How Montreal artist Forest Blakk ‘broke through the pain’ after childhood of abuse, homelessness

Montreal-born artist Forest Blakk says songs are sometimes born out of the scars one carries.

The singer-songwriter has used his hardships — like living through abuse as a child and being homeless as a teenager — to help inspire his music and lyrics. As his tour made a stop in his hometown, Blakk opened up about some of his most difficult moments and how they shaped him and his career.

Blakk endured a difficult childhood, with his abusive father being involved in organized crime.

“It was definitely strange growing up, having parents and characters who weren’t necessarily great at what they were doing. You don’t always know what impact those parts will have on you as you age and grow into an adult,” he said.

“I was homeless on and off from 13 to 18 and life was just complicated. My dad was in jail and my mom was a young mother with three kids and not knowing how to raise three kids with her husband in jail. And you know, she was into drugs and into just being a young mom,” he added.

Part of a punishment Blakk endured from his father was being grounded for a year for “messy handwriting,” which he says, had a deeper meaning.

“Being grounded for messy writing, it was never about messy writing. It was a way of just making it uncomfortable for a kid,” he said.

As he sat in his room, and read a dictionary and wrote sentences using those words as a punishment, he found comfort in words as a way to express what he couldn’t. And at the times, it’s still the case.

“I’m trying to find ways to communicate the feelings that I have locked up inside of me,” he said

“I think for a lot of people, and especially a lot of young boys, a lot of us carry a lot of emotions and we don’t work through them. And then what happens is we grow up and we turn into bad men. We turn into what we were or what we were shown or given by our parents. And I think that for me, again, using that idea of a plant growing through concrete, it’s when you can break through that it suddenly shows you that there’s sky, clouds, and life. You can break through all these traumas and things that have happened.

“For me, writing was like the jackhammer that I used to break through that concrete. It gave me a sense of purpose. It showed me a way out. Every page was a step forward and a way out of all these problems and the chaos. So yeah, that’s where I’m at with it. And so it continues. Every song I write is just another opportunity to break through another part of that experience.”

Growing up, Blakk attended various schools across Montreal, but he remembers one in particular: Dorset Elementary School in Baie D’Urfé.

When he was in the sixth grade, the same year he was grounded for a year, he recalls the teacher coming up to him, telling him there was a competition for writers across Quebec, and if he had submitted a piece of writing, he would have a chance to get published.

“I remember writing this poem about my dad, about how I made him mad and how sorry I was for that. Not thinking, you know, with hindsight as an adult, that I didn’t make my dad mad—the dad was not being a good father, and I was paying the consequence of it as a kid, not knowing it. But I wrote this poem, and it got published. That was a beautiful moment because, out of all that darkness, there was this moment of validation, and all of a sudden, I was worth something, and I was important. And I still have that book with me now,” he said.

“I became friends with words through that pain. And so, that terrible thing, I found a way out, and it feels like that’s kind of my life — like the plant growing through concrete.”

The first six string: ‘she changed my whole life’

Amid an unstable family life, and living on and off the streets, Blakk says his grandmother (Nana) saved his life when he was going down a very rough path.

“When everything fell apart, I ended up, I was in Ottawa at the time, and I was just struggling. I had no one else to call, so I called my Nana, and she said, ‘Well, why don’t you grab a Via Rail to Dorval, and I’ll pick you up, and you can come live with me? All you have to do is go to school.’ And so I did,” said Blakk.

When she picked him up, all he had was two garbage bags full of his belongings. She took him in and inspired him to turn his life around. She also gifted him something special.

“I came to her house, and she offered me a gift. ‘I want to get you something. What do you want?’ I didn’t really know what to say. I just hadn’t been asked that question. And the only thing I could think of was a guitar. So she went to Steve’s Music Shop, bought a cheap little electric guitar, and put it in my hands. And that guitar, it was like the first time I had an axe or a jackhammer. It’s the first time I saw something chip. I was like, ‘Oh.’ And I was scared of it because something inside of me connected to it. Music was always, I guess, part of me. I just didn’t know it. And so something broke, and I went, ‘Oh, wow.’ And so it started from there, where it opened that door, and I’ve just been digging ever since to see what’s on the other end. And this is where I’m at so far. This is what I found. But she changed my whole life.”

His grandmother also played a big part in helping Blakk find the love of his life. While he was enduring a broken heart, she encouraged him to get back out there and date.

“The world was black and white. I only saw black and white in this world. And the minute I met her, the whole world filled up with colours. It was like I saw everything for the first time. It was like being a baby, opening your eyes, you know, and I realized I didn’t know very much before meeting her. She’s… yeah, it changed everything. Like, I instantly knew,” he expressed.

“The thing about meeting someone you really love is that you immediately understand that you don’t want to die. You know, like, you really understand that you want to be here. And that’s how I feel with her. Like, now I’m just… the tragedy of finding someone you love so much is knowing that it will end. It’s easy looking for people because you don’t know what you’re missing yet. But when you know what you’ll miss, you realize that time becomes very fragile. So that’s where I’m at now. I’m just trying to make life work where minutes go by slowly, and we have as much time as we can, because we’re going to get old real quick, and then it’ll be over.”

He met her while living in the back of the truck. Blakk said she saw him for who he was. He wrote the song “Fall Into Me” about her.

“I didn’t know what I had to offer. And to her, I had everything. And that’s what I think — another thing about meeting people you really love or people you really trust: you get to see yourself through them. And so, you learn to trust what you are, and you build yourself up; you become a much better version of yourself. And so, that’s what I feel like has happened with her. I’m just, again, seeing myself through her lenses and trying to become a better person. And going back to the heartbreak that you experienced.”

Blakk’s first breakthrough single was “If You Love Her.”

“‘If You Love Her’ was heartbreak for me. It was like someone telling you that you don’t know them, and that’s why they’re leaving you. And it’s like, oh my God. So it was like my way of going, ‘Yeah, OK, well here’s who you are.’ And I wrote it while I was homeless. So to see a song that was born out of such a difficult moment in your life take off and go around the world over and over again, I still don’t know how to process it. Every time I hear it—if I hear it on the radio, or I’m in a shopping place or whatever, like a store—I’m like, oh my God, it’s crazy. I don’t—I can’t understand it. It makes no sense. And maybe that’s just because I am who I am or I’m from where I’m from, but all of this makes no sense. So I’m just hanging on every day, being like, ‘This is crazy, man.’

He recalls the day where he heard it for the first time on radio.

“My wife and I, it was the middle of COVID, and I heard that it was going to be played in San Francisco. So we just drove. And we couldn’t go anywhere, so we sat in our car. We slept in our car, I think, and ended up in San Francisco, and it was being played. I broke down. It was like, because I think everybody dreams of that, you know? To feel, again, to feel valid, to feel seen. And here is this place, and they’re going to choose to let you be part of something in their world. It’s like, yeah, and it hasn’t stopped since. It was crazy. I think about it right now, and I’m like, oh my God, I just want to cry. It’s like, it’s pretty wild, all of this. It feels like a dream.

“I never knew I would have a hit song. I never knew I’d have two hit songs. I never knew how it would work with the people I’d work with. I never knew I would be here.”

‘Trying to find my healing’

Blakk has also opened about his mental health issues, including wanting to end his life. He encourages those who are struggling to help.

“Speak up. You can suffer in silence, but you can also heal in public. That’s what I’m doing. I’ve been suffering in silence my whole life, and now I’m just trying to find my healing in public. I’m saying what I feel and how I feel, because sometimes people hear that, and it shapes the course of how they connect through stuff like that,” he said.

“A lot of people assume I’m popular and have everything, and the truth is I’m alone a lot. And so when people check in on me, it feels really special. And I always think, like, if that’s where I’m at, then where are other people who aren’t in the public eye? Where are people who can be easily forgotten? So I think that’s the big thing. Again, suffering in silence is tough because you’re suffering in silence. And, you know, it’s like, if you’re looking for depressed people, don’t look for the sad ones. Look for the ones that are too happy. You’ll find them. So I think that’s what it is. Now I’m healing in public.”

Last Tuesday, Blakk brought his “Love and Loss” tour to Montreal. Love and loss are two powerful emotions, he says.

“I named the tour ‘Love and Loss’ because it comes from the album ‘Undone (Love & Loss).’ When I was writing the last chunk of songs, I didn’t know what I was going to write. I never do. I don’t walk in going, ‘This is what I’m writing today.’ And sometimes, you know, you write about love. Sometimes you write about loss. Sometimes you write about stuff that’s in the middle of it. And when it came time to put the album together, I was with my team, and we’re all looking at the songs. What do we like? And it was kind of like a general consensus—we loved this chunk of songs. But then I was like, ‘What do I call this album?’ Half the songs are love, and then half the songs are about heartbreak or loss. So I was trying to figure it out. I was just sitting there, and it’s obvious now, obviously, but it wasn’t so obvious in the moment. I was like, ‘Do I need to go write more love songs? Or do I need to go write a really sad album? Who am I in this moment?’ And I was sitting there, and eventually it was just, well, it’s what it is to come undone. It’s what it is to unravel all these emotions. And sometimes, when you come undone, you discover love. And sometimes it’s loss that causes you to come undone. And that’s what it was. It was ‘Undone, Love and Loss.’ And so, this is the ‘Love and Loss’ tour.

“We’re going to play songs that are about love and about finding the people that you love. But it’s also about how love isn’t always pretty. Sometimes you love people from beyond the grave. What’s that about? So sometimes loss is not always loss. Sometimes it’s a version of love. And sometimes love isn’t always love. Sometimes it’s a version of loss. So it’s the ‘Love and Loss’ tour.”

Emotional return to the 514

For him, being back in Montreal brings back memories of the past.

“It’s weird being back, you know, driving into these streets. Like, I know these streets, I know these people, I know what it is to be born here. You know, I feel like I’m the remnants of a past life that’s kind of piecing itself back together. So when I come back, a lot of people are excited for me to come home. For me, it’s like kind of stepping back into the fire,” said Blakk.

To be back in the city where it all started, is quite emotional for him.

“People like me don’t get out. People like me end up like everybody else, broken and the byproducts of all the chaos. We don’t leave LaSalle, we don’t leave the places we’re from, we struggle. So the fact that I’m here and I don’t have to be in those shoes is pretty powerful,” he said.

One of the things Blakk does during his show is a spoken word, something he’s never done before live, as he’s always kept his poetry to himself.

Blakk has shared a lot of content from his tour on social media. From tearful reactions, to father-daughter moments, and proposals, it is evident to see the impact his music has.

“For me, fans have always been more than just fans. They’re people. They’re people with stories and hearts and heartbreak and heartache. What is it to be human? Like, to really connect with somebody, to show them that they’re visible. There was a band that did that for me a long, long time ago, and it changed my life. And so for me, I’ve always stuck to that—that no matter how big this got or how small it was, I’ll always be a human first and a musician second. So to see everyone proposing, dancing, connecting, being better parents, being better friends—what greater gift is there in music?

“You can have plaques, you can have hits, you can have radio stuff, you can have whatever. You could be the most famous person on the planet, but the more fame you get, the more alone you are. With me, the bigger it gets, the more I feel like I actually have a family for the first time.

“I always tell fans that you go from stranger to fan, fan to friend, friend to family. And that’s how it is. I know a lot of my fans by name. They’re not fans anymore. They’re friends who like my music. And those friends who like my music, I eventually get to know really well. So I talk to them at Christmas, and I check in on them, and I know how their hearts are.

“They’re real people. They’re real names. They’re not just fans. They’re not just strangers in the crowd. They’re people that you get to know, and they’re everything. And their story inspires you. So yeah, that’s what it is to me. They’re not just fans. They’re everything.”

‘Strip myself of the armour that I built’

In a social media post, Blakk said: “I’m determined to become the man I never had in my life.” It’s something he feels he hasn’t achieved yet.

“I feel like it’s a lifelong journey. I think I’ll know in my last breaths if I did a good enough job. But I’m always trying. I have a wife who encourages me to be the better version of myself every day. Again, I’m like a big rock. I came from a city that was really rough and tough on me. And so I’ve been trying to strip myself of the armour that I built here by going out into the world and finding people who don’t necessarily have that much armour on. And so I don’t want to be the one covered in all this metal and pain

“The truth is, over time, I break it down and try to become just a better version. But every day there’s a chance to grow. There’s a chance to interact with somebody and figure out how to do something better. Again, I don’t always realize how harsh things can be when you come from something harsh and deep. So again, it’s a lot of just trying to figure out how to walk through the world. But I’m very lucky. I have an incredible wife, like I said. And I get to write a lot of songs about how she makes me see the world differently, and yeah, she inspires me, and that’s what I’m doing. So hopefully, when I get to the end of all this, I’ve done everybody a service and I’ve done all the lessons justice by becoming a soft, gentle man who broke through the pain. But I’m still stuck in the concrete a bit right now.”

Blakk says you can go through chaos as a child — as many people do — but often it’s a matter of what you want to do with it as an adult.

“I don’t think everything happens for a reason, but I do think that you can find a reason in everything that happens. And I think they’re really different because one means you don’t have control, and the other means you do. I think it’s up to us.

“So I can be upset about it, which a lot of people do. I can become the same thing because it’s all I’ve ever known. Or I can go, ‘I really don’t love that. So what else is there?’ And that’s what I’m doing.

“I’m on a path of self-discovery for the rest of my life. So sometimes the things that you don’t have inspire you to find those things. Sometimes the things you do have inspire you to look somewhere else. So again, everything doesn’t happen for a reason, but there is a reason that you can find in everything that happens.”

As for what’s coming up next, Blakk shared what he has been up to.

“I’ve been writing an album in secret for five years, and I’ve been trying to figure out how to not just talk about love and loss, but also the stuff that happened in between. So I think people can expect the next incarnation of me to be just going inside a lot deeper than ever. It’s not about writing hit songs; it’s about writing my truth because I need that out. I can’t hold on to it by myself anymore, so I need the world to help carry it with me, and then I’ll see what comes out the other side of that.

“It’s been very special to be writing. I just didn’t want anyone to tell me they liked something or didn’t like something. These aren’t songs to me; they’re, again, parts of me.”

As for his fans in Montreal, he has a message for them too.

“If you are a fan of mine from Montreal, here’s what I want to say: One, thank you. Thank you for being here for me. I am a Montrealer through and through, man. Ville LaSalle, Metro Angrignon, this is my place. I love you guys. And the biggest thing that I want to tell people out there, all you Montrealers, is to dream as big as you can. I never thought in a million years that a kid from Ville LaSalle would get anywhere, but now here I am. I’m living my dream. I’m travelling the world. So if you’re anything like me, if any of this resonates with you, don’t stop. Dream big. Go for the world. And I look forward to meeting you all out there. Be my friends. Be my family. Peace.”