"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
I am not a pattern to be followed
The pill that I'm on
Is a tough one to swallow
I'm not a criminal
Not a role model
Not a born leader
I'm a tough act to follow
I am not the fortunate and the fame
Or the same verse I'm telling you to forfeit the game
I came in the ring like a dog on a chain
And I found out the underbelly is sicker than it seems
And it seems ugly, but it can get worse
'Cause even the blueprint is a gift and a curse
'Cause once you have the theory of how the thing works
Everybody wants the next thing to be just like the first
And I'm not a robot
I'm not a monkey
I will not dance even if the beat's funky
Opposite of lazy, far from a punk y'all
Stop talking, start tryna catch up motherfucker
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
Lauren said money changes situations
Big said it increases the complication
Kane said don't stab, I ain't the one
Chuck said a an Uzi weigh a motherfucking ton
And I'm just a student of the game that they taught me
Rocking every stage and every place that they brought me
I'm awfully underrated
But can be corrected
And so this second I'm gonna save it for the record
I am the opposite of whack
Opposite of weak
Opposite of slack
Standing in the heat
Standing in a crack
Closest to a beat, far from a punk
Y'all oughta stop talking, start tryna catch up motherfucker
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
Oh when they come for me
Come for me
I'll be gone
Oh, when they come for me
Come for me
I'll be gone
Oh, when they come for me
Come for me
I'll be gone
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
Aah, aah, aah
Aah, aah, aah
I am not a pattern to be followed
The pill that I'm on
Is a tough one to swallow
I'm not a criminal
Not a role model
Not a born leader
I'm a tough act to follow
I am not the fortunate and the fame
Or the same verse I'm telling you to forfeit the game
I came in the ring like a dog on a chain
And I found out the underbelly is sicker than it seems
And it seems ugly, but it can get worse
'Cause even the blueprint is a gift and a curse
'Cause once you have the theory of how the thing works
Everybody wants the next thing to be just like the first
And I'm not a robot
I'm not a monkey
I will not dance even if the beat's funky
Opposite of lazy, far from a punk y'all
Stop talking, start tryna catch up motherfucker
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
Lauren said money changes situations
Big said it increases the complication
Kane said don't stab, I ain't the one
Chuck said a an Uzi weigh a motherfucking ton
And I'm just a student of the game that they taught me
Rocking every stage and every place that they brought me
I'm awfully underrated
But can be corrected
And so this second I'm gonna save it for the record
I am the opposite of whack
Opposite of weak
Opposite of slack
Standing in the heat
Standing in a crack
Closest to a beat, far from a punk
Y'all oughta stop talking, start tryna catch up motherfucker
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
Oh when they come for me
Come for me
I'll be gone
Oh, when they come for me
Come for me
I'll be gone
Oh, when they come for me
Come for me
I'll be gone
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
And all the people say
Aah, aah, aah
Try to catch up motherfucker
Aah, aah, aah
Aah, aah, aah
Aah, aah, aah
Lyrics submitted by MusicFREAK20, edited by AdamArtz, SarahZB
When They Come for Me Lyrics as written by Chester Charles Bennington Brad Delson
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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I agree with what most people have posted before hand, and I'd just like to say that I think the lyrics in the first verse are just completely brilliant, starting with the first line -- LP has expressed numerous times that they don't want their albums to sound like each other -- especially ATS -- on the DVD they talk about how they kept coming up with ideas for songs that sounded similar to their old music and they kept trashing the ideas. This completely reflects the first line of the song, they're not a pattern, they're not repeating themselves despite what a lot of fans want, which is more Hybrid Theory and Meteora. That fact being the tough pill to swallow.
Then continuing on to "I am not the fortune or the fame/Or the same person telling you to forfeit the game". A bunch of people have said that the money and fame has gone to LP's heads and they're just trying to pull off crazy shit. And then they pull a line straight from Points of Authority to say that they're not the same band anymore, they've grown and matured.
"I came into the ring like a dog on a chain" - When they started making CD's they were under pressure from producers or record labels (I'm assuming) to make the music they made. I read in an interview that Mike said that the Hybrid Theory and Meteora were not Linkin Park, that M2M and ATS were Linkin Park. They broke off and started to make the music that THEY WANTED to make.
"Because even a blueprint is a gift and a curse/Because once you have a theory of how the thing works/Everybody wants the next thing to be like the first/But I'm not a robot, I'm not a monkey/I will not dance even if the beat is funky" - Pretty self explanatory but basically again, they're trying to make different music. Their old blueprint for music was the same -- it made some great songs, but you don't want to get stuck in that habit or everything will start to sound the same. But at the same time, that's what the fans wanted. Some people don't realize that making more music that sounds the same isn't a good thing. And then obviously, monkey's mimic things and robots do what they're programmed to do, and they're not going to "dance" regardless of what people say.
Lastly, I think it'd be wrong to copy and paste, so I'll just say that I think SusieB's interpretation of the last line was spot on. I'm not good enough with this interpreting crap to do the rest of the song, but I figured I'd just throw in my 2 cents.