"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.
You kids have such short memories
Last year you looked right through me
I was just a little man
But I used a lot of "Yes, I can!"
I used to watch and wonder how
At all the girls you would wow
But when you tried hard, then you find
That it's just a state of mind
Now, I'm so Waldo P. Emerson Jones
While you spent the summer topping up your tan
I was working on my image, now I'm a self made man
I could fill a notebook with all the paths I could have taken
I used to watch and wonder how
At all the girls you would wow
But when you tried hard Then you find
That it's just a state of mind
Now I'm so (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
Waldo P. Emerson Jones (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
It's not that drastic, I suppose
Just a hair cut and some different clothes
You don't change much when you change your name
You just feel better about being the same
I used to watch and wonder how
At all the girls you would wow
But when you tried hard, then you find
That it's just a state of mind
Now I'm so (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
Waldo P. Emerson Jones (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
Waldo P. Emerson Jones, at your service
Last year you looked right through me
I was just a little man
But I used a lot of "Yes, I can!"
I used to watch and wonder how
At all the girls you would wow
But when you tried hard, then you find
That it's just a state of mind
Now, I'm so Waldo P. Emerson Jones
While you spent the summer topping up your tan
I was working on my image, now I'm a self made man
I could fill a notebook with all the paths I could have taken
I used to watch and wonder how
At all the girls you would wow
But when you tried hard Then you find
That it's just a state of mind
Now I'm so (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
Waldo P. Emerson Jones (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
It's not that drastic, I suppose
Just a hair cut and some different clothes
You don't change much when you change your name
You just feel better about being the same
I used to watch and wonder how
At all the girls you would wow
But when you tried hard, then you find
That it's just a state of mind
Now I'm so (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
Waldo P. Emerson Jones (Waldo P. Emerson Jones)
Waldo P. Emerson Jones, at your service
Lyrics submitted by Vague Rant
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Fast Car
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A response to "Waldo P. Emerson Jones" by the Archies, in which a smooth, popular guy impresses all the girls and makes everybody else look bad. The response comes from Waldo's perspective: he was once the unpopular kid in school, but spent summer redoing his image, changed his name to Waldo P. Emerson Jones and became the smooth talker from the original song.
In Eddie's words: The Archies can't figure out Waldo P. Emerson Jones, a new character on the block who impresses all of their girlfriends and generally shows everyone up. The Everybody Was In The French Resistance ... Now! version tells Waldo's side — he was a little-known "nerd" at their school who spent the summer reinventing himself and came back with added confidence, a new haircut and a much cooler name (Waldo P. Emerson Jones is clearly not the name his mother gave him).