"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.
Let me see through all the lights
I know I'll feel better in time
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
Now things have cleared, I'm not dead
Now that I've settled in bed
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
What if I walked off the line?
And what if I never revived?
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
You know, it should have been red
You know, I should have been led
Down in, deep inside, I am safer
Now and then I want to fly
Away from everything, on my own
On my way through the night
I wake up, I don't know where I've been
And then I'll start over again
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
You know, it should have been red
You know, I should have been led
You know, I could have been dead
I know I'll feel better in time
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
Now things have cleared, I'm not dead
Now that I've settled in bed
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
What if I walked off the line?
And what if I never revived?
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
You know, it should have been red
You know, I should have been led
Down in, deep inside, I am safer
Now and then I want to fly
Away from everything, on my own
On my way through the night
I wake up, I don't know where I've been
And then I'll start over again
You should have told me a lie
I'll tell you why, I don't know
What was going through my head
You know, it should have been red
You know, I should have been led
You know, I could have been dead
Lyrics submitted by Willowbear
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
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Captures the rollercoaster of emotions of feeling lost while loving someone who is not there for you, feeling let down and abandoned while waiting for a lover. Lost with no direction, "Now I'm up in the air with the rain in my hair, Nowhere to go, I can go anywhere"
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Great version of a great song,
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I think the song might be about a loved one telling the singer some distressing news.
"See through the lights" is sort of a cartoon-image in my head of seeing stars, like he was knocked out by the news.
I imagine it to be that a friend informed him or even his lover told him she's had an affair or was about to have an affair, or was leaving him or something equally disconcerting.
What was going through his head is anyone's reactions to such heart-rending news, he might hurt himself or someone else.
He's saying the information should have been given to him in a less shocking manner.
Too much emotionally shocking information, led him thankfully to sleep, but when he awoke there it was again, his first thoughts.