"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.
Every time I move
I'm in another dimension
Every thing I do changes what I want
I see a choice I make
Explode in thousands of pieces
Every time I choose
I become unsure
I can take up science
And study cells of the body
Learn to postpone death
Under the microscope
I made my own lab coat
Under the house in the forest
You and me eating mushrooms together
We'll stretch out so long
And hope we don't sever
[Chorus]
Forever growing centipedes
Forever growing centipedes, you and I
Forever growing centipedes
Through time.
I could step outside
And walk in any direction
Everything I choose
Erases ghosts that aren't natural
But it makes some new ghost
That I can feel
I can just choose one as far as I can tell
If I feel off course
I'll learn to kick of the habit
If I spin off track, I know that I can change
We can both grow up, to be 150
But for now we have children together.
Every time I move
I'm in another dimension
Every thing I do changes what I want
I see a choice I make
Explode in thousands of pieces
Every time I choose
I become a choice
[Chorus]
Forever growing centipedes
Let's build a buck-minster dome on an island
We see ourselves in a timeless web
If every second we make new futures
We'll see how long we can hide from
Forever growing centipedes
[Chorus]
I'm in another dimension
Every thing I do changes what I want
I see a choice I make
Explode in thousands of pieces
Every time I choose
I become unsure
I can take up science
And study cells of the body
Learn to postpone death
Under the microscope
I made my own lab coat
Under the house in the forest
You and me eating mushrooms together
We'll stretch out so long
And hope we don't sever
[Chorus]
Forever growing centipedes
Forever growing centipedes, you and I
Forever growing centipedes
Through time.
I could step outside
And walk in any direction
Everything I choose
Erases ghosts that aren't natural
But it makes some new ghost
That I can feel
I can just choose one as far as I can tell
If I feel off course
I'll learn to kick of the habit
If I spin off track, I know that I can change
We can both grow up, to be 150
But for now we have children together.
Every time I move
I'm in another dimension
Every thing I do changes what I want
I see a choice I make
Explode in thousands of pieces
Every time I choose
I become a choice
[Chorus]
Forever growing centipedes
Let's build a buck-minster dome on an island
We see ourselves in a timeless web
If every second we make new futures
We'll see how long we can hide from
Forever growing centipedes
[Chorus]
Lyrics submitted by onethinwallaway
Forever Growing Centipedes Lyrics as written by Todd Beachle Clark Baechle
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
More Featured Meanings
Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
The Night We Met
Lord Huron
Lord Huron
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"
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
Magical
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
How would you describe the feeling of being in love? For Ed Sheeran, the word is “Magical.” in HIS three-minute album opener, he makes an attempt to capture the beauty and delicacy of true love with words. He describes the magic of it all over a bright Pop song produced by Aaron Dessner.
Amazing
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran tells a story of unsuccessfully trying to feel “Amazing.” This track is about the being weighed down by emotional stress despite valiant attempts to find some positivity in the situation. This track was written by Ed Sheeran from the perspective of his friend. From the track, we see this person fall deeper into the negative thoughts and slide further down the path of mental torment with every lyric.
Does anyone notice the references to Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse 5 here?
Throughout the book, Billy Pilgrim mentions the way humans see time vs. the way Tralfamadorians see time (3v4 dimensions)
Tralfamadorians see humans like centipedes with small baby legs in the front and older legs in the back. They see in 4 dimensions which means they can see how a single action affects past, present, and future.
The references I see here are as follows:
"every time i move, i'm in another dimension" referring to the switches Billy experiences, or the ability of Tralfamadorians to experience time as a dimension
"Everything I do changes what I want. I see a choice I make explode in thousands of pieces, Every time I choose I become a shard" the experience of understanding the implications of our actions through time and seeing those implications physically
"studying cells ... postpone death ... we stretch out so long I hope we don't sever" directly relating to what it would look like if a human died to a Tralfamadorian, the longer a human lives, the longer the centipede gets in the eyes of someone who would experience life in 4 dimensions. if you died, the centipede would "sever."
"forever growing centipedes, through time" again. direct relationship to the book
The next several verses refer to both a fatalystic view of life, as well as a Tralfamadorian-like way of viewing choices as "a habit." "if i veer off course" i know i'll eventually get back on SOME course.
I think there are some direct references to the story as well. When Billy Pilgrim is taken to the world where the Tralfamadorians live, he is placed in a great "dome" to simulate the environment on earth, like a zoo. He ends up making love to a supermodel who is also placed in there with him, and she bears him a child on the planet. Much like animals in a zoo on earth, they don't have much else to do.
Anyone else, know the book well enough to refute any of these or postulate more, let me know. i'm really interested in this cryptic song.