"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.
Long live the eerie strange of lie soaked beauty
Synthetic impression fills the gash of imposing danger
Satire feeds the flame to awake hostility
Full blown premonition gun down to solid ground
Free will can starve prestige
Disassemble mental structure and drops the weight to hide prosperity
And when the lights go out
We're stripped down reckless
And when the lights go out
We're stripped down to nothing
Say it isn't so easy
Caved in controversy withstands the test of time
Enlists salvation's anthem - pinpoints the enemy
Open fire penetration drags the scene of substance
Relieves coded acceptance to yield any temptation
The call of strangers in self deception
Makes attraction so much harder to swallow
Repairs a bitter bleeding conscience
Crown the tender keepsake that fathoms
The beating of prediction sells the heat
To fill the air with accident
Limits pursuance
Long lost but not forgotten
Manipulation's sudden crush
Sugar coats the compliment
And those scars in the landscape
They're all dressed to kill
An infamous victim of shocking truth
Crafts the skill of never saying you're sorry
For what I've done
Synthetic impression fills the gash of imposing danger
Satire feeds the flame to awake hostility
Full blown premonition gun down to solid ground
Free will can starve prestige
Disassemble mental structure and drops the weight to hide prosperity
And when the lights go out
We're stripped down reckless
And when the lights go out
We're stripped down to nothing
Say it isn't so easy
Caved in controversy withstands the test of time
Enlists salvation's anthem - pinpoints the enemy
Open fire penetration drags the scene of substance
Relieves coded acceptance to yield any temptation
The call of strangers in self deception
Makes attraction so much harder to swallow
Repairs a bitter bleeding conscience
Crown the tender keepsake that fathoms
The beating of prediction sells the heat
To fill the air with accident
Limits pursuance
Long lost but not forgotten
Manipulation's sudden crush
Sugar coats the compliment
And those scars in the landscape
They're all dressed to kill
An infamous victim of shocking truth
Crafts the skill of never saying you're sorry
For what I've done
Lyrics submitted by thienosaurus
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himsa's lyrics are so complex.so many meanings. what an amazing song writer.