Though the title lends itself to our Covid lives, certainly these days as Omicron wreaks havoc around the world, “Nothing To Do (For Real This Time)” is about something entirely different. The song, from Ward Hayden & the Outliers‘ outstanding 2021 release Free Country, considers the experience of returning to one’s hometown after time spent away pursing one’s dreams. In Hayden’s tale, the experience is a humbling one that is fraught with loneliness and second-guessing.
Yet he does put it in an important and inspiring perspective. “I got nothing to do and not all dreams come true but at least I got off the starting line,” he sings.
Hayden explains further below. I only wish he had answered an important question about the video: exactly how many donuts were consumed, both for the camera and behind the scenes, during its making?
Twangville is honored to premiere “Nothing To Do (For Real This Time)” from Ward Hayden and the Outliers.
“I’ve often felt that some of my songs have been prophesies. If anyone ever doubts my claim, I wrote this song in March of 2018, two years prior to the pandemic.
It came to me in a moment of reflection, we had just gotten back from a long stretch of tour dates in Europe and the US and I was looking at an unfamiliar stretch of being home and without any shows for the next couple months. I hadn’t had that much time off from gigging in probably ten years.
With time on my hands I had to ask myself “What did independence ever get me?”, I felt strange, without purpose and concerned about what was in store for the future. I really had to ask myself was everything I’ve been doing worth it and what has it got me in the long run? I didn’t have much money, I didn’t own anything of real value, a lot of the things other people my age had in their lives were absent from mine because of my pursuit of music. This song is an exploration of the trade offs between a more standard life and the life of traveling and performing music for a living, then one day having it stop or slow down and realizing you have nothing to do, for real this time.”
– Ward Hayden
About the author: Mild-mannered corporate executive by day, excitable Twangville denizen by night.