"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.
In a church, by the face
He talks about the people going under
Only child know
A man decides after seventy years
That what he goes there for, is to unlock the door
While those around him criticize and sleep
And through a fractal on a breaking wall
I see you my friend, and touch your face again
Miracles will happen as we trip
But we're never gonna survive, unless
We get a little crazy
No we're never gonna survive, unless
We are a little crazy
Crazy yellow people walking through my head
One of them's got a gun, to shoot the other one
And yet together they were friends at school
Ohh, get it, get it, get it, get it no no
If all were there when we first took the pill
Then maybe, then maybe, then maybe, then maybe
Miracles will happen as we speak
But we're never gonna survive unless
We get a little crazy
No we're never gonna survive unless
We are a little crazy
No no, never survive, unless we get a little bit
Oh, a little bit
Oh, a little bit
Amanda decides to go along after seventeen years
Oh darlin'
In a sky full of people, only some want to fly
Isn't that crazy
In a world full of people, only some want to fly
Isn't that crazy, crazy
In a heaven of people there's only some want to fly
Ain't that crazy
Oh babe, oh darlin'
In a world full of people there's only some want to fly
Isn't that crazy, isn't that crazy, isn't that crazy, isn't that crazy
But were never gonna survive unless, we get a little crazy
No were never gonna to survive unless we are a little
But were never gonna survive unless, we get a little crazy
No were never gonna to survive unless, we are a little, crazy
No no, never survive unless, we get a little bit
And then you see things
The size of which you've never known before
They'll break it
Someday, only child know
Them things
The size of which you've never known before
Someday, someway, someway, someway, someday, someday
He talks about the people going under
Only child know
A man decides after seventy years
That what he goes there for, is to unlock the door
While those around him criticize and sleep
And through a fractal on a breaking wall
I see you my friend, and touch your face again
Miracles will happen as we trip
But we're never gonna survive, unless
We get a little crazy
No we're never gonna survive, unless
We are a little crazy
Crazy yellow people walking through my head
One of them's got a gun, to shoot the other one
And yet together they were friends at school
Ohh, get it, get it, get it, get it no no
If all were there when we first took the pill
Then maybe, then maybe, then maybe, then maybe
Miracles will happen as we speak
But we're never gonna survive unless
We get a little crazy
No we're never gonna survive unless
We are a little crazy
No no, never survive, unless we get a little bit
Oh, a little bit
Oh, a little bit
Amanda decides to go along after seventeen years
Oh darlin'
In a sky full of people, only some want to fly
Isn't that crazy
In a world full of people, only some want to fly
Isn't that crazy, crazy
In a heaven of people there's only some want to fly
Ain't that crazy
Oh babe, oh darlin'
In a world full of people there's only some want to fly
Isn't that crazy, isn't that crazy, isn't that crazy, isn't that crazy
But were never gonna survive unless, we get a little crazy
No were never gonna to survive unless we are a little
But were never gonna survive unless, we get a little crazy
No were never gonna to survive unless, we are a little, crazy
No no, never survive unless, we get a little bit
And then you see things
The size of which you've never known before
They'll break it
Someday, only child know
Them things
The size of which you've never known before
Someday, someway, someway, someway, someday, someday
Lyrics submitted by Ice, edited by SacrificialNewt
Crazy Lyrics as written by Henry Olusegun Adeola Samuel Guy Sigsworth
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Universal Music Publishing Group, Tratore
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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this song for me is deeply spiritual. When I think of this song I think of the way my own consciousness has expanded as well as humanity's collective consciousness. When I hear this song I think about the fact that people are becoming more aware of their own souls.
I get so spiritually high listening to this song and thinking about where humans have been, are now, and are going.
line by line:
A man decides after seventy years, That what he goes there for, is to unlock the door.
This man is going to church to "unlock the door" - the Doors of thr 60s taught us about opening our "doors of perception," and this too is what church is intended to do, in spite of those around him who "criticize and sleep"
I don't think the tripping and the fractals and stuff has to be interpreted specifically as acid or drugs. I definitely believe he's talking about the expansion of consciousness, but it need not necessarily be driven through LSD. In the first line, "only child know" harkens to a famous line by Jesus that says something like "you must make yourself as a child if you want to enter the kingdom of heaven." it sort of also reminds me of that famous line by Wordsworth: "Child is the father of the man" (this was also found in Brian Wilson's previously unreleased album, Smile). -- If children are first souls that have not yet come down from heaven, they are closer to God, the "father," than a man on earth who has been away from Heaven for man years.
So here's what I think:
I think Seal is talking about what Alan Watts called "cosmic conscisousness," a phrase that has been echoed by a number of new agers and gurus. Watts and his contemporaries, including Richard Alpert (Ram Dass of "Be Here Now") believe that Jesus experienced cosmic consciousness, a sudden burst of consciousness that caused him to believe that he was God -- not invalid, because Watts says that we all inhabit the potential for greater consciousness. But these gurus were in the 60s and 70s. More and more people are developing this cosmic consciousness, I believe, and I think it's reflected in Seal's 1991 lyrics. Check this out:
Listen to the way he talks about "And then you see things
The size
Of which you've never known before."
And I'm not sure entirely what to think of the pill, but I am convinced it's not literal. Think of the idea of instantaneous transformation, and perhaps even the idea of Adam and Eve's transgression of eating the forbidden fruit.
I believe this a song about humanity, and I think someone might have been right when they mentioned the idea of the Berlin wall coming down. Another major event that happened that year (i think) was the massacre at Tianamen Square in China led by a group of pro-capitalist students:
"Crazy yellow people walking through my head. One of them's got a gun, to shoot the other one. And yet together they were friends at school Ohh, get it, get it, get it, get it no no!"
just a guess.
but I get pretty moved by this song. it makes the hair on my hair stand up every time.