"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.
Morning, your toast
Your tea and sugar
Read about a politician's lover
Go through the day
Like a knife through butter
Why don't you
You dress in the colours of forgiveness
Your eyes as red as Christmas
Purple robes are folded on the kitchen chair
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
In your dreams everything is alright
Tomorrow dawns like someone else's suicide
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Dreams
It's a dirty business, dreaming
Where there is silence and not screaming
Where there's no daylight
There's no healing, no no
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
In your dreams everything is alright
Tomorrow dawns like a suicide
But you're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Hope, hope is where the door is
When the church is where the war is
Where no one can feel no one else's pain
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
In your dreams everything is alright
Tomorrow dawns like a suicide
But you're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Sleep like a baby tonight
Like a bird, your dreams'll take flight
Like St. Francis covered in light
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Your tea and sugar
Read about a politician's lover
Go through the day
Like a knife through butter
Why don't you
You dress in the colours of forgiveness
Your eyes as red as Christmas
Purple robes are folded on the kitchen chair
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
In your dreams everything is alright
Tomorrow dawns like someone else's suicide
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Dreams
It's a dirty business, dreaming
Where there is silence and not screaming
Where there's no daylight
There's no healing, no no
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
In your dreams everything is alright
Tomorrow dawns like a suicide
But you're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Hope, hope is where the door is
When the church is where the war is
Where no one can feel no one else's pain
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
In your dreams everything is alright
Tomorrow dawns like a suicide
But you're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
Sleep like a baby tonight
Like a bird, your dreams'll take flight
Like St. Francis covered in light
You're gonna sleep like a baby tonight
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