"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.
Did you call for the night porter?
You smell the blood running warm
I stay close to this frozen border, so close I can hit it with a stone
Now something crawls right up my spine
That I always got to follow
Turn out the lights
Don't see me drawn and hollow
Just blood running warm
No one needs to tell you that
There's no use for ya here anymore
And where are your friends?
They've gone away
It's a different world, they left you to this
To janitor
The emptiness
So let's get it on
When the sun is finally going down, and you're overdue to follow
But you're still above the ground
What ya got comin' is hard to swallow
Like blood running warm
Did they call for the night porter
And smell the blood, blood running warm
Well I've been waitin at this frozen border, so close you could hit it with a stone
You smell the blood running warm
I stay close to this frozen border, so close I can hit it with a stone
Now something crawls right up my spine
That I always got to follow
Turn out the lights
Don't see me drawn and hollow
Just blood running warm
No one needs to tell you that
There's no use for ya here anymore
And where are your friends?
They've gone away
It's a different world, they left you to this
To janitor
The emptiness
So let's get it on
When the sun is finally going down, and you're overdue to follow
But you're still above the ground
What ya got comin' is hard to swallow
Like blood running warm
Did they call for the night porter
And smell the blood, blood running warm
Well I've been waitin at this frozen border, so close you could hit it with a stone
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More Featured Meanings
Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
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."
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.
Page
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
There aren’t many things that’ll hurt more than giving love a chance against your better judgement only to have your heart crushed yet again. Ed Sheeran tells such a story on “Page.” On this track, he is devastated to have lost his lover and even more saddened by the feeling that he may never move on from this.
In his memoir, Mark says ‘Night Porter’ was a nickname Kurt Cobain once used to describe Mark’s ability to deliver him heroin late into the night.\n\nBeyond that this song seems to be about surviving through addiction while many of your friends have died, and how close to death he felt. Some of Mark’s closest friends were Kurt Cobain, Layne Staley, and Jeffrey Lee Pierce, all lost to addiction.
anyon egot any idea? im trying to figure this one out but he gets me lost on this one
ah wait, i think i got an idea. I think its about a guy who has lived his live and wants to die. But "his number isn't up"
Well, i think its about this :s
I'd assume its about a guy close to overdose on some narcotics. Why? - "I stay close to this frozen border, so close I can hit it with a stone" - This frozen border suggests that it might be death itself.
So there he sits; abandoned, left alone to janitor the emptiness. Overdue to follow the setting sun - but he doesn't. At least not yet...
the title is a reference to a car accident he was in
Even though my life has had a very different trajectory than Lanegan's, I believe I've been in the place he sings about in this song--that desolate sort of place where you're "in between the worlds," not dead but yet strangely aloof and detached from the world of the living. The narrator of this song is surprised that he's still alive, and still feels close to death--that "frozen border"--but knows that his "number isn't up," that it isn't his time to die. What's left is to "janitor the emptiness"--which is all any of us ever really do, it's just that the narrator of this song has the haunting knowledge of it.
Reminds me of Tom Waits's "The Ocean Doesn't Want Me" from Bone Machine. There seem to be thoughts of suicide.
I also agree with nobody_'s interpretation.
Lord Pembroke has it pretty much right. It's about someone who is waiting to die, they feel like their life is about over. They feel lonely and just want it to be over as their freinds have all gone leaving them nobody to lean on;
And where are your friends? They've gone away It's a different world, they left you to this To janitor The emptiness So let's get it on
The frozen border to me at least is clearly 'passing on'. The sun is finally going down is metaphor picturing your life as a single day and the sun is setting on it so it's time to go to sleep and end it. That's how they feel, but they're 'still above the ground' and their number isn't yet up but it's what they long for. Awesome song.
i agree. i also thought it alludes to a person who has outlived a lot of his friends, not unlike Mark
I always thought of it (though this is just a personal interpretation, not based in anything other than what the song makes ME think about), of it as a song about doing drugs with someone in a hotel, and you come to or check the bathroom or something and they're dead, but you aren't, and just the surreal detachment and existential pondering that comes along with that.
Rereading the lyrics in light of what some of you posted, your interpretations actually make more sense. Related ideas, but particularly the lyric 'Blood Running Warm' I was thinking of as someone who has recently died (perhaps slitting wrists or something) but hasn't even had a chance to get cold yet... thus: his/her blood is still warm, and has that particular scent.
Then 'Did you call for the night porter' is a massive understatement of: 'Shit, well something should probably be done about the body', also the term 'Janitor' might have conjured up this image as well.
Finally, to my interpretation, he is then turning out the lights so he doesn't have to see the body, or have the body see him as he get's high again before he must leave, which is 'Hard to Swallow'
“Night porter” was something Kurt cobain used to call lanegan back in the day. Because mark used to stay up all night delivering heroin to people for money, if I’m not mistaken. (Source: Sing Backwards And Weep, mark lanegans memoir, chapter name is “did you call for the night porter”)