"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.
Locked up inside you
Like the calm beneath castles
Is a cavern of treasures that
Noone has been to
Let's go digging
Let's go digging
Bring it out to take you back in
You won't do what you'd like to do
Lay back and let me show you another way
I'll kill what you want me to
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Life's just too short to push it away
Take it all
Take it all in
All the way in
All the way in
Let it go in
Let it go in
You won't feel what you'd like to feel
Lay back and let me show you another way
Kill what you want me
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Just too short to push it away
If you knock me down
I'll just come back running
Knock you down
It won't be long now
All the way in
All the way
All the way in
All the way in
Kill what you want me
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Just too short to push it away
Take it up, take it up higher
4 degrees now, 4 degrees warmer
Give in now, give in now
And let me in
You'll like this in
Don't pull it out
It brings us closer than
Dying and cancer and crying
Kill what you want me
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Just too short to push it away
Just like that
Just like that
Just like that
Like the calm beneath castles
Is a cavern of treasures that
Noone has been to
Let's go digging
Let's go digging
Bring it out to take you back in
You won't do what you'd like to do
Lay back and let me show you another way
I'll kill what you want me to
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Life's just too short to push it away
Take it all
Take it all in
All the way in
All the way in
Let it go in
Let it go in
You won't feel what you'd like to feel
Lay back and let me show you another way
Kill what you want me
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Just too short to push it away
If you knock me down
I'll just come back running
Knock you down
It won't be long now
All the way in
All the way
All the way in
All the way in
Kill what you want me
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Just too short to push it away
Take it up, take it up higher
4 degrees now, 4 degrees warmer
Give in now, give in now
And let me in
You'll like this in
Don't pull it out
It brings us closer than
Dying and cancer and crying
Kill what you want me
Take what's left and eat it
Take all or nothing
Just too short to push it away
Just like that
Just like that
Just like that
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More Featured Meanings
Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
Bron-Y-Aur Stomp
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin
This is about bronies. They communicate by stomping.
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
When We Were Young
Blink-182
Blink-182
This is a sequel to 2001's "Reckless Abandon", and features the band looking back on their clumsy youth fondly.
Plastic Bag
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
The sitar Adam Jones uses at the beginning adds a very "tantric" mood to start off the song.............just sayin' :)