"I am not afraid of dying / But I fear dying unloved"...
rock
blues
poetry
ballad
singersongwriter
emotional
classic rock
philosophical
melancholy
pensive
somber
road song
Story behind the song
I am not a country music fan, although I admire and respect some stuff I listen here and there; Willie Nelson, Hank Williams... Unfortunately the genre has often been "snatched" by nationalistic bigots, but I don't think that always has to be the case, and also it's hard not to recognize it as one of the seminal roots in American music, with Dylan and Young and Petty and all that great stuff...
Not being a fan, I wouldn't have any business making a country song, but my first fidelity is to the Muse, and for some reason she whispered to me the chorus of this song during a siesta. I liked its dreamy and "road movie" vibe, so the quest for the other excerpts of the song began...
I suspect that, in a weird way, my influences can have to do with my love for Leonard Cohen. He only has perhaps 3, 4 proper country songs in his whole discography, but one of his first bands was a country one, so I think I may have been indirectly influenced.
As for the theme.... of course you can't never be sure, but this song was written by that part of me that thinks that I have never been loved. Love, real love is such a rare thing. I've been drinking buddy, motherhood-enhancer, occassional savior of the day, male-figure-I-need-to-get-one-of-those... But I don't think I've ever experienced an unconditional, non-transactional kind of love. I've sometimes given it, which is a lot, but...
As usual, besides the usual struggle author-vs-what-he-intends-to-say, I've had to struggle my very sparse musical equipment, currently so fisherpricey that makes me want to cry. Hopefully some of you will be able to get past the modest audio quality, and the electricity will be somewhat conveyed, despite the "poor insulation"...
Lyrics
Born in the middle of madness
I guess that I managed
I guess I got strength
Drowned in a sea of bad avices
so boiled I was no one
above all myself
I'm not complaining, I made it
seen way too many who don't
gladly loved but still don't know
what is it like being loved
Time went by always failing
always the poor critic
of what I was fed
Well trained slave heading smiling
to awful decisions
a bag in my head
Wish didn't need all those U-turns
false signs and years of detours
sleepless nights never guessing
when evil was in the 'hood
Sure's a rocky road when you're unloved
I see the people around me
I see the same sickness
that still cannot see
I see the vicious, the addicts
to that stinking poison
that was kiling me
I have my sisters and brothers
friends that I never see
we are a million of heartaches
they all unloved just like me
Sure's a rocky road when you're unloved
I sing my song to the silence
the wind on my face
they can't take it from me
So many chains have been broken
by music of sadness
perhaps even this
I have pains I have regrets
scars that make me feel blue
so much evil I allowed
so much good didn't do
I am not afraid of dying
sooner or later we fall
I am not afraid of dying
but I fear dying unloved
Sure's a rocky road when you're unloved
Sure's a rocky road when you're unloved