"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.
Patriots of the wasteland torching two hundred years
Dragging my spirit back into the dungeon again
Bring back crucification cry the moral death's head legion
Using steel nails manufactured by the slaves in Asia
You won't fall for that law and order is a baton in the rib
You won't fall for that just like your mummy and your daddy did
Blood inside a fountain pen wrote you out of life again
Who knows any better than to kick and scratch under English weather
From a chain gang to the mill.
The mill that sits on top of the hill
The fog drowned towns arr gonna have to fade
The wrong side of the a scissor blade
You won't fall for that law and order is a baton in the rib
You won't fall for that just like your mummy and your daddy did
I'll eat my hat I'm gonna be sick
They own the pack while we play the three card trick
Don't you remember the place
Where we hid the ace?
Yeah not thick but slick
Now we all gotta play the three card trick
Dragging my spirit back into the dungeon again
Bring back crucification cry the moral death's head legion
Using steel nails manufactured by the slaves in Asia
You won't fall for that law and order is a baton in the rib
You won't fall for that just like your mummy and your daddy did
Blood inside a fountain pen wrote you out of life again
Who knows any better than to kick and scratch under English weather
From a chain gang to the mill.
The mill that sits on top of the hill
The fog drowned towns arr gonna have to fade
The wrong side of the a scissor blade
You won't fall for that law and order is a baton in the rib
You won't fall for that just like your mummy and your daddy did
I'll eat my hat I'm gonna be sick
They own the pack while we play the three card trick
Don't you remember the place
Where we hid the ace?
Yeah not thick but slick
Now we all gotta play the three card trick
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