"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.
To my unholy father
Justice is swift at your black hand
Humanity will fall to the deceased
Hear them begging for mercy, their god wont hear their cries
Your rule forever will and always be
Your hellish army shall claim the earth once more
The dead and buried will surmount their gates of soil
This vanquished nation is now quivering in fear
Their rotting corpses shall line their blood filled streets
They should have seen this coming
Without a blink came this judgement day
The reckoning for the mistakes of all mankind
Don't go to sleep tonight
We'll take your life in quiet slumber
We follow endlessly
Our faces - no remorse
A brand new day of man
The sun born red in blood filled skies
We'll take your hearts tonight, your putrid vision dies
The undead have escaped the grave
So joyously we'll kill, devour, rape and maim
We always claim our prize
And nothing can stop us now
Just another failure of humanity
They cry out "We repent for our misdeeds"
No one can hear your screams
In this orgy of dissection peeling skin from bone relieves us of the throes of necrophilic sin
This appocalyptic ends in sight
Feeble humanity shall no longer prevail
Iniquitous and impious, to the darkest lord we hail
Pray for forgiveness in atonement for your sins
We'll make it so the righteous wont set foot on earth again
You no longer rule this earth
The dying have fallen at the hands of the dead
You will be silenced in wake of this change
All that remains is death and decay
Justice is swift at your black hand
Humanity will fall to the deceased
Hear them begging for mercy, their god wont hear their cries
Your rule forever will and always be
Your hellish army shall claim the earth once more
The dead and buried will surmount their gates of soil
This vanquished nation is now quivering in fear
Their rotting corpses shall line their blood filled streets
They should have seen this coming
Without a blink came this judgement day
The reckoning for the mistakes of all mankind
Don't go to sleep tonight
We'll take your life in quiet slumber
We follow endlessly
Our faces - no remorse
A brand new day of man
The sun born red in blood filled skies
We'll take your hearts tonight, your putrid vision dies
The undead have escaped the grave
So joyously we'll kill, devour, rape and maim
We always claim our prize
And nothing can stop us now
Just another failure of humanity
They cry out "We repent for our misdeeds"
No one can hear your screams
In this orgy of dissection peeling skin from bone relieves us of the throes of necrophilic sin
This appocalyptic ends in sight
Feeble humanity shall no longer prevail
Iniquitous and impious, to the darkest lord we hail
Pray for forgiveness in atonement for your sins
We'll make it so the righteous wont set foot on earth again
You no longer rule this earth
The dying have fallen at the hands of the dead
You will be silenced in wake of this change
All that remains is death and decay
Lyrics submitted by Fantastic_Stu
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Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
The Night We Met
Lord Huron
Lord Huron
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"
Bron-Y-Aur Stomp
Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin
This is about bronies. They communicate by stomping.
No Surprises
Radiohead
Radiohead
Same ideas expressed in Fitter, Happier are expressed in this song. We're told to strive for some sort of ideal life, which includes getting a good job, being kind to everyone, finding a partner, getting married, having a couple kids, living in a quiet neighborhood in a nice big house, etc. But in Fitter, Happier the narrator(?) realizes that it's incredibly robotic to live this life. People are being used by those in power "like a pig in a cage on antibiotics"--being pacified with things like new phones and cool gadgets and houses while being sucked dry. On No Surprises, the narrator is realizing how this life is killing him slowly. In the video, his helmet is slowly filling up with water, drowning him. But he's so complacent with it. This is a good summary of the song. This boring, "perfect" life foisted upon us by some higher powers (not spiritual, but political, economic, etc. politicians and businessmen, perhaps) is not the way to live. But there is seemingly no way out but death. He'd rather die peacefully right now than live in this cage. While our lives are often shielded, we're in our own protective bubbles, or protective helmets like the one Thom wears, if we look a little harder we can see all the corruption, lies, manipulation, etc. that is going on in the world, often run by huge yet nearly invisible organizations, corporations, and 'leaders'. It's a very hopeless song because it reflects real life.
Head > Heels
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Head > Heels” is a track that aims to capture what it feels like to experience romance that exceeds expectations. Ed Sheeran dedicates his album outro to a lover who has blessed him with a unique experience that he seeks to describe through the song’s nuanced lyrics.