"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.
Well, I can tell by the way you take your infusion
You've spent some time in a mental institution
What a dream, life would seem if only
They let you keep your etch-a-sketch
Eh, you laugh like a banshee, gesticulate your delirium
They treat you like a corpse, keep you full of candy lithium
What a dream life would seem if only you could see
The world from inside an etch-a-sketch
I can tell by the way you reach your conclusions
You're the director of a mental institution
What a dream, life would seem if only
It hadn't been for Doctor be
Animate yourself an alternate reality
Consummate a self pleasing artificiality
You can have yourself a tea
I can tell by the way you take your infusion
You've spent some time in a mental institution
Oh, what a dream life would seem if only you could see
The world from inside an etch-a-sketch
You've spent some time in a mental institution
What a dream, life would seem if only
They let you keep your etch-a-sketch
Eh, you laugh like a banshee, gesticulate your delirium
They treat you like a corpse, keep you full of candy lithium
What a dream life would seem if only you could see
The world from inside an etch-a-sketch
I can tell by the way you reach your conclusions
You're the director of a mental institution
What a dream, life would seem if only
It hadn't been for Doctor be
Animate yourself an alternate reality
Consummate a self pleasing artificiality
You can have yourself a tea
I can tell by the way you take your infusion
You've spent some time in a mental institution
Oh, what a dream life would seem if only you could see
The world from inside an etch-a-sketch
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More Featured Meanings
Fast Car
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Holiday
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@[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.
When We Were Young
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This is a sequel to 2001's "Reckless Abandon", and features the band looking back on their clumsy youth fondly.
Blue
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“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.
Punchline
Ed Sheeran
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Ed Sheeran sings about missing his former partner and learning important life lessons in the process on “Punchline.” This track tells a story of battling to get rid of emotions for a former lover, whom he now realized might not have loved him the same way. He’s now caught between accepting that fact and learning life lessons from it and going back to beg her for another chance.
i remember reading somewhere that it was about his autistic brother's experiences in a mental institution. I guess its pretty obvious, except for the part about his brother. anyways, awesome song.
Awesomely dark humored and derisive song. The instrumentals and echo effects after the second verse make it all the more atmospheric to what the lyrics describe; sounding like wails and moans bouncing off cold walls or the walls of one's skull for being kept in a place and full of thorazine or some other drug when it might not be necessary... wanting to escape, even if it can only be into your etch a sketch...
'Dr B' seems to be Clifford Beers, who was institutionalized and at his horror to the terrible maltreatment of patients smuggled out letters to state officials, and then later once de-institutionalized and after having written an autobiographical account formed the "National Committee for Mental Hygiene". Hmm. Oh what a dream life would seem for the shoddy directors... if it hadn't been for that Dr. B. Indeed.
This reminds me of how mental people can be amused by the smallest things, like an Etch-A-Sketch. I case you don't know (unlikely), Thorazine is med for schizos.
b.d ooh sparkly!
AAAAHHH!!! Bad ssss...sssoap!
...None of us are schizo here. :D
That's really nothing like how people with schizophrenia behave and actually an insulting imitation. Clearly, you don't know anything about the disease.