"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.
There's a world container with your name on it
And a billion ways to go berserk
When the country quits on you it must be dinner
And the Himmler on this one is there's no dessert
(He's the one who couldn't imagine all the people living life in peace)
Good News! You get to vanish
Go to Cleveland, be an indie smash
The good news is now you're smaller
The bad news is you can be smaller than that
Go suck some souls, be a reader, get used
Laugh at a funeral or two
And laugh til all the chameleons turn black
Laugh and laugh til you're told 'please don't come back'
Then fake incredulous, say 'I just can't believe!
How'd it get so late so early?'
Say 'ain't life a grand and I'm in awe of y'all'
Then drop into your haunted bunk
Go to your touchless times out where the water's drying
Go past the 'No Attractions Past This Point' sign
What you'll find there are all flaws in progress
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
I've faked incredulous and said 'I just can't believe!
How'd it get so late so early?'
Said, 'ain't life a grand and I'm in awe of y'all'
I've dropped into my haunted bunk
Been to your touchless times out where the water's drying
Been past the 'No Attractions Past This Point' sign
What we have here are all flaws in progress
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
And a billion ways to go berserk
When the country quits on you it must be dinner
And the Himmler on this one is there's no dessert
(He's the one who couldn't imagine all the people living life in peace)
Good News! You get to vanish
Go to Cleveland, be an indie smash
The good news is now you're smaller
The bad news is you can be smaller than that
Go suck some souls, be a reader, get used
Laugh at a funeral or two
And laugh til all the chameleons turn black
Laugh and laugh til you're told 'please don't come back'
Then fake incredulous, say 'I just can't believe!
How'd it get so late so early?'
Say 'ain't life a grand and I'm in awe of y'all'
Then drop into your haunted bunk
Go to your touchless times out where the water's drying
Go past the 'No Attractions Past This Point' sign
What you'll find there are all flaws in progress
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
I've faked incredulous and said 'I just can't believe!
How'd it get so late so early?'
Said, 'ain't life a grand and I'm in awe of y'all'
I've dropped into my haunted bunk
Been to your touchless times out where the water's drying
Been past the 'No Attractions Past This Point' sign
What we have here are all flaws in progress
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Where all songs are one song and that song is Don't Forget
Lyrics submitted by OpinionHead
World Container Lyrics as written by Gordon Sinclair Gordon Downie
Lyrics © Peermusic Publishing
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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Great lyrics. I was confused for a while because the song sounds like something you'd sing in an Irish pub.
I think the Himmler mention is the key here - i.e. Nazi Germany. The song is about the "final solution".
"Go to Cleveland" is a reference to John Demjanjuk, the alleged Nazi death camp work who resided (?resides - he may get extradicted) in Cleveland.
"Laugh at a funeral or two" - makes sense for a death camp worker. "And laugh til all the chameleons turn black" - the chameleon takes on the shade of its environment; basically a reference to the black hearts of the guards
"Been past the 'No Attractions Past This Point' sign" - I think this is a sign at one of the camps if you go to visit. The closest I've ever been is in video/photos and that was close enough for me.
"What we have here are all flaws in progress Where all songs are one song" - I think this is saying that we are all flawed and not to target one group or another because ultimately we are all the same.
"Don't forget" - a common reference to the Holocaust.
So what's the world container? I dunno for sure - a gas chamber maybe? A casket?