"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.
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
'Twas 1659 forgotten now for sure
They dragged us from our homeland
With the musket and their gun
Cromwell and his roundheads
Battered all we know
Shackled hopes of freedom
We're now but stolen goods
Darken the horizon
Blackened from the sun
This rotten cage of Bridgetown
Is where I now belong
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
Red leg down a peg
Blistered burns the soul
The floggings they're a plenty
But reasons there are none
Our backs belong to landlords
Where branded is there name
Paid for with ten shillings
Cheap labor never breaks
The silver moon is shinin'
Cools the copper blood
Where the livin' meet the dead
And together dance as one
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
Agony, will you cleanse this misery?
For it's never again I'll breathe
The air of home
From this sandy edge
The rolling sea breaks my revenge
With each whisper a thousand waves
I hear roar
I'm coming home
Dark is the horizon
Blackened by the sun
This rotten cage of Bridgetown
Is where I now belong
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
'Twas 1659 forgotten now for sure
They dragged us from our homeland
With the musket and their gun
Cromwell and his roundheads
Battered all we know
Shackled hopes of freedom
We're now but stolen goods
Darken the horizon
Blackened from the sun
This rotten cage of Bridgetown
Is where I now belong
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
Red leg down a peg
Blistered burns the soul
The floggings they're a plenty
But reasons there are none
Our backs belong to landlords
Where branded is there name
Paid for with ten shillings
Cheap labor never breaks
The silver moon is shinin'
Cools the copper blood
Where the livin' meet the dead
And together dance as one
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
Agony, will you cleanse this misery?
For it's never again I'll breathe
The air of home
From this sandy edge
The rolling sea breaks my revenge
With each whisper a thousand waves
I hear roar
I'm coming home
Dark is the horizon
Blackened by the sun
This rotten cage of Bridgetown
Is where I now belong
All to hell we must sail
For the Shores of sweet Barbados
Where the sugar cane grows taller
Than the god we once believed in
Till the butcher and his crown
Raped the land we used to sleep in
Now tomorrow chimes of ghostly crimes
That haunt Tobacco Island
Lyrics submitted by PapaBobDole
Tobacco Island Lyrics as written by David R King Bridget A Regan
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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this song is completly different from anything else flogging molly has done, but i love it. The drums in the begging of the song get you all worked up and then the course comes in and all you wanna do is jump in the pit and fuck up lil emo kids. Anyway, it's about the british comming to ireland to take away the natives to work on the sugar plantations in Barbados...song's pretty self explanitory. Buy the new album though...it's sick