"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.
You and I got somethin
But it's all and then it's nuthin to me, yeah
And I got my defenses
When it comes through your intentions for me, yeah
And we wake up in the breakdown
With the things we never thought we could be, yeah
I'm not the one who broke you
I'm not the one you should fear
We got to move you darlin'
I thought I lost you somewhere
But you were never really ever there at all
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
And I wanted to be
All you need
Somehow here is gone
I am no solution
To the sound of this pollution in me, yeah
And I was not the answer
So forget you ever thought it was me, yeah
I'm not the one who broke you
I'm not the one you should fear
We got to move you darlin
I thought I lost you somewhere
But you were never really ever there at all
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
And I wanted to be
All you need
Somehow here is gone
And I don't need the fallout
Of the past that's in between us
And I'm not holding on
And all your lies weren't enough to keep me here
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
And I wanted to be
All you need
Somehow here is gone
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
I know it's out there
I know it's out there
And I can feel you falling
I know it's out there
I know it's out there
Somehow here is gone, yeah
I know it's out there
I know it's out there
Somehow here is gone, yeah
But it's all and then it's nuthin to me, yeah
And I got my defenses
When it comes through your intentions for me, yeah
And we wake up in the breakdown
With the things we never thought we could be, yeah
I'm not the one who broke you
I'm not the one you should fear
We got to move you darlin'
I thought I lost you somewhere
But you were never really ever there at all
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
And I wanted to be
All you need
Somehow here is gone
I am no solution
To the sound of this pollution in me, yeah
And I was not the answer
So forget you ever thought it was me, yeah
I'm not the one who broke you
I'm not the one you should fear
We got to move you darlin
I thought I lost you somewhere
But you were never really ever there at all
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
And I wanted to be
All you need
Somehow here is gone
And I don't need the fallout
Of the past that's in between us
And I'm not holding on
And all your lies weren't enough to keep me here
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
And I wanted to be
All you need
Somehow here is gone
And I want to get free
Talk to me
I can feel you falling
I know it's out there
I know it's out there
And I can feel you falling
I know it's out there
I know it's out there
Somehow here is gone, yeah
I know it's out there
I know it's out there
Somehow here is gone, yeah
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Fast Car
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Magical
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Plastic Bag
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“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
'untruewords' you got it the best. exactly how I see the song. great interpretation.