"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.
I know nothing, don't know much
I think my education's gone out to lunch
I can't remember, I cannot think
What is the difference between Iron and Zinc
I can listen, I can speak
But my conversational skills are gobblety-geek
I know Harold in 1066
Got shot in the eye with a long pointy stick
Revolutions and World War Two is it true what they say
That Charles de Gaulle was a hero and Churchill's a Nero
I threw that away
I get up when I like
Wear anything I like
Don't keep up with the cool
I make up my own rules
Don't have to eat my greens
Or keep my bedroom extra tidy
'Cause nobody is around to tell me off
I can lounge about in my house 'cause lounging about is ...good
I know all I need to know
Why talk Swahili if it's where i won't go
Latin is clever and sexy is French
Sprechen sie Deutsche would hardly make sense
Inquisitions and missionaries seem fairly bizarre
Do I follow commandments from Moses or petals off roses
I am the Czar
I get up when I like
Wear anything I like
Don't keep up with the cool
I make up my own rules
Don't have to eat my greens
Or keep my bedroom extra tidy
'Cause nobody is around to tell me off
I can lounge about in my house 'cause lounging about is...good
Revolutions and World War Two is it true what they say
That Charles de Gaulle was a hero and Churchill's a Nero
I threw that away
I get up when I like
Wear anything I like
Don't keep up with the cool
I make up my own rules
Don't have to eat my greens
Or keep my bedroom extra tidy
'Cause nobody is around to tell me off
L l l l l l l l l l lounge
I think my education's gone out to lunch
I can't remember, I cannot think
What is the difference between Iron and Zinc
I can listen, I can speak
But my conversational skills are gobblety-geek
I know Harold in 1066
Got shot in the eye with a long pointy stick
Revolutions and World War Two is it true what they say
That Charles de Gaulle was a hero and Churchill's a Nero
I threw that away
I get up when I like
Wear anything I like
Don't keep up with the cool
I make up my own rules
Don't have to eat my greens
Or keep my bedroom extra tidy
'Cause nobody is around to tell me off
I can lounge about in my house 'cause lounging about is ...good
I know all I need to know
Why talk Swahili if it's where i won't go
Latin is clever and sexy is French
Sprechen sie Deutsche would hardly make sense
Inquisitions and missionaries seem fairly bizarre
Do I follow commandments from Moses or petals off roses
I am the Czar
I get up when I like
Wear anything I like
Don't keep up with the cool
I make up my own rules
Don't have to eat my greens
Or keep my bedroom extra tidy
'Cause nobody is around to tell me off
I can lounge about in my house 'cause lounging about is...good
Revolutions and World War Two is it true what they say
That Charles de Gaulle was a hero and Churchill's a Nero
I threw that away
I get up when I like
Wear anything I like
Don't keep up with the cool
I make up my own rules
Don't have to eat my greens
Or keep my bedroom extra tidy
'Cause nobody is around to tell me off
L l l l l l l l l l lounge
Lyrics submitted by katie-s
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
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Lord Huron
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This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
Mountain Song
Jane's Addiction
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Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell gives Adam Reader some heartfelt insight into Jane’s Addiction's hard rock manifesto "Mountain Song", which was the second single from their revolutionary album Nothing's Shocking. Mountain song was first recorded in 1986 and appeared on the soundtrack to the film Dudes starring Jon Cryer. The version on Nothing's Shocking was re-recorded in 1988.
"'Mountain Song' was actually about... I hate to say it but... drugs. Climbing this mountain and getting as high as you can, and then coming down that mountain," reveals Farrell. "What it feels to descend from the mountain top... not easy at all. The ascension is tough but exhilarating. Getting down is... it's a real bummer. Drugs is not for everybody obviously. For me, I wanted to experience the heights, and the lows come along with it."
"There's a part - 'Cash in now honey, cash in Miss Smith.' Miss Smith is my Mother; our last name was Smith. Cashing in when she cashed in her life. So... she decided that, to her... at that time, she was desperate. Life wasn't worth it for her, that was her opinion. Some people think, never take your life, and some people find that their life isn't worth living. She was in love with my Dad, and my Dad was not faithful to her, and it broke her heart. She was very desperate and she did something that I know she regrets."
American Town
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran shares a short story of reconnecting with an old flame on “American Town.” The track is about a holiday Ed Sheeran spends with his countrywoman who resides in America. The two are back together after a long period apart, and get around to enjoying a bunch of fun activities while rekindling the flames of their romance.
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.
this song is terrific, bloody amazing. when you hear a song like this, you realise that the schools in the UK at the moment are absolutly crap. you know when your parents say 'what do they teach you at school?' - it makes me think of this song. "I can listen, I can speak But my conversational skills are gobblety-geek" - Great lyric, they teach you all kinds of things but is it neccassery? will you actually need the things that they teach you? this great lyric tells us that even though we get taught a variety of things, it's actually being able to talk to somebody thats going to get you anywhere in life. "What is the difference between Iron and Zinc" - I'm doing stuff like this in school now, when will i ever need this in life?ever? "Why talk Swahili if it's where i won't go" - Why do i learn welsh in school? i've never spoke a word of it outside the classroom exept when i'm making fun of the language! "I know Harold in 1066 Got shot in the eye with a long pointy stick" hehe, this is a great lyric, they go on about this in school for ages, you do a long history thing about it, will you EVER need it in life? The chorus is amazing too, it makes me think about how good it's going to be when i finally move out of my house and leave school. Such a good song, it cheers me up when i get home all tired from a long school day learning about Charles de Gaulle...