"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.
Wiped out in the city slick
Another sick rock 'n' roller acting like a dick
Needing cash
Burning through the trash
That piles up in this place
And fills up behind my empty face
Full of things that I'm not to do
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away with nowhere to go
I run down to the corner lot
It's forty-five past two
I almost forgot to show
Got a date to make with Mr. So-and-so
After which
I won't care when you all start to bitch and moan
About being alone
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away with nowhere to go
Well, can't you just leave me alone?
You've already thrown all the sticks and stones
You had to send my way
Well, can't you just leave it at that?
And spare us both the bother
Because I just bounce back anyway
I got nothing that I want to do more
Than make another sonic "fuck you" to play
Whenever you make my life cliche
So to fit in some little box with the all the labeled shit
You would say to keep confusion away
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away with nowhere to go
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away
Another sick rock 'n' roller acting like a dick
Needing cash
Burning through the trash
That piles up in this place
And fills up behind my empty face
Full of things that I'm not to do
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away with nowhere to go
I run down to the corner lot
It's forty-five past two
I almost forgot to show
Got a date to make with Mr. So-and-so
After which
I won't care when you all start to bitch and moan
About being alone
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away with nowhere to go
Well, can't you just leave me alone?
You've already thrown all the sticks and stones
You had to send my way
Well, can't you just leave it at that?
And spare us both the bother
Because I just bounce back anyway
I got nothing that I want to do more
Than make another sonic "fuck you" to play
Whenever you make my life cliche
So to fit in some little box with the all the labeled shit
You would say to keep confusion away
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away with nowhere to go
You come over with all of your friends
And all their opinions I don't want to know
And I'm looking over my shoulder
Booking away
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
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Jane's Addiction
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Yo La Tengo
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This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
Magical
Ed Sheeran
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Head > Heels
Ed Sheeran
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i think this is another one of those songs like everbody cares, everbody understands, where he expresses his hate for his so called 'friends' trying to force him into rehab