January 28 - Early Spring

This is a song of rolling tension. The top line of the vocals is of both unsettling pitch and content, the story of someone fundamentally uncomfortable in his situation and his relationship and his world and his place in his song.

The idea of being in a place where you were comfortable and no long er are is a core Mountain Goats theme, at points as a spur for someone to leave, and at other points simply as a sign that what was sweet is now bitter. There's a certain horrible beauty in the bad situation that someone knows to be bad and is making no effort to change. The coffee is bitter because it's been heating too long. The smile is both real pretty and a lie.

There's no effort to leave or change in this song. It's a bad situation that was once a good situation. And right at the edge a hint of the idea (illustrated in its absence) that maybe the fault for it being bad sits with the narrator. The coffee didn't heat too long, he heated the coffee too long.

Maybe there's no point in leaving because you'll be taking yourself when you go.