"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.
well traveling to the pointthat I, I can't stop it
get so familiar
never get enough
talk about it all the time
just drop it
damage on your pretty little eyes says it all
I can't stand to be under your wing
I can't fly or sink or swimit's a lot like falling downstanding up and I'm falling downyour my cup till I understand
wait a minute and see the pieces don't fit this time
well yesterday's news is what I have been reading
see you at the Comet and I end up needing
know if you were thinking it could have been
it was nothing it's cause nothing's what you did
I can't stand to be under your wing
I can't fly or sink or swimit's a lot like falling downstanding up and I'm falling downyour my cup till I understand
wait a minute and see the pieces don't fit this time
I can't stand to be under your wing
I can't fly or sink or swimit's a lot like falling downstanding u and I'm falling downyour my cup till I understand
wait a minute and see the pieces don't fit this time
get so familiar
never get enough
talk about it all the time
just drop it
damage on your pretty little eyes says it all
I can't stand to be under your wing
I can't fly or sink or swimit's a lot like falling downstanding up and I'm falling downyour my cup till I understand
wait a minute and see the pieces don't fit this time
well yesterday's news is what I have been reading
see you at the Comet and I end up needing
know if you were thinking it could have been
it was nothing it's cause nothing's what you did
I can't stand to be under your wing
I can't fly or sink or swimit's a lot like falling downstanding up and I'm falling downyour my cup till I understand
wait a minute and see the pieces don't fit this time
I can't stand to be under your wing
I can't fly or sink or swimit's a lot like falling downstanding u and I'm falling downyour my cup till I understand
wait a minute and see the pieces don't fit this time
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this song was like my mantra for a while, which is interesting because i don't really know exactly what the end of the second verse means... but it seems right, and incredibly empowering (except for the parts about getting drunk until everything makes sense-- actually come to think of it i probably should have picked a better mantra...)
Clearly about a guy that has a girl that strung him along and he has/is convincing himself of the futility of the situation. The first verse means he would fall for her bad but there was something she was witholding, commitment or ahem. The last 2 lines of the chorus clarify this, he keeps up with her over and over and then its clear it won't work out, the whole thing about filling his cup has a second meaning besides a booze refrence. The second verse refers to a time or the times when he sees her at a place (probably a bar, club or coffee shop) and just seeing her, wants her, and thinks to himself that if she thinks it didn't turn out it was because of something she withheld.