"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.
Slip slide, dip then take a dive
Planets lookin' high when we travellin' on a vibe
Cribs, dorms grasshoppers in swarms
Thinkin' life is big, is that hip is it norm
Psych-e-delic and fat
Flowers and beads and peaces and naps
Ah yes, planets got the blessed
Beats are played on Friday to get Monday off your chest
Kick live dig into the quotes
Lose yourself and groove in the beaty as it floats
Hair, clothes monochrome it ain't
Many different worlds in the sweet and funky joint
Pounds, hands speakers and jams
Even those that fam get fitted in the plans
Light, years sugar for your ears
Hip-hop is the fave we been diggin' it for years
Funk, rhythm psychedelic money
Studied my lessons got vision 20/20
Check out the glow they need it what we brought
Ladybug don't we boom it from new york
Yes we do, uh
Time, space what is that like
Just how we livin' when in the hip life
Kids, roll with hot buttered soul
From 125 right down to Ludlow
The juice the cup the token fare is up
The ancestors peace with the daughters of the dust
We just freaks aquafunky beats
Vented to the streets from the boxes and the jeeps
Nuclear is we different time different space
Up on planet Earth we brought the mad bass
Brung is the tongue they all can understand
I'm free so let me pass it to my G
Check me out, Butterflies funk induced highs
I gain a better reason to smack me up a five
Bald caps, pleasurable naps
Time and space is fake and that's the real haps
Youth flights, land on Friday nights
Birds be with the cats DJs savin' lives
Soul funk jive and rhythm jams
Sound drips comin' off the lips
Smuggled from the planets that freak the 9 zips
Time space no one's is alike
Be you and just be you or be out
That's right so
Step into the jams
Let the sugars make you sweet
Kept it underhand cause the planets get you free
Ladybug Mecca with the groove in time and space
With the funk and rhythm butter chase
Goddam
Planets lookin' high when we travellin' on a vibe
Cribs, dorms grasshoppers in swarms
Thinkin' life is big, is that hip is it norm
Psych-e-delic and fat
Flowers and beads and peaces and naps
Ah yes, planets got the blessed
Beats are played on Friday to get Monday off your chest
Kick live dig into the quotes
Lose yourself and groove in the beaty as it floats
Hair, clothes monochrome it ain't
Many different worlds in the sweet and funky joint
Pounds, hands speakers and jams
Even those that fam get fitted in the plans
Light, years sugar for your ears
Hip-hop is the fave we been diggin' it for years
Funk, rhythm psychedelic money
Studied my lessons got vision 20/20
Check out the glow they need it what we brought
Ladybug don't we boom it from new york
Yes we do, uh
Time, space what is that like
Just how we livin' when in the hip life
Kids, roll with hot buttered soul
From 125 right down to Ludlow
The juice the cup the token fare is up
The ancestors peace with the daughters of the dust
We just freaks aquafunky beats
Vented to the streets from the boxes and the jeeps
Nuclear is we different time different space
Up on planet Earth we brought the mad bass
Brung is the tongue they all can understand
I'm free so let me pass it to my G
Check me out, Butterflies funk induced highs
I gain a better reason to smack me up a five
Bald caps, pleasurable naps
Time and space is fake and that's the real haps
Youth flights, land on Friday nights
Birds be with the cats DJs savin' lives
Soul funk jive and rhythm jams
Sound drips comin' off the lips
Smuggled from the planets that freak the 9 zips
Time space no one's is alike
Be you and just be you or be out
That's right so
Step into the jams
Let the sugars make you sweet
Kept it underhand cause the planets get you free
Ladybug Mecca with the groove in time and space
With the funk and rhythm butter chase
Goddam
Lyrics submitted by mcsqualor08
Time & Space (A New Refutation Of) Lyrics as written by Ishmael R. Butler Ishmael Butler
Lyrics © CONCORD MUSIC PUBLISHING LLC, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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Fast Car
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This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
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This song is soo chill. Pretty sure under the "influence" when written. lol amazing nonetheless