"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.
One one one one two
P-P-5-D
Yeah, yeah, P-P-5-D
I'm sayin, yo
Touch this yo, nahmsayin what?
Yo-yo, yo, 100%
Yo! On these seventy-three keys, of ivory and ebony
I swear solemnly that I'll forever rock steadily
People want to know where Malik? He right next to me
The weaponry, the secret recipe
Hard to peep this, deep shit, shows I eat with
Contaminated thoughts I walk the street with
I bayonet cassettes and chop beats with
This olympic lyricism you can't, compete with
Globe travelin', throwin' your verse like a javelin
Things Fall Apart and MC's unravelin'
Backstage whisperin' to management like
"Change the order, it's no way that we can rock after them"
My man sport the 'fro like 'What's Happenin?'
From the latest hi-atus, The Roots back again
Your crew practicin' to catch this natural blend
They packages read "care when handlin'"
It's all soft shit, batteries not included with
Matter of fact, your whole front's a re-enactment
I blow your ba-tty ass into fragments, P-5-D
The new testament, mic specialist, what?
Yeah
Check it out, yo
Yo yo, Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
The Milli-illitant-tant, 'pon cock, ready to rock
Power out, in the clout, it seems out, all through your block
Posse don't play the cut, but what, you get sheist
Got the personality named trife, ready to heist
Smashin 'graphs, snatch the ice, crush your mental device
Thought twice, shoulda thought once, got played for the dunce
Dialogues I moderate, cool out, we outta state
Just blendin' in the great, give me room to ventilate
Most niggaz is fraudulent, the rap sergeant
Bargin', through your regiment, call your president
Hittin' all targets 'cause it's a cause that's lost
Between the killers when they probably Teddy Ruxpin talk
Droppin' tears of steel, two drops up in the bucket
Facin' three ? and a cop so yo fuck it
If I get abducted, trapped up in the belly
Wacked up my celly, get known like Dawn Stanley
You know the deally on the daily in the ?
If I sense you got a bend to your kite, then send it up
We press up on your corner with windows they're tinted up
Lay our props face down on the ground and get it up, what?
Face on the ground and get it up
Yo yo, Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Check it out
While you pose for pictures, I'm the invisible enigma
Down low, scope you off the roof like the fiddler
Cage you up in the vocal booth, you're held prisoner
Watch, while I'm bangin' out this hot shit from Sigma
Illa-del-P-A, live without a DJ
And it's been that way, since Sergio Vallente
Yo, The Roots holdin' it down, is all you can say
Plus the Black Thought em-cey, professional-lay
Push pen to paper like Chinua Achebe
Thumpin', what was your assumption
I lace your function, make it a Black Thought production
Word up I'm on somethin', stellar hold off course
I'm gone bluntin', travel light and broadcast
Via satellite, Illa-Fifth Dynamite
Lyrically calculus in this arithmetic hip-hop metropolis
But loyal fiends coppin this hot shit
Yaknahmsayin? Hot shit, word up
Illa-Fifth hot shit y'all
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
P-P-5-D
Yeah, yeah, P-P-5-D
I'm sayin, yo
Touch this yo, nahmsayin what?
Yo-yo, yo, 100%
Yo! On these seventy-three keys, of ivory and ebony
I swear solemnly that I'll forever rock steadily
People want to know where Malik? He right next to me
The weaponry, the secret recipe
Hard to peep this, deep shit, shows I eat with
Contaminated thoughts I walk the street with
I bayonet cassettes and chop beats with
This olympic lyricism you can't, compete with
Globe travelin', throwin' your verse like a javelin
Things Fall Apart and MC's unravelin'
Backstage whisperin' to management like
"Change the order, it's no way that we can rock after them"
My man sport the 'fro like 'What's Happenin?'
From the latest hi-atus, The Roots back again
Your crew practicin' to catch this natural blend
They packages read "care when handlin'"
It's all soft shit, batteries not included with
Matter of fact, your whole front's a re-enactment
I blow your ba-tty ass into fragments, P-5-D
The new testament, mic specialist, what?
Yeah
Check it out, yo
Yo yo, Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
The Milli-illitant-tant, 'pon cock, ready to rock
Power out, in the clout, it seems out, all through your block
Posse don't play the cut, but what, you get sheist
Got the personality named trife, ready to heist
Smashin 'graphs, snatch the ice, crush your mental device
Thought twice, shoulda thought once, got played for the dunce
Dialogues I moderate, cool out, we outta state
Just blendin' in the great, give me room to ventilate
Most niggaz is fraudulent, the rap sergeant
Bargin', through your regiment, call your president
Hittin' all targets 'cause it's a cause that's lost
Between the killers when they probably Teddy Ruxpin talk
Droppin' tears of steel, two drops up in the bucket
Facin' three ? and a cop so yo fuck it
If I get abducted, trapped up in the belly
Wacked up my celly, get known like Dawn Stanley
You know the deally on the daily in the ?
If I sense you got a bend to your kite, then send it up
We press up on your corner with windows they're tinted up
Lay our props face down on the ground and get it up, what?
Face on the ground and get it up
Yo yo, Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Check it out
While you pose for pictures, I'm the invisible enigma
Down low, scope you off the roof like the fiddler
Cage you up in the vocal booth, you're held prisoner
Watch, while I'm bangin' out this hot shit from Sigma
Illa-del-P-A, live without a DJ
And it's been that way, since Sergio Vallente
Yo, The Roots holdin' it down, is all you can say
Plus the Black Thought em-cey, professional-lay
Push pen to paper like Chinua Achebe
Thumpin', what was your assumption
I lace your function, make it a Black Thought production
Word up I'm on somethin', stellar hold off course
I'm gone bluntin', travel light and broadcast
Via satellite, Illa-Fifth Dynamite
Lyrically calculus in this arithmetic hip-hop metropolis
But loyal fiends coppin this hot shit
Yaknahmsayin? Hot shit, word up
Illa-Fifth hot shit y'all
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
Black Thought, I represent the Fifth Dynasty
Lyrical click, 100% Dundee
Malik B, I represent the P-5-D
Guerilla click, 100% Dundee
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"On these seventy-three keys, of ivory and ebony I swear solemnly that I'll forever rock steadily"
Fuckin amazing line.