"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.
When you were nineteen I first laid eyes on you
The small stream that ran through the center of town carried your name to me
Your hair was dark and your eyes were frosty blue
Then they put me in jail 'til you were twenty-three
When you were twnety-four we took to drinking and dancing
We boxed with our shadows like a couple of kangaroos
Then we went down to Chechnya for the weekend
Your eyes were glacial and your promises all rang true
And things are happening here where we sleep
I can feel it in my boiling brain
And I'm dreaming in blood-red color
When I see the Stolypin car riding through the light rain
They'll have to carry me out on my back
They'll have to tear me to pieces all right
We are warm in our hidden room down here
We've got stars in our eyes tonight
The small stream that ran through the center of town carried your name to me
Your hair was dark and your eyes were frosty blue
Then they put me in jail 'til you were twenty-three
When you were twnety-four we took to drinking and dancing
We boxed with our shadows like a couple of kangaroos
Then we went down to Chechnya for the weekend
Your eyes were glacial and your promises all rang true
And things are happening here where we sleep
I can feel it in my boiling brain
And I'm dreaming in blood-red color
When I see the Stolypin car riding through the light rain
They'll have to carry me out on my back
They'll have to tear me to pieces all right
We are warm in our hidden room down here
We've got stars in our eyes tonight
Lyrics submitted by shipwright
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A Stolypin car is a windowless police wagon, used in Soviet Russia for carting arrested folks away to jail.
Chechnya is a disputed former Soviet republic and current Russian province trying (via terrorism) to gain independende).
And this is perhaps the most romantic Mountain Goats song that I can think of.
This is my favorite Russian dissident love song.
I think its about a couple in Russia where one of them is getting hunted by the police, so they are hiding so they can be together.
It is one of my favourites.