"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.
These thoughts are old
Let's keep it cold
Dry lines on me
Dry history
Dryology
That stupid sound
That awful feel
Don't bring them down
And it never will
No, it never will
No, it never will
No, it never will
Hard to believe
That after all this time
That after all this I'm still me
No one wants to hear
What you dreamt about
Unless you dreamt about them
Don't let that stop you
Tell them anyway
And you can make it up as you go
I'm already gone now
You were outside just waiting
I'm already nothing
You just noticed me fading
It takes a lot to make me crazy
And a lot is always going on
Let's keep it cold
Dry lines on me
Dry history
Dryology
That stupid sound
That awful feel
Don't bring them down
And it never will
No, it never will
No, it never will
No, it never will
Hard to believe
That after all this time
That after all this I'm still me
No one wants to hear
What you dreamt about
Unless you dreamt about them
Don't let that stop you
Tell them anyway
And you can make it up as you go
I'm already gone now
You were outside just waiting
I'm already nothing
You just noticed me fading
It takes a lot to make me crazy
And a lot is always going on
Lyrics submitted by prod
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This is one of my favorite songs. https://fnfgo.io
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No one has commented on "no one wants to hear what you dreamt about unless you dreamt about them don't let that stop you/ tell them anyway and you can make it up as you go"!? Come on, this is cool shit. Granted Doug Martsch contends none of this is chosen for meaning, only for sound and phonetics, but songs like this are proof in the pudding Built To Spill have the arrangements--and the sentiment.
when i hear the line,
"That stupid sound That awful feel Don't bring them down And it never will No, it never will"
i always think about the song "i would hurt a fly" and the lyrics, "i can't get that sound you make out of my my head." and how he uses the "sound" element in both songs and i wonder if it just refers to the same thing...
Both of those lines always remind me of Dickinson's poem "I heard a Fly buzz".
Also remember about "Stop making that sound" in Randy Described Eternity. It bothers me, too and I'm almost certaint it refers to the same thing.
I love the composition of this song, the way it starts off really quite and builds up to a beautiful crescendo, and it's got such amazing lyrics too. Love it.
beautiful
I love the "It takes a lot to make me crazy, and alot is always going on" line, great song.
Love how it builds from cynicism to optimism to realization
holy shit. this song is beyond fucking amazing. built to spill = love
Ok. "Dryology?"
Ever notice how the last notes of this song foreshadow the next? It's the same motif as the "You thought of everything..." part of "Velvet Waltz". Like kelsey3671 noted about "sound", and Velvet Waltz's "killing in the sun" and "left it in the sun" followed later by the song "Kicked it in the Sun". Lots of interconnections on this album.
I think that several songs on Perfect From Now On interconnect; this one, in my opinion, is with I Would Hurt A Fly.
IWHAF is about an annoying problem he sees with the world that's like a fly, going unnoticed by, he feels, everyone.
I believe this is either that annoying problem, or, perhaps, just a more specific one that he sees independent of I Would Hurt A Fly. Now let me explain my own interpretation of the song.
1st verse: He's saying there's no novelty in his life anymore, specifically in an intellectual sense. No one has any new thoughts and so things have become dry.
2nd verse: "that stupid sound" is what made me think of IWHAF. Here he's saying that he hates this dryness that he sees in everyone. It makes him sick but others don't seem to be bothered, and he feels they never will.
3rd verse: He feels uncomfortable in his own skin. its hard for him to believe this has happened to him.
4th verse: he feels people are self centered and uninterested, even in things there's no way they could know about, (dreams are always novel because we experience them individually). I think there's some truth to the literal meaning of the verse, but on a deeper level I think he's saying that lies have become the only way to entertain those people. they are only interested in fantastical things they might be a part of, dreams or otherwise.
5th verse: IMO this is him saying again that nobody notices this blandness in themselves, or the fact that it really has been pushing him away. It has made him crazy and perhaps changed who he is.