating to Austin, TX anyway…so, c’est fini.

At about the same time, Chad was exploring the idea of stepping outside the catchy pop rock of his current project, The Tipsy Russells, who had found success with songs being featured in a Nautica advertisement and NPR’s Car Talk. Nothing wrong with a good-time band with catchy songs…Chad just had some material that didn’t fit as well in the aesthetic of that project.

Once James was settled in the Twin Cities and ready to move forward at a pace that makes glaciers look speedy, he placed an ad on craigslist, looking for fellow fans of a diverse list of artists (many of whom are mentioned in the list in the first paragraph) who wanted to make original music in some sort of vein informed by those artists, with a spirit of collaboration. The goal was not to “MAKE IT” in any traditional sense of the word, but rather to have some fun making music with cohorts who had similar esoteric tastes and see if those tastes could coalesce into something greater than the sum of the individual parts (cliché-quota…achieved!). Naturally, James heard from ONLY guitar players (seriously). He made an attempt at getting these six-string warriors together in the same room, with the caveat that all of us would obviously not be able to ALL play guitar ALL the time, but that we could each switch over to our secondary instruments (everything from bass to keys to horns) as the songs required. But only Chad replied back to that proposal positively and came over to meet and play some songs. James and Chad made each other a mix disc of influences (some of which overlapped) and decided to keep playing. They also met up with a bass player, Derek, at the Triple Rock (RIP…Triple Rock, not Derek), and practiced one or two times, but Derek decided to take another run at bike racing and wouldn’t have time for a music project, so he respectfully bowed out. Chad and James kept meeting and working on material and fleshing out a small catalog of songs. 

An opportunity arose to open for Chad’s other band, The Tipsy Russells, who were doing a release show for their new album at the Terminal Bar. Chad and James chose the pyrrhic-inspired name One More Such Victory and began preparing for the show. The show didn’t end up going smoothly…the openers (booked by the venue) were strange and NOT genre-adjacent and One More Such Victory played AFTER the headlining Tipsy Russells and suffered power/gear issues and just generally didn’t have a great show (I mean, there was no rhythm section – so it definitely felt like a work-in-progress type presentation). The resultant hiatus of the briefly named One More Such Victory lasted around a year, where both James and Chad worked on other projects, kept writing, and kept in touch. When Chad put some feelers out about loosely collaborating on some songs, forward progress was again achieved, at the same glacial pace. 

Chad and James assembled a loose collection of guitar and vocal demos, with a plan to use those demos to lure a bass player and drummer to join their fold. Chad happened to reconnect with an old high school buddy, Eric Edevold, who played in bands with Chad back in their school days. Chad mentioned that we needed a bass player and a drummer, and Eric expressed that he had always had a desire to try playing bass (guitar was his primary instrument), so he came over and jammed with Chad and James and everything went swimmingly. Chad and James had stipulated that the main requirement for potential new members was that they would WANT to hang out with them, and Eric was that guy. They moved forward as a trio, again posting a detailed craigslist ad, this time looking specifically for a drummer…and received NO responses. They retooled the ad slightly and reposted it and got several promising follow-ups, including Tony Martin of Twin Cities’ Liftbridge, a power trio rooted in an early, earthy heavy rock sound. Chad, James, and Eric clicked with Tony pretty dang hard, on all things music, biking, and kayaking, and it didn’t take too long to offer him the seat at the kit, which he graciously accepted.

It was around this time that the four members had gone around and around trying to settle on a name. From their earliest meetings, Chad and James had both expressed interest in finding a name that had some significance to their shared love of the North Shore area, landing on Temperance River and variations on that theme, that never felt indicative of the music they were making. They came up with options like The Good Lakes, Mooncussers, and many other names, always finding out they were already in use. While researching various elements of Lake Superior and the North Shore, such as The Sisters or Three Sisters, referencing rogue waves, and other supernatural references, James came across the Witch Tree, an Anglo-Saxon bastardization of the Ojibwe-named Little Cedar Spirt Tree, an ancient, gnarled cedar tree growing out of a rock face on the shore of Lake Superior near the US/Canadian border. The slightly bitter pill of the English Judeo-Christian-centric name’s condescension having an evil connotation contrasting the gifts of tobacco that Ojibwe tribespeople would leave at the Little Cedar Spirit Tree to ensure safe voyage across the treacherous waters of Gitchigumi felt like an appropriately complicated namesake for a band of four white guys that had a love for the North Shore, inhabited by the Ojibwe people when white fur traders originally made their way through the area. The sad modern fact is that visitors who wish to see the Little Cedar Spirit Tree must now be accompanied by a member of the Ojibwe tribe, due to multiple instances of vandalism by unaccompanied visitors. But the Minneapolis four-piece finally settled on the name Witch Tree.

Unfortunately, the glacial pace that had become comfortable to primary writers James and Chad didn’t put the band in a good place to book any shows, which didn’t gel with drummer Tony’s desire to play out more often than his previous projects. After having a metric shit-ton of patience while they tried to get some traction, Tony departed and joined a gigging project, Lost Kitten, while the remaining members of the recently coined Witch Tree despondently strummed their instruments in the basement with no percussion backing them up. They decided to focus on getting some decent practice room recordings of their best tracks ready for a drummer to add percussion (secretly hoping they could trick Tony into doing it). After Lost Kitten didn’t end up getting found (#BandNamePuns), the remaining members of Witch Tree met up with Tony and promised a more industrious schedule, at least with regards to booking shows, and managed to wrap up a decent demo of eight songs, recorded in their practice space, The Root Cellar, in Northeast Minneapolis. 

Witch Tree began looking for shows and played their first show on Friday, August 7^th, 2015, to a surprisingly good turnout of friends and family at Lee’s Liquor Lounge (RIP). They continued to play a few times a year, notching off appearances at Memory Lanes, Wild Tymes, Art-A-Whirl, Day Block Brewing, 331 Club, The Hexagon Bar (RIP), and a couple of private benefit shows, sharing the stage with such bands as Annie and the Bang Bang; Dead Kings of Norway; Kiss the Tiger; The Strips; and Whiskey Rock ‘n’ Roll Club. In the middle of this leisurely stint of live shows, Witch Tree’s founding bass player, Eric, reluctantly bowed out of the project, having too many irons in his fire to feel comfortable playing out consistently. Eric departed on good terms and is still a good friend of the band. He has stopped over occasionally on practice nights to hear where the project is heading.

Eric’s departure gave Witch Tree the opportunity to welcome Matt Hicks into the fold. Matt played drums in the Tipsy Russells, but also was an accomplished bass player, with an affinity for Music Man basses (he’s got quite the collection), and his easy-going personality fit with everyone immediately. He played his first show with Witch Tree at Elias Metal Studio for Witch Tree’s debut Art-A-Whirl performance (with Eric in the audience).

In 2020, Witch Tree was scheduled to make their triumphant return to the mighty Terminal Bar (with Sigcell and Annie and the Bang Bang), the scene of their previous namesake’s one and only live appearance. However, COVID reared its head, and the show was cancelled.

There was the inevitable hiatus of practicing and performing as a group during the height of COVID, but with all members vaccinated, practice started again in earnest, and plans formed around how to release the music they’d accumulated. James reconnected with an old acquaintance who had recently got his degree in music production, and Witch Tree worked with him (Danny Anton Productions) to remix and remaster five of their demo tracks into a release-ready EP, coined The Root Cellar Sessions, and they’re also recording their debut full length, Be a Great Sea (a literal translation of the Ojibwe word for Lake Superior, Gitchigumi), with Danny behind the faders, starting later this month for release soon! We’re looking forward to sharing both The Root Cellar Sessions (later this year) and Be a Great Sea (in 2023) with anyone/everyone willing to give them a listen.