‘Graveyard Whistling’ by Morgan Wallen - Lyrics & Meaning

First released as a YouTube exclusive in March 2024 to commemorate the one-year anniversary of Morgan Wallen's 2023 album, One Thing At A Time, the Sneedville megastar's haunting cover of ‘Graveyard Whistling’ was recorded at the iconic Abbey Road Studios during his time in London for the UK's BST Hyde Park Festival.

The track - which is a cover of UK band Nothing But Thieves’ 2015 song - was packaged up as part of Wallen's Abbey Road Sessions YouTube EP, with ‘Graveyard Whistling’ then dropping as an Amazon Music Original in June 2025. In October 2025, Wallen's take on ‘Graveyard Whistling’ finally got a full streaming release.

Wallen sticks closely to the brooding, ominous instrumental of Nothing But Thieves’ original, with the eerie, undulating guitar riff helping to build the picture of an eerie stroll through a misty graveyard at night. Aside from the wonderfully intricate ‘I'm a Little Crazy’ and the rousing ‘Don't Think Jesus’, there's a case to be made for ’Graveyard Whistling’ being Wallen's most evocative vocal performance to date. He laces a weary, jaded feel into his enchanting drawl, before delivering a heart-rending crescendo during the anguished bridge.

“All that afterlife
I don't hold with it
All your gods are false
Just get used to it
Let's go out tonight
Kill some stubborn myths
Set those ghosts alight
Get into it”

The phrase ‘Graveyard Whistling’ is generally employed to convey a sense of false confidence during an anxiety-inducing situation, such as pretending to be calm and casual by whistling as you wander through a creepy cemetery. The specific cause of our protagonist's angst is not made clear, but it appears to be related to existential questions of mortality and faith, implied by the references to the “afterlife” and the line, “all your gods are false”. The latter carries a sense of being cut adrift, where the beliefs you once relied upon as ironclad no longer feel certain.

“No one's getting younger
Would you like a souvenir?
Let it take you under
Feel your worries disappear”

The line, “No one's getting younger / Would you like a souvenir?”, touches on the anxieties around death and mortality. The implication is that you can't take any worldly possessions beyond the grave, so why worry about accumulating wealth, status, etc.?

“'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you
And when you let it leave
It can't hurt you
'Cause if you don't believe
Then you know, then you know it can never do you harm
'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you”

The hook is particularly enigmatic, with it being unclear as to what the protagonist is suggesting you should stop believing in. It seems to be giving general, vague advice about the strength of the mind, where if you try and stop believing in the credibility of all your worst fears, you remove the power they hold over you.

Given Wallen's staunch Christian faith, it's unlikely the ‘Thought You Should Know’ singer-songwriter is making any kind of deeper point about religion with these lyrics. This anthemic hook seems to be more about letting your concerns and anxieties go.

“Okay, I'll admit
I'm not innocent
I did еverything
And I would again
I'm not listening
I've hеard everything
Graveyard whistling
I'm into it”

Again, the hazy lyricism here requires the listener to impose some of their own meaning on this verse, but it seems to be a confession of guilt after some vague wrongdoing nestled secretively in the protagonist's past. This adds new colour to the hook, with the narrator potentially attempting to free himself of the shame he feels after this mistake, by adjusting his beliefs about forgiveness and redemption. It could carry an underlying message about shaking off some of the blame and self-hatred that can arise in relation to some teachings of organised religion.

Perhaps, alternatively, it could be about gaining freedom from the shackles of crippling superstition, hence the references to “ghosts” and “stubborn myths”. This would apply, for instance, to someone struggling with OCD, where false beliefs about how the world operates in relation to oneself can lead to self-contempt and guilt.

As the hook outlines, if you can stop believing in this framework, “it can't hurt you” - but sadly, of course, changing an entire belief system is very often not as simple as this.

“Got a picture and a passport and a number
That give me access to the cloud I'm living under
And when I go there will I find a sense of wonder?
Open up the gates”

This verse is equally as enigmatic, and some have interpreted this to hint that the protagonist is considering suicide, with the “Open up the gates” lyric potentially a description of the Pearly Gates of Heaven - or, alternatively, the Gates of Hell.

It's a visceral set of lyrics, which accentuates the narrator's overarching sense of crisis and uncertainty, as he looks ahead at what his future holds. He grapples with the “cloud” of misery that lingers over him, and attempts to free himself from its grasp.

Wallen has never commented too extensively on his reason for covering ‘Graveyard Whistling’, but Nothing But Thieves previously shed a little bit of light on the track's creation during an interview with purevolume. The British five-piece cryptically explained, “It’s about a topic that we all share very deeply between us, that we all sat in a room and talked about and decided to write about. We’re very proud about that and we never like to give away too much about it. We’re glad that people have their own opinions on it and that’s important to us. This song took us a little while to record, but we wanted to get it right because we knew there was something underneath it, something in there. That song was also the first real lesson for us that the parts you play in the studio may not translate live and might not work the same way. It becomes a different kind of beast – you have to change your parts and make them work in a live setting”.

“All that afterlife
I don't hold with it
All your gods are false
Just get used to it
Let's go out tonight
Kill some stubborn myths
Set those ghosts alight
Get into it

-

No one's getting younger
Would you like a souvenir?
Let it take you under
Feel your worries disappear

-

'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you
And when you let it leave
It can't hurt you
'Cause if you don't believe
Then you know, then you know it can never do you harm
'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you

-

Okay, I'll admit
I'm not innocent
I did еverything
And I would again
I'm not listening
I've hеard everything
Graveyard whistling
I'm into it

-

No one's getting younger
Would you like a souvenir?
Let it take you under
Feel your worries disappear

-

'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you
And when you let it leave
It can't hurt you
'Cause if you don't believe
Then you know, then you know it can never do you harm
'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you

-

Got a picture and a passport and a number
That give me access to the cloud I'm living under
And when I go there will I find a sense of wonder?
Open up the gates

-

'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you
And when you let it leave
It can't hurt you
'Cause if you don't believe
Then you know, then you know it can never do you harm
'Cause if you don't believe
It can't hurt you”

For more on Morgan Wallen, see below:

Morgan Wallen

Artist