Talking to No-One

This is a more recent work. I wrote the lyrics while I was in Africa last year (2024), after watching a drive-through documentary on the human decay across the Appalachian Mountains. I was born in West Virginia. If not for the grace of God, I would likely be a coal miner or an engine driver.

The documentary broke my heart — it captured real desperation. I wanted this song to reflect that film through the lens of my own experience. I stripped it of sentimentality and aimed for gravity and painful realism — not a “pretty tragedy” and absolutely no postcard sadness. When it ended, I set my iPad down with a weight in my stomach. My goal was for this song to leave the same mark.

This is a link to the documentary if you interested in watching:

LYRICS

Verse 1

Ya know, the mountains can’t promise tomorrow


They just teach your back how to bend


Born between the Bible and a bottle


one’s the real thing, the other’s pretend

There’s a holler where hope go’s missing


Like a joke that chills the room


Where the boys learn not to ask questions

And girls grow too old, too soon

we don’t talk about dreams where I’m from


They all land like a small-town joke


We just talk about the mileage and the money


how many times we’ve elected real hope

There’s a dirt road with bones in the gravel


And a church with a flickering cross


Half the town’s lost track of their children


the other halves learned not to watch

the other halves learned not to watch

Chorus

Ohhhh, don’t nobody here want oblivion


just looking for an honest day’s pay

ya know God don’t answer his phone here


he just looks the other way when we pray

we’d chase anything to find meaning

Even if it’s all colored up in gray


Some pain is a bruise to the ego


Some pain is the edge of a blade

Some pain teaches you survival


Some teaches you how to behave


(Some pain never fades, some pain never fades)

Verse

There’s a boy with his mother’s sad eyes


Selling pills by an old school-bus sign


Tells himself it’s only just for a season


But the seasons never end here on time

There’s a girl who still dreams in her sleep

Wakes up in a sweat every night

Says, “I swear I was born for a reason”

Then clocks-in every day to survive

Then clocks-in every day to survive

verse 3

The factories all folded like scripture


that no one remembered to read


the future is sold by the ounce here


and no one ever looks twice when you bleed

We were taught to be proud of our sufferings


Wear em’ like our best Sunday clothes


But pride will keep you alive, past living


Till there’s nothing left that’s your own

Till there’s nothing left that’s your own

Chorus

Ohhhh, don’t nobody here want oblivion


just looking for an honest day’s pay

ya know God don’t answer his phone here


he just looks the other way when we pray

we’d chase anything to find meaning

Even if it’s all colored up in gray


Some pain is a bruise to the ego


Some pain is the edge of a blade

Some pain teaches you survival


Some teaches you how to behave


(Some pain never fades, some pain never fades)

Bridge

The mountains don’t owe you a god dammed thing


For years they’ve watched us come and go


From the nights where the silence is screaming


To the days where they hum soft and low

Where the mountains hum so soft and low

Chorus

Ohhhh, don’t nobody here want oblivion


just looking for an honest day’s pay

ya know God don’t answer his phone here


he just looks the other way when we pray

we’d chase anything to find meaning

Even if it’s all colored up in gray


Some pain is a bruise to the ego


Some pain is the edge of a blade

Some pain teaches you survival


Some teaches you how to behave


(Some pain never fades, some pain never fades)

Press Blurb:

This song confronts Appalachia without myth or sentimentality. Built on industrial Americana textures — grinding guitars, mournful violins, and drums that feel like failing infrastructure — it rejects nostalgia in favor of truth. There is no romantic ruin here, no polished sorrow. The lines observe instead of perform, documenting a region shaped by endurance, addiction, and inherited silence.

Written from personal connection rather than distance, the song moves through collapsing towns with quiet accuracy. It names what is often edited out: pride as survival, numbness as defense, and pain as instruction. The chorus refuses metaphor and categorizes its subject plainly: “Some pain is the edge of a blade / Some pain teaches you survival / Some teaches you how to behave.”

Rather than offering solutions, the song leaves a weight. Not resolution — recognition. It does not console the listener. It tells them the truth and trusts them to sit with it.