"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.
Oh, launched all the world’s nukes this morning
Hoping it would kick-start something
Some of them went off course and hit the moon instead
It was kinda pretty.
Hasn’t been a whole lot of looting
On the other hand, oh, it’s fucking freezing
Someone on TV said something about going underground…
Guess we better start digging.
What were you doing for those eight and a half minutes?
Was it mean, was it petty, or did you realize you were sorry
And that you love them?
I saw an astronomer break down on CNN
He said, “I’m a scientist, not your fucking clergyman!”
And no one’s going nowhere ‘cause the cars are all frozen
They give the power plants ten days
What were you doing for those eight and a half minutes?
Was it mean, was it petty, or did you realize you were sorry
And that you love them?
But the sky is like a dome of black metal flake
And stars bleed together in phosphorescent lakes
And a dead black disk slides silently overhead
It’s fucking beautiful is what it is.
What were you doing for those eight and a half minutes?
Was it mean, was it petty, or did you realize you were sorry
And that you love them?
When I die I’m going to heaven
Leave it all to the cockroaches and the 7-11s
But it’d be nice to think we could get it right down here just once
Hoping it would kick-start something
Some of them went off course and hit the moon instead
It was kinda pretty.
Hasn’t been a whole lot of looting
On the other hand, oh, it’s fucking freezing
Someone on TV said something about going underground…
Guess we better start digging.
What were you doing for those eight and a half minutes?
Was it mean, was it petty, or did you realize you were sorry
And that you love them?
I saw an astronomer break down on CNN
He said, “I’m a scientist, not your fucking clergyman!”
And no one’s going nowhere ‘cause the cars are all frozen
They give the power plants ten days
What were you doing for those eight and a half minutes?
Was it mean, was it petty, or did you realize you were sorry
And that you love them?
But the sky is like a dome of black metal flake
And stars bleed together in phosphorescent lakes
And a dead black disk slides silently overhead
It’s fucking beautiful is what it is.
What were you doing for those eight and a half minutes?
Was it mean, was it petty, or did you realize you were sorry
And that you love them?
When I die I’m going to heaven
Leave it all to the cockroaches and the 7-11s
But it’d be nice to think we could get it right down here just once
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Fast Car
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