"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.
Like Jimmy Carter like, electric underwear
Like any idea that never had a chance of going anywhere
This is who you are
Hey celebrity who drives off a bridge in a car
Your beautiful body filling up with water
Like Harry Truman dropping bombs out of the air
Like any self-respecting multi-billionaire
This is who you are
Five dancing teenage boys who sing their way into our hearts
Backstreets back alright
And there's a toxic cloud hanging over her
And there's white noise on the screen
And there's a man in a hotel room assaulting the maid who just came to clean
Up the mess
Backstreets back alright
Like Ronald Reagan falling asleep for ever more
Dreaming of horses and dreaming of nuclear war
This is where we are tonight
Everybody under surveillance from a satellite
You could be the first one on your block to die
And there's a plague of locusts upon us
And there's a nightmare in the swarm
And there's a lion out in the desert slouching towards Bethlehem to be born, again
Backstreets back alright, alright.
Like any idea that never had a chance of going anywhere
This is who you are
Hey celebrity who drives off a bridge in a car
Your beautiful body filling up with water
Like Harry Truman dropping bombs out of the air
Like any self-respecting multi-billionaire
This is who you are
Five dancing teenage boys who sing their way into our hearts
Backstreets back alright
And there's a toxic cloud hanging over her
And there's white noise on the screen
And there's a man in a hotel room assaulting the maid who just came to clean
Up the mess
Backstreets back alright
Like Ronald Reagan falling asleep for ever more
Dreaming of horses and dreaming of nuclear war
This is where we are tonight
Everybody under surveillance from a satellite
You could be the first one on your block to die
And there's a plague of locusts upon us
And there's a nightmare in the swarm
And there's a lion out in the desert slouching towards Bethlehem to be born, again
Backstreets back alright, alright.
Lyrics submitted by iagoAdmirer, edited by gandalfe
Jimmy Carter Lyrics as written by Spencer
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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This is one of my favorite songs. https://fnfgo.io
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