"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.
Late for work again today
Somebody's lying down on the job again
Will you people please stop jumping under my train
Ladies and gentlemen, there will be a slight delay
While we hose the blood away
(And the clock keeps ticking...)
So I spent my evening wishing I was never born
Drinking toasts to that hood with the hooves and the horns
Because the roaches won't do the laundry no more
And the rats refuse to fix the holes in the floor
Water comes through the ceiling...
I asked a pig if he wanted to dance
He says is that a 45 in your pants
Or are you just glad to see me?
I said, All I need is a distraction
Or maybe a sense of satisfaction
Perhaps a pair of pliers to rip off these blinders
Because my peripheral vision is dying
It ain't as if I ain't trying
I'm a rat in a maze of my own devising
And is that a call to arms... Is that a call to arms I hear rising?
Is that a call to arms I hear rising out of that concrete hole?
Yer war on drugs got no soul, yer hired thugs got no soul.
You hippy trash got no soul. Yer yuppie cash got no soul.
Yer video clips, yer beauty tips, remote control.
It's a big black hole. Got no soul. Got no soul.
Got no soul. Got no soul.
And the clock's clicking off like the timer on some big neutron switch
Except that there's just one hitch: you gotta strike it rich
Before the shit comes down
So they're out there panhandling for gold
Prospecting in the street, sifting garbage in the gutter
Digging in the tenements, looking for a vein
Trying to find that big score: the mother lode
And everything's a wannabe -- the wicked and the weak,
The victors and the victimized, the economists and the economized
My T.V. mind-set is shattered (sh'dooby)
No guts, no glory, no balls -- whatever you want to call it --
There ain't nothing real there at all (and I don't feel whole)
Yeah, yer mobile phone got no soul. Yer rolling stone got no soul.
Yer music scene got no soul. Yer answering machine got no soul.
Yer microwave, yer toilet slave. You corporate swine.
Yer bullshit line. Hey you on the payroll! Hey you on the J Train!
Hey you on the T.V. News! Hey you in the 3-piece suit!
I got no soul. I got no soul. Got no soul.
I got no soul. I got no soul. Got no soul...
Somebody's lying down on the job again
Will you people please stop jumping under my train
Ladies and gentlemen, there will be a slight delay
While we hose the blood away
(And the clock keeps ticking...)
So I spent my evening wishing I was never born
Drinking toasts to that hood with the hooves and the horns
Because the roaches won't do the laundry no more
And the rats refuse to fix the holes in the floor
Water comes through the ceiling...
I asked a pig if he wanted to dance
He says is that a 45 in your pants
Or are you just glad to see me?
I said, All I need is a distraction
Or maybe a sense of satisfaction
Perhaps a pair of pliers to rip off these blinders
Because my peripheral vision is dying
It ain't as if I ain't trying
I'm a rat in a maze of my own devising
And is that a call to arms... Is that a call to arms I hear rising?
Is that a call to arms I hear rising out of that concrete hole?
Yer war on drugs got no soul, yer hired thugs got no soul.
You hippy trash got no soul. Yer yuppie cash got no soul.
Yer video clips, yer beauty tips, remote control.
It's a big black hole. Got no soul. Got no soul.
Got no soul. Got no soul.
And the clock's clicking off like the timer on some big neutron switch
Except that there's just one hitch: you gotta strike it rich
Before the shit comes down
So they're out there panhandling for gold
Prospecting in the street, sifting garbage in the gutter
Digging in the tenements, looking for a vein
Trying to find that big score: the mother lode
And everything's a wannabe -- the wicked and the weak,
The victors and the victimized, the economists and the economized
My T.V. mind-set is shattered (sh'dooby)
No guts, no glory, no balls -- whatever you want to call it --
There ain't nothing real there at all (and I don't feel whole)
Yeah, yer mobile phone got no soul. Yer rolling stone got no soul.
Yer music scene got no soul. Yer answering machine got no soul.
Yer microwave, yer toilet slave. You corporate swine.
Yer bullshit line. Hey you on the payroll! Hey you on the J Train!
Hey you on the T.V. News! Hey you in the 3-piece suit!
I got no soul. I got no soul. Got no soul.
I got no soul. I got no soul. Got no soul...
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
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Page
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