"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.
We walked along the rocks for nearly an hour
I caught the way you looked at me in the sunlight
You took something before you went in the shower
To help suppress the things that make you feel uptight
If I'd known you couldn't swim
We would never have gone in
I left my love in the river
The only one who sees
I lost his hand in the current
It was the life I wanted and I'd hoped for
And now I am left sifting through the leaves
The sun so hot, I saw his skin through his t-shirt
The grass so tall, we knew we wouldn't be found
We climbed into the stream, sure no one would be heard
And in no time at all, there wasn't a sound
If I'd known you couldn't swim
We would never have gone in
I left my love in the river
The only one who sees
I lost his hand in the current
It was the life I wanted and I'd hoped for
And now I am left sifting through the leaves
No color to his skin
Inform the next of kin
No color to his skin
I left my love in the river
The only one I see
I left his hand in the current
And now I am left blowing through the trees
Ooh
Ooh
I caught the way you looked at me in the sunlight
You took something before you went in the shower
To help suppress the things that make you feel uptight
If I'd known you couldn't swim
We would never have gone in
I left my love in the river
The only one who sees
I lost his hand in the current
It was the life I wanted and I'd hoped for
And now I am left sifting through the leaves
The sun so hot, I saw his skin through his t-shirt
The grass so tall, we knew we wouldn't be found
We climbed into the stream, sure no one would be heard
And in no time at all, there wasn't a sound
If I'd known you couldn't swim
We would never have gone in
I left my love in the river
The only one who sees
I lost his hand in the current
It was the life I wanted and I'd hoped for
And now I am left sifting through the leaves
No color to his skin
Inform the next of kin
No color to his skin
I left my love in the river
The only one I see
I left his hand in the current
And now I am left blowing through the trees
Ooh
Ooh
Lyrics submitted by SongMeanings, edited by minicuotas
Next of Kin Lyrics as written by Alec O'hanley Molly Rankin
Lyrics © ROUGH TRADE PUBLISHING
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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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"
Mental Istid
Ebba Grön
Ebba Grön
This is one of my favorite songs. https://fnfgo.io
Punchline
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran sings about missing his former partner and learning important life lessons in the process on “Punchline.” This track tells a story of battling to get rid of emotions for a former lover, whom he now realized might not have loved him the same way. He’s now caught between accepting that fact and learning life lessons from it and going back to beg her for another chance.
Plastic Bag
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
Interesting fact - Molly's father, John Morris Rankin, actually did die by drowning. The circumstances were nothing like the song, though; he was driving on a winding highway in Cape Breton, and he hit a pile of road salt that had been spilled on the road. He lost control of the truck and plunged off a 25 metre cliff into the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
These makes me think about two people not being sexually/emptionally compatible.
Or about not wanting to date someone with substance abuse issues...
sounds like dating someone with a drug dependency and having to let them go
Straightforward, if you listen to the lyrics: she went into the water with her boyfriend, and he died. He didn't know how to swim, and was also drug-impaired. Pretty song though.
@jcovarru Yeah and Bob Dylan was just writing about some guy with a Tambourine...