The nervous Alpha Couple pretends it will be okay for the last time in “First Few Desperate Hours.”

Track: “First Few Desperate Hours”
Album: Tallahassee (2002)

Tallahassee is the story of the final days of The Alpha Couple, the recently married, miserable, excited, drunken disaster couple that weaves through the Mountain Goats catalog like connective tissue. They are in dozens of songs, but Tallahassee tells of their marriage and attempt to solidify it by moving from Nevada to a run-down house in Florida. It won’t save them. We know that and they know that, but it’s more about the attempt than the possibility of success.

When John Darnielle introduces songs from Tallahassee he talks about how this was never going to work. The couple even knows that, which makes the nervous energy in “First Few Desperate Hours” less hopeful and more cringe-inducing. The Alphas move their things into their new home and they exude fake hope. Their spirits “sag like withering flowers” and “there’s a stomach-churning shift in the way the land lies.” The couple is only two songs into their album and they’ve already totally given up. There will be other attempts in “Game Shows Touch Our Lives” and “Old College Try” but this is the final time that they can pretend it isn’t all tinged with dread.

The emotions here are clear, but the geography is murky. The “bad luck comes in from Tampa” lines throw a wrench in the story that the couple drove from Vegas to their new home, but you shouldn’t think about it too hard. The Tallahassee in this album is an anti-Shangri-La where everything is terrible and should not be confused for the real capital city of Florida. Tampa is far south of Tallahassee, though it’s entirely possible to imagine that the couple wandered deep into Florida and had to double back to their final resting place. That adds an even sadder element to their cross country drive.