"Fast car" is kind of a continuation of Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." It has all the clawing your way to a better life, but in this case the protagonist never makes it with her love; in fact she is dragged back down by him.
There is still an amazing amount of hope and will in the lyrics; and the lyrics themselve rank and easy five. If only music was stronger it would be one of those great radio songs that you hear once a week 20 years after it was released. The imagery is almost tear-jerking ("City lights lay out before us", "Speeds so fast felt like I was drunk"), and the idea of starting from nothing and just driving and working and denigrating yourself for a chance at being just above poverty, then losing in the end is just painful and inspiring at the same time.
We don't serve your country
Don't serve your king
Know your custom, don't speak your tongue
White man came, took everyone
We don't serve your country
Don't serve your king
White man listen to the songs we sing
White man came, took everything
We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
We follow in the steps of our ancestry
And that cannot be broken
We don't serve your country
Don't serve your king
Know your custom, don't speak your tongue
White man came, took everyone
We don't need protection
Don't need your hand
Keep your promise on where we stand
We will listen we'll understand
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
We follow in the steps of our ancestry
And that cannot be broken
We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
We follow in the steps of our ancestry
And that cannot be broken
Broken
Mining companies, pastoral companies
Uranium companies of, companies of
Collected companies
Got more right than people, yeah
Got more say than people, yeah
More say than the people, oh yeah
More say than people, yeah
More say than people, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah
Forty thousand years that makes a difference to the state of things
The dead heart
The dead heart
The dead heart, oh, lives here
The dead heart
The dead heart, I said
The dead heart lives
It lives here
Don't serve your king
Know your custom, don't speak your tongue
White man came, took everyone
We don't serve your country
Don't serve your king
White man listen to the songs we sing
White man came, took everything
We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
We follow in the steps of our ancestry
And that cannot be broken
We don't serve your country
Don't serve your king
Know your custom, don't speak your tongue
White man came, took everyone
We don't need protection
Don't need your hand
Keep your promise on where we stand
We will listen we'll understand
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
We follow in the steps of our ancestry
And that cannot be broken
We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
We follow in the steps of our ancestry
And that cannot be broken
Broken
Mining companies, pastoral companies
Uranium companies of, companies of
Collected companies
Got more right than people, yeah
Got more say than people, yeah
More say than the people, oh yeah
More say than people, yeah
More say than people, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, yeah, yeah
Forty thousand years that makes a difference to the state of things
The dead heart
The dead heart
The dead heart, oh, lives here
The dead heart
The dead heart, I said
The dead heart lives
It lives here
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Forty thousand years ago was about when anthropologists believe humanity developed the concept of language and, with it, symbolic thought.
What the band is trying to say, I believe, is that Western society, somehow, has fallen off the track, that we no longer live the way nature/God/whatever meant us to live. To some degree, he's right.
The question is, is that entirely a bad thing? Sure, corporations have far too much power and influence over our daily lives.
While we don't live simple hunter/gatherer lifestyles, humanity's legacy is technological advance. Without these advances, which are the legacy of language and symbolic thought, our fate will be no different than any other species on this planet - we'll spend our time here, then disappear.
Personally, I'm not too fond of that idea.
@SirThoreth I'd say the line of thought is that we've lost our connection with the land and abused the rights of individuals for greed, more so than that we should return to how things were. We can progress but what costs are we willing to pay? More poignantly, do we need to pay that cost? Or was there a better way to achieve the same results?