"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.
Yeah, as a kid growin' up in Brooklyn, my pops was a DJ (my pops too)
He had a bunch of records funk, jazz, rhythm and blues, soul (word?)
You know what I'm sayin' (of course)
There was this one gospel record I liked like (which one?), Like
Like holy moly, I might get some religion and leave you holy holy
Yeah, this rhyme is so fat it's rollie pollie
I give you intimate details so you can get to know me
These corporate rappers like, "Why this dude pickin' on me?"
You rap your way to the top, but now it's gettin' lonely
Kids is hungry and you lookin' like a steak from Nick & Toni's
But don't nobody want your jewels, 'cause your shit is phony
Say word? Your shit is real? Damn, your shit is corny
My rhymes turn a new page like Mark Foley and
Touch kids like when Larry Clark gave the part to Chloe
Rest in peace to Harold Hunter, the greatest from New York
Started out skatin' for Zoo York
Word hangin' out at The Gavin, I was very lucky
To talk to Rash' once I got past Derek Dudley
Got him on "Respiration", that's pre-Badu
Bet you Garnett Reid got a Matt Doo tattoo
Sometimes I feel like I'm drownin' I gotta tread water
Head above the water I always remember Headquarters
Heads up, eyes open, I got my mind focused
I find hope inside a line, my rhymes define opus
Sometimes hopeless people, fill my thoughts with evil
My record so hard it broke the needle
At the Mixtape Awards niggas act like they don't give a fuck though
And disrespect the legacy of Justo
What the blood claat? No, let the blood flow
You ain't come to pay your respect, then what you come fo'?
Too many good niggas die, it's like a stop loss
Hood niggas ghetto like fried wings and hot sauce
How you hard? The cops lettin' fifty shots off
Baby Jay-Z's with the knockoff Scott Storch beat
You are not Short, you are not Katt
You're not a player or a pimp, money, stop that
Learn to master your speech and be eloquent
Rappers keep peddlin' sweets, the beats weaker than gelatin
We used to kick up dust, now we settlin'
Rest in peace to Dilla, Weldon, we can't forget you
Professor X and, Proof we miss you, word
Rest in peace to Shaka, twenty one gun salute
In the air like, "BLAKA BLAKA BLAKA"
You're still here 'cause you're livin through me
You're like a gift God has given to me
Uh, uh, uh, what?
He had a bunch of records funk, jazz, rhythm and blues, soul (word?)
You know what I'm sayin' (of course)
There was this one gospel record I liked like (which one?), Like
Like holy moly, I might get some religion and leave you holy holy
Yeah, this rhyme is so fat it's rollie pollie
I give you intimate details so you can get to know me
These corporate rappers like, "Why this dude pickin' on me?"
You rap your way to the top, but now it's gettin' lonely
Kids is hungry and you lookin' like a steak from Nick & Toni's
But don't nobody want your jewels, 'cause your shit is phony
Say word? Your shit is real? Damn, your shit is corny
My rhymes turn a new page like Mark Foley and
Touch kids like when Larry Clark gave the part to Chloe
Rest in peace to Harold Hunter, the greatest from New York
Started out skatin' for Zoo York
Word hangin' out at The Gavin, I was very lucky
To talk to Rash' once I got past Derek Dudley
Got him on "Respiration", that's pre-Badu
Bet you Garnett Reid got a Matt Doo tattoo
Sometimes I feel like I'm drownin' I gotta tread water
Head above the water I always remember Headquarters
Heads up, eyes open, I got my mind focused
I find hope inside a line, my rhymes define opus
Sometimes hopeless people, fill my thoughts with evil
My record so hard it broke the needle
At the Mixtape Awards niggas act like they don't give a fuck though
And disrespect the legacy of Justo
What the blood claat? No, let the blood flow
You ain't come to pay your respect, then what you come fo'?
Too many good niggas die, it's like a stop loss
Hood niggas ghetto like fried wings and hot sauce
How you hard? The cops lettin' fifty shots off
Baby Jay-Z's with the knockoff Scott Storch beat
You are not Short, you are not Katt
You're not a player or a pimp, money, stop that
Learn to master your speech and be eloquent
Rappers keep peddlin' sweets, the beats weaker than gelatin
We used to kick up dust, now we settlin'
Rest in peace to Dilla, Weldon, we can't forget you
Professor X and, Proof we miss you, word
Rest in peace to Shaka, twenty one gun salute
In the air like, "BLAKA BLAKA BLAKA"
You're still here 'cause you're livin through me
You're like a gift God has given to me
Uh, uh, uh, what?
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
The Night We Met
Lord Huron
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This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
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."
Gentle Hour
Yo La Tengo
Yo La Tengo
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,