You've all been with me through a lot of "OMG! This is the best thing ever and you need to hear ir!1!!"
For a minute here, let's put 1337 aside and get back to English.
This song is from The Mountain Goats "Tallahassee". And to make no bones about it, this is my favorite album of all-time. This is my #1. Let us leave no bones about it. I've left bones everywhere I've gone, but for once and for real, I love this album like I love myself. It's as much a part of me as the ache in my leg when I stretch in the morning. It's what I hear when I drink the first sip of coffee and sit down at my desk. It's what I leave with when I take off from that desk at the end of the day. I take it home with me and go to bed with it.
It's the greatest album I've ever heard. And you all should go out and buy it right now.
Were I to do you justice, I'd tell you to listen to the album and get back to me. But I can't expect that. So, it's an album about a couple... a couple who's been together for a long, long time. They drank together, fooled around and fell in love, drank some more, got married, and that's that.
The years have not been kind to the Alpha Couple. And while their love waned while they drank a drink or two to smooth the bad times over, shit was just not working out. Love became an excuse for survival. We love, therefore we must see this through. I got you, babe, so here we go.
"I got you, babe, so here we go" through the years became "I got you, babe, and that's all I got. So let's drive Cross Country and buy a run down old house in Tallahassee and watch each other drink ourselves to death. Cuz we ain't goin' out any other way."
This sounds like a depressing album doesn't it? I assure you it's not. It' remarkably uplifting, the whole thing. Here are two people who have made a decision not to only live together, but to die together. Forever. And once the decision is made, well, the rest of their lives is a celebration of all they've known. Tons of bad times to reconcile, be honest about completely before they burn themselves into oblivion. But tons of great times as well. Tons of things to remember why they fell in love in the first place, and why they love each other to this day even though their love is not the same as it was when it started, but the love don't leave.
Track 1 through the end is about the decision to end things that way. Through track 14.
This is track 12. Before they get really hammered and get all Dracula on our asses.
Personally, this song hits me from two heads. On one head, it's an apology to all those that I've ever loved but failed. Such I've loved, and such Shit Happens. But our love has never had a leg to stand on. From the aspirins, to the crosstops, to the elevils.
On the other head, this song is a proposal and a marriage vow which beats the living shit out of 'will you marry me / til death do us part'. I want to say I'm sorry for stuff I haven't done yet. Things will shortly get completely out of hand
These fuckers are going to die together, and this is the last loving sober thought they'll ever have
From the housetops to the gutters From the ocean to the shore The warning signs have all been bright and garish Far too great in number to ignore
From the cities to the swamplands From the highways to the hills Our love has never had a leg to stand on From the aspirins to the cross-tops to the Elevils But I will walk down to the end with you If you will come all the way down with me
From the entrance to the exit Is longer than it looks from where we stand I want to say I'm sorry for stuff I haven't done yet Things will shortly get completely out of hand I can feel it in the rotten air tonight In the tips of my fingers In the skin on my face In the weak last gasp of the evening's dying light In the way those eyes I've always loved illuminate this place Like a trashcan fire in a prison cell Like the searchlights in the parking lots of hell I will walk down to the end with you If you will come all the way down with me
I ask this song like it's a question. I ask her if she will come all the way down with me, but I don't until she knows I will walk down to the end with her.
