"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.
He sees her face
The highway signs
The traffic lights
And she's turning red
At a motel
On a double bed
He swears he feels her lying there
And she whispers in his ear
"You can't run away forever"
But sometimes
That feels like coming home to me anymore
It feels like coming home to me
But the further off I get
The more I get upset
I could never make it home
She sees his face
In the sweat-stained sheets
The dirty cups
They keep on piling up
In the backyard
So overgrown
In the dandelions
They peek through the cracks in the patio
She swears she hears the phone
But she only gets a dial-tone
So she imagines what'd she say:
"If you feel like coming home to me sometime
Yeah, if you feel like coming home to me
I'll be waiting at the door
There is nothing to be sorry for
So why can't you come home?
Don't you feel like coming home to me anymore?
You don't feel like coming home to me?"
That's the game you choose
But you don't have to play the loser
The highway signs
The traffic lights
And she's turning red
At a motel
On a double bed
He swears he feels her lying there
And she whispers in his ear
"You can't run away forever"
But sometimes
That feels like coming home to me anymore
It feels like coming home to me
But the further off I get
The more I get upset
I could never make it home
She sees his face
In the sweat-stained sheets
The dirty cups
They keep on piling up
In the backyard
So overgrown
In the dandelions
They peek through the cracks in the patio
She swears she hears the phone
But she only gets a dial-tone
So she imagines what'd she say:
"If you feel like coming home to me sometime
Yeah, if you feel like coming home to me
I'll be waiting at the door
There is nothing to be sorry for
So why can't you come home?
Don't you feel like coming home to me anymore?
You don't feel like coming home to me?"
That's the game you choose
But you don't have to play the loser
Lyrics submitted by Godhates
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