"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.
You see him creeping around the church
For a year he's been alone
Sorrow took all his senses away
Every night he sleeps beside her grave
There by the bells there is a stone
I'm the only one who can read it
And on the fence is the red rooster
Who once had been in your heart
Fear driven on this fence
I go digging every night
To see what remained
From the face that smiled for me
There by the bells I'm spending the night
There among snails a lonely animal
During the day I run after the night
You escape me for the second time
Marry me
I'm digging deep with my hands
To find what I missed so much
And the moon in its most beautiful dress
I've kissed your cold lips
I embrace you tenderly
But your skin tears off like paper
And parts are falling off of you
You escape me for the second time
There by the bells I'm spend the night
There amongs snails a lonely animal
During the day I run after the night
You escape me a second time
Marry me
So I take what remained of you
The night is hot and we are stripped
To curse the rooster who greets the morning
I have his head hacked off
For a year he's been alone
Sorrow took all his senses away
Every night he sleeps beside her grave
There by the bells there is a stone
I'm the only one who can read it
And on the fence is the red rooster
Who once had been in your heart
Fear driven on this fence
I go digging every night
To see what remained
From the face that smiled for me
There by the bells I'm spending the night
There among snails a lonely animal
During the day I run after the night
You escape me for the second time
Marry me
I'm digging deep with my hands
To find what I missed so much
And the moon in its most beautiful dress
I've kissed your cold lips
I embrace you tenderly
But your skin tears off like paper
And parts are falling off of you
You escape me for the second time
There by the bells I'm spend the night
There amongs snails a lonely animal
During the day I run after the night
You escape me a second time
Marry me
So I take what remained of you
The night is hot and we are stripped
To curse the rooster who greets the morning
I have his head hacked off
Lyrics submitted by John M
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You see him creeping around the church For a year he's been alone Sorrow took all his senses away Every night he sleeps beside her grave
(obviously she is dead and he is very lonley and his lonliness is becoming depression and insanity, kinda goes with Du Riechst So gut)
There by the bells there is a stone I'm the only one who can read it (The bells = Church, and that he is the only one who can read it maybe means that he is the only one who CARES about the death of this woman anymore)
And on the fence is the red rooster Who once had been in your heart Fear driven on this fence (The rooster was an old friend of the deceaced woman, who was once the Main characters friend. But the fear on the fence is maybe that he would be afraid that everyone would forget this woman after she dies)
I go digging every night To see what remained From the face that smiled for me
(He is trying desperatley to remember his loved one)
There by the bells I'm spending the night There among snails a lonely animal During the day I run after the night You escape me for the second time
(Ok so he is lonely and the day I think equals when everyone is just going about their day in and day out lives after the death of this woman, so she died physically, but now she is dying mentally, (you died a second time) )
Marry me
(I think she died before He could ask her to marry him, now this is getting into the song Du Hast)
I'm digging deep with my hands To find what I missed so much And the moon in its most beautiful dress I've kissed your cold lips I embrace you tenderly But your skin tears off like paper And parts are falling off of you You escape me for the second time
(By this point he has gone insane and desperatley wants to remember the fallen love, I think that he notes the physical atributes of the dead body is that he in coming to understand she is really gone)
There by the bells I'm spend the night There amongs snails a lonely animal During the day I run after the night You escape me a second time
Marry me
(repeats)
So I take what remained of you The night is hot and we are stripped To curse the rooster who greets the morning I have his head hacked off
(I think this is possibly a memory not necrohphilia, and he just tells everyone who forgot her to kinda screw off, and let him love)