The Sadies Soldiering on in Honour of Dallas Good

The Sadies, a legendary Canadian rock and country-western band that’s been active for nearly 25 years, were forced to reinvent themselves after the death of a key band member. Longtime vocalist and guitarist Dallas Good passed away unexpectedly due to coronary illness at the age of 48 in February 2022.

“A son, a brother, a husband, a friend, a bandmate, a leader, a force to be reckoned with, we have no words for the shock we are all feeling,” The Sadies wrote on their Instagram account at the time. In the aftermath of this tragedy, Dallas’s brother and fellow band member, Travis Good, was faced with an obligation to his brother and their shared love of music.

The group had a completed record which Dallas “was very proud of,” according to Travis Good. That record, Colder Streams, was released later that year, and went on to win the Juno award for Adult Alternative Album of the Year in 2023. Now the band is touring across Canada and parts of the northern U.S. to promote Dallas’s last record, and honour his contributions.

“It’s a very strange and unique situation we find ourselves in, where we’ve been a band for 25 years and we’ve had to re-learn everything,” Travis Good says. “We’ve got some help from our friends who sit in with us and help once and a while, but it’s been about a year now [since Dallas’s death] and we’re starting to get our sea legs.” The decision to carry on wasn’t entirely out of sentiment, but also a reminder of the need to finish the job as professional musicians. “We had this new record. […] It hadn’t been released yet when Dallas died, so it was just a no-brainer to carry on.”

The record is propelled by the deeply haunting song “More Alone,” which contains the lyric “He died all alone, but he was never alone,” as a posthumous Dallas Good can be heard on vocals and guitar. “It’s a grim period that we’re still working our way through, and who knows how it will end,” Travis Good says. “We have a duty to promote this last record that he was so proud of, and we’re soldiering on.”

The Sadies will be performing at Black Pirates Pub on July 24 with the Cartwrights opening. Check out The Sadies’ website at thesadies.net and the Cartwrights at http://facebook.com/cartwrights807.

Story by Michael Charlebois, Photo by Heather Pollock