No-One's There : My First Blog About Songwriting

No-One’s There

Thursday November 30th 2023

That’s a pretty bleak title, isn’t it? Nether-the-less it’s the working title of a song I wrote this morning. I’m not generally a writer of happy songs. It’s not that I’m an unhappy person, it’s just the way it is. 

Lots of songs, even if they sound happy, have at the very least, unhappy beginnings. I tried to explain that to a reporter from The Independent, who was questioning me about the R.E.M. song “Shiny Happy People” for an online article a few years ago. The song is happiness itself, (I believe Michael Stipe used the word “bubblegum”), but the title is taken from Chinese propaganda posters that appeared following the 1989 Tianamen Square Protests. I digress.

Blog writing for me has a few purposes. Some parts, some people might find useful (great), some parts people might find interesting (also great), and some parts people might find pointless (I’ll refund your subscription fee)....but I’d also like to use it to try and record my progress with songwriting. I will write about what I’ve found out about songwriting in the three years since I started trying to take it a bit more seriously, but today I’m going to talk about today, and today I wrote this….

No-One’s There

Verse

So much, for so little, but it just won’t die

The emptiness, loneliness, behind those little lies

That you wove, with your own hands, defend you from all sides

And the heat, from the fire, that’s burns behind your eyes

Pre-Chorus

You hope that hope is coming, but it comes as no surprise,

No-one’s there

Verse

You tire, of the pulling, all those tiny strings

That connect, a reflection, of all this life can bring

And you grip, at the table, til the splinters start to sting

And they stab, at the heart of, the man who would be king.

Pre-Chorus

You hope that hope is coming, but it’s really not your thing

Chorus

No-one’s there, to protect you, and keep the wolves at bay,

No-one’s there, to respect you, or hear the words you say,

No-one’s there, to remind you, how you even got this way,

If it hurts, remember not to care

Cause no-one’s there

Half-Verse

Never have I ever, is not a game you’ve played

Or surveyed, the wreckage, to see how far you’ve strayed

Pre-Chorus

You hope that hope is coming, but you feel you’ve been betrayed

Chorus

No-one’s there, to protect you, and keep the wolves at bay,

No-one’s there, to respect you, or hear the words you say,

No-one’s there, to remind you, how you even got this way,

If it hurts, remember not to care

Bridge

You made yourself an island, exuberance and flair

All alone too castaway to care

No-one’s there

No-one’s there

No-one’s there

No-one’s there

Outro Verse

So much, for so little, but it just won’t die

The emptiness, loneliness, comes as no surprise

No-one’s there

Hhhmmmm. Needs work. Or maybe it doesn’t. I tend to write quickly, without thinking too much about what I’m writing about. I scribble into a book, and then usually, hopefully….when I actually type it up after a few days, a meaning becomes clearer  and I can start to refine the idea. I don’t consciously set out to write about specific things, and definitely not specific people. Superficially, this song appears to be about someone who seems to be in control but secretly wants help, despite pushing people away. Sometimes the mist doesn’t clear and stray chord progressions and ideas get recycled, but this as an overall piece has more promise than others.

There are certain things about this song which kind of tick my boxes. I understand that musically, you’re going to have to take my word for that today, but lyrically it’s got a pretty classic structure. It’s not overly verbose, it doesn’t contain a selection of stock, throwaway song phrases and the song title is pretty clear. It can go in the “definitely maybe” pile.

Record Time

Based on all this, today’s musical share should probably be “Shiny Happy People”, but I’m going to expand that to the R.E.M. album it appeared on, 1991’s “Out Of Time”. I think, even more than its more popular successor “Automatic For The People”, it’s a rich, diverse selection of songs that show a band finally unhindered by the expectation of any particular kind of record. The title apparently was only agreed upon at the eleventh hour when the band was forced to make a decision upon it ….”Huh, I guess we’re out of time…..” but it’s also a beautiful analogy for a record that was unlike any other released that year. Perfection.