The song Josh Ritter was nervous to share and more stories from his catalog

In every musician’s career, there are the songs that stand out among the rest. Maybe it’s a song they were nervous to share with the world, the song that changed everything, or the song that was inspired by a spiritual experience.

Those are the songs we want to learn more about on Backtracking. The premise is simple: We’ll give artists a long list of prompts they can choose from. Then, they’ll look back through their catalog and pick the song that fits best. They’ll tell us the stories behind them and, sometimes, perform them live.

In our latest episode, Josh Ritter joins us to revisit some of the songs that have shaped his career. Songs like “Truth is a Dimension (Both Invisible and Blinding),” which was inspired by amateur astronomers.

“He’s going out into look at the sky and maybe find a little peace,” he says. “As he’s doing it, he has a mystical experience. He looks up at the sky and receives the fundamental nature of truth, and it comes to him all in a moment. That’s how it happened to me when I was writing the song. I wasn’t looking up at the sky. I was writing the song, and the blank space just kept getting filled up.”

Ritter also revisits “Dreams,” from 2017’s Gathering, which was the first time he decided to write about his experience with Bipolar II disorder.

“ I wanted to write about that because I also wanted to write about medication,” he says. “I felt like it was important to say, and I’d read so much and seen so many heroes of mine, friends of mine and people that had to live in darkness for so long that it became overpowering. I did not want to be overpowered.”

Ritter also tells the story behind writing “Girl in the War” while on tour with Joan Baez.

“I took it right upstairs to Joan in her hotel room, and I knocked on the door,” Ritter says. “I said, ‘I have to play you this song.’ ”

It’s a wide-ranging conversation with one of the best narrative songwriters in the Americana sphere. Plus, Ritter performs in front of a live audience at World Cafe.

This episode of World Cafe was produced and edited by Kimberly Junod.  Our digital producer is Miguel Perez. World Cafe‘s engineer is Chris Williams. Our programming and booking coordinator is Chelsea Johnson and our line producer is Will Loftus.