"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.
ANNIE
Maybe far away or maybe real nearby
He may be pouring her coffee
She may be straighting his tie
Maybe in a house all hidden by a hill
She's sitting playing piano
He's sitting paying a bill
Betcha they're young, betcha they're smart
Bet they collect things like ashtrays and art
Betcha they're good, why shouldn't they be?
Their one mistake was giving up me
So maybe now it's time and maybe when I wake
They'll be there calling me "Baby"
Maybe...
Betcha he reads, betcha she sews
Maybe she's made me a closet of clothes
Maybe they're strict, as straight as a line
Don't really care as long as they're mine
So maybe now this prayer's the last one of its kind
Won't you please come get your baby
Maybe
Maybe far away or maybe real nearby
He may be pouring her coffee
She may be straighting his tie
Maybe in a house all hidden by a hill
She's sitting playing piano
He's sitting paying a bill
Betcha they're young, betcha they're smart
Bet they collect things like ashtrays and art
Betcha they're good, why shouldn't they be?
Their one mistake was giving up me
So maybe now it's time and maybe when I wake
They'll be there calling me "Baby"
Maybe...
Betcha he reads, betcha she sews
Maybe she's made me a closet of clothes
Maybe they're strict, as straight as a line
Don't really care as long as they're mine
So maybe now this prayer's the last one of its kind
Won't you please come get your baby
Maybe
Lyrics submitted by Rosiega1218
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This song is so sad, I saw the movie, it was brilliant!
The meaning of this songis pretty clear (little orphan Annie wants to find her parents). But the emotion of it is still the same. Sorrowful, yet still full of hope.
This song is really having children and caring for other people. People in the West now-a-days make excuses for being selfish and have really small families, but that's not how they did it in the old days, nor how they do it in the rest of the world.
People don't realize it, but they get married really late and then contracept until they have 1 or 2 kids, and it's not good for the West. An epidemic or natural disasters will come, wipe us clean out, the Mexicans take over. All this "overpopulation" stuff is sinister, it's just an excuse for selfishness.
This happened to Rome and Egypt, too : people in civilizations get wrapped up with themselves, neglect having kids through the greedy, then get overwhelmed by "the barbarians", who at that point have the better idea about what it is to be human.
This song is also about Divine Providence, because pretty soon Daddy Warbucks is going to adopt Annie. And in real life, God and the Saints are looking out for us, especially if we let them.
"Annie" is a great movie about kids and parenthood, but in allegorical ways.