"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.
I am a man who looks after the pigs
Usually I get along okay
I am man who reveals all he digs
Should be more careful what I say
I'm getting put down
I'm getting pushed round
I'm being beaten every day
My life's fading
But things are changing
I'm not gonna sit and weep again
I am man who drives a local bus
I take miners to work, but the pits all closed today
It's easy to see that you are one of us
Ain't it funny how we all seem to look the same?
I'm getting put down
I'm getting pushed round
I'm being beaten every day
My life's fading
But things are changing
I'm not gonna sit and weep again
My karma tells me
You've been screwed again
If you let them do it to you
You've got yourself to blame
It's you who feels the pain
It's you that feels ashamed
I am a young man
I ain't done very much
You men should remember how you used to fight
Just like a child, I've been seeing only dreams
I'm all mixed up but I know what's right
I'm being put down (I'm being put down)
I'm getting pushed round
I'm being beaten every day
My life's fading
But things are changing
I'm not gonna sit and weep again
I'm not gonna weep again
Usually I get along okay
I am man who reveals all he digs
Should be more careful what I say
I'm getting put down
I'm getting pushed round
I'm being beaten every day
My life's fading
But things are changing
I'm not gonna sit and weep again
I am man who drives a local bus
I take miners to work, but the pits all closed today
It's easy to see that you are one of us
Ain't it funny how we all seem to look the same?
I'm getting put down
I'm getting pushed round
I'm being beaten every day
My life's fading
But things are changing
I'm not gonna sit and weep again
My karma tells me
You've been screwed again
If you let them do it to you
You've got yourself to blame
It's you who feels the pain
It's you that feels ashamed
I am a young man
I ain't done very much
You men should remember how you used to fight
Just like a child, I've been seeing only dreams
I'm all mixed up but I know what's right
I'm being put down (I'm being put down)
I'm getting pushed round
I'm being beaten every day
My life's fading
But things are changing
I'm not gonna sit and weep again
I'm not gonna weep again
Lyrics submitted by Chris_Gough, edited by Prisonmike
The Dirty Jobs Lyrics as written by Pete Townshend
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Spirit Music Group, Abkco Music Inc.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
More Featured Meanings
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"
Mountain Song
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell gives Adam Reader some heartfelt insight into Jane’s Addiction's hard rock manifesto "Mountain Song", which was the second single from their revolutionary album Nothing's Shocking. Mountain song was first recorded in 1986 and appeared on the soundtrack to the film Dudes starring Jon Cryer. The version on Nothing's Shocking was re-recorded in 1988.
"'Mountain Song' was actually about... I hate to say it but... drugs. Climbing this mountain and getting as high as you can, and then coming down that mountain," reveals Farrell. "What it feels to descend from the mountain top... not easy at all. The ascension is tough but exhilarating. Getting down is... it's a real bummer. Drugs is not for everybody obviously. For me, I wanted to experience the heights, and the lows come along with it."
"There's a part - 'Cash in now honey, cash in Miss Smith.' Miss Smith is my Mother; our last name was Smith. Cashing in when she cashed in her life. So... she decided that, to her... at that time, she was desperate. Life wasn't worth it for her, that was her opinion. Some people think, never take your life, and some people find that their life isn't worth living. She was in love with my Dad, and my Dad was not faithful to her, and it broke her heart. She was very desperate and she did something that I know she regrets."
When We Were Young
Blink-182
Blink-182
This is a sequel to 2001's "Reckless Abandon", and features the band looking back on their clumsy youth fondly.
American Town
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran shares a short story of reconnecting with an old flame on “American Town.” The track is about a holiday Ed Sheeran spends with his countrywoman who resides in America. The two are back together after a long period apart, and get around to enjoying a bunch of fun activities while rekindling the flames of their romance.
I think the first two verses are the voices of two people Jimmy meets after he leaves home, both stuck in dead end jobs. He criticises them for not fighting against the system that put them there. The guy in the first verse looks after pigs, which is a reference to the story of the Prodigal Son, which suggests that Jimmy's rebuke is probably motivated by guilt at leaving his parents to go off on his own.
I work in the medical field, and this song it close to me because it feels like I get pissed on for trying to do good things... but tough sh*t. The 2nd to last verse is what I think of - do more for myself than for others. But "I'm not gonna weep again".
Such an inspirational song for me.
It's a song talking about the working man, and how he gets put down.
wow only a few comments... Great song!
I remember being an angsty young man and noting the hypocrisy of jaded older men who had conceded to capitalism, family, practicality, quiet desperation. In those early years, Jimmy too is beginning to make concessions and older guys who work dirty jobs are a symbol of what he's likely to slide into, so he feels compelled to call them out.
The journey of masculinity involves being emasculated, just as the journey of humanity involves being dehumanized, in our empty modern life of work/pay/leisure and for Jimmy, in search of a deeper meaning to life than dances and fighting - he is right to think, this ain't it. What I love about the Who is the complexities and open questions tagged on to the simple punk message "society is stupid." Sure, it is, now what will you do about it.