"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.
the best thing i ever saw on tv was that s.q. (securite quebec) cop catching a bullet with his teeth. condolence, madame canadiana, but your husband was a fucking (stuck) pig. but this song's not about some romantic account of history. it's not about martyrs or mythos or heroes or burnings-in-effigy. it's about a native kid flipping her lid just trying to keep some self-respect intact. it's about an oka the size of a fist in resistance and a will to fight back... and the girls at work, they still deny their racism. they claim tolerance for all. but it seems the degree of (only) racial slurs is their gauge (and it defines tolerance as hate). and there's 27 million "girls-at-work" here. imagine fighting that for 500 years. and golly-gee! how valient! how the white oppressor makes allowance for calculated gestures of insurgence (all tightly tethered to their purses/purpose). oka had this orchestra(tion) aborted. oka fucked their rules to choose a future self-determined and i, for one, support it... ...and the smartest thing i think i ever said: "if a kevin kostner kavalry is your means to their end, then the struggle is dead". why do we pretend that our approval is upon what they depend?
Lyrics submitted by PLANES
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
Holiday
Bee Gees
Bee Gees
@[Diderik:33655] "Your a holiday!" Was a popular term used in the 50s/60s to compliment someone on their all around. For example, not only are they beautiful, but they are fun and kind too ... just an all around "holiday".
I think your first comment is closer to being accurate. The singer/song writers state "Millions of eyes can see, yet why am i so blind!? When the someone else is me, its unkind its unkind". I believe hes referring to the girl toying with him and using him. He wants something deeper with her, thats why he allows himself to be as a puppet (even though for her fun and games) as long as it makes her happy. But he knows deep down that she doesnt really want to be serious with him and thats what makes him.
No Surprises
Radiohead
Radiohead
Same ideas expressed in Fitter, Happier are expressed in this song. We're told to strive for some sort of ideal life, which includes getting a good job, being kind to everyone, finding a partner, getting married, having a couple kids, living in a quiet neighborhood in a nice big house, etc. But in Fitter, Happier the narrator(?) realizes that it's incredibly robotic to live this life. People are being used by those in power "like a pig in a cage on antibiotics"--being pacified with things like new phones and cool gadgets and houses while being sucked dry. On No Surprises, the narrator is realizing how this life is killing him slowly. In the video, his helmet is slowly filling up with water, drowning him. But he's so complacent with it. This is a good summary of the song. This boring, "perfect" life foisted upon us by some higher powers (not spiritual, but political, economic, etc. politicians and businessmen, perhaps) is not the way to live. But there is seemingly no way out but death. He'd rather die peacefully right now than live in this cage. While our lives are often shielded, we're in our own protective bubbles, or protective helmets like the one Thom wears, if we look a little harder we can see all the corruption, lies, manipulation, etc. that is going on in the world, often run by huge yet nearly invisible organizations, corporations, and 'leaders'. It's a very hopeless song because it reflects real life.
Blue
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Blue” is a song about a love that is persisting in the discomfort of the person experiencing the emotion. Ed Sheeran reflects on love lost, and although he wishes his former partner find happiness, he cannot but admit his feelings are still very much there. He expresses the realization that he might never find another on this stringed instrumental by Aaron Dessner.
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.
So yes, this is about the armed standoff between Indigenous peoples and police / troops near a town in the Canadian province of Quebec called Oka, often refferred to as the "Oka Crisis." The "girls at work" segment of the lyrics, if I had to make an educated guess, is kind of talking about how in Canada, there is an ugly underbelly of racism but it tends to be less obvious than in other places like the US. Also I think it speaks to how Canadians have a reputation for being polite and nice but in reality that sometimes hides more negative attitudes towards minorities. The "imagine fighting that 550 years" I believe refers to how at the time this song came out, it had been roughly 500 years since Columbus first landed in the Americas, and started his genocide of the local Indigenous population, slaughtering hundreds of thousands of Arawaks and enslaving many more.