"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.
I feel a hot wind on my shoulder
And the touch of a world that is older
Turn the switch and check the number
Leave it on when in bed I slumber
I hear the rhythms of the music
I buy the product and never use it
I hear the talking of the dj
Can't understand just what does he say?
I'm on a mexican radio
I'm on a mexican radio
I dial it in and tune the station
They talk about the u.s. inflation
I understand just a little
No comprende--it's a riddle
I'm on a mexican radio
I'm on a mexican radio
I wish I was in Tiajuana
Eating barbequed iguana
I'd take requests on the telephone
I'm on a wavelength far from home
I feel a hot wind on my shoulder
I dial it in from south of the border
I hear the talking of the dj
Can't understand just what does he say?
Radio radio...
And the touch of a world that is older
Turn the switch and check the number
Leave it on when in bed I slumber
I hear the rhythms of the music
I buy the product and never use it
I hear the talking of the dj
Can't understand just what does he say?
I'm on a mexican radio
I'm on a mexican radio
I dial it in and tune the station
They talk about the u.s. inflation
I understand just a little
No comprende--it's a riddle
I'm on a mexican radio
I'm on a mexican radio
I wish I was in Tiajuana
Eating barbequed iguana
I'd take requests on the telephone
I'm on a wavelength far from home
I feel a hot wind on my shoulder
I dial it in from south of the border
I hear the talking of the dj
Can't understand just what does he say?
Radio radio...
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Fast Car
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This is one of my favorite songs. https://fnfgo.io
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Great version of a great song,
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i have no clue what this song means but i know its amazing
Ever flipping through the FM dial and get a few Mexican stations crystal clear?--i guess this is the thoughts of a Man listening to Mexican Radio.
those stations come in so well because there are no FCC regulations on broadcast strength in mexico, so the transmitters are VERY powerful
I remember this song from the 80s and I just thought it was a kitschy, funny song. But consdiering the fact that Wall of Voodoo are from LA where there's a huge mexican american community I think this song is mean to be a politcal commentary about mexican american relations. In fact I think this song is as relavant today as it was back in 1982 when it first hit the airwaves.
Yeah, great song...too bad it was their only hit. Very underappreciated and underexposed band. I've never even seen their Dark Continent album available on CD.
New wave did become trashy (when it became all about dancing and flocks of haircut 100's), but Wall of Voodoo was not that. Check out their version of Ring of Fire.
Barriers to clear communication-- language barriers, infrastructure (fuzzy signals), and the different lenses that we use to view our lives (making sense of U.S. inflation or, in remakes of the song, the Iraq invasion)-- don't need to limit curiosity. Meaningful communication can still be shared through the feeling // rhythm (as in sharing music).
By the end of the song, he's imagining a radio DJ in Mexico. He has some fanciful ideas about what they eat there, and pictures himself taking song requests on the phone. Then he imagines tuning into the radio south of the border, and being unable to understand what the U.S. DJs are saying.
Or, in a sense, language barriers may limit communication, but values do so even more because, even when he hears folks speak in English about issues such as U.S. inflation or the Iraq invasion, he still doesn't understand.
So anyway, just wanted to point out that I don't think this song is strictly about Mexico or English/Spanish, so much as it's about communication and understanding in general.
@inteleckshual <br /> I like your take on the latter half of the song in paragraph two. I guess it is pretty obvious when you read the lyrics but I never thought of it in quite that way. Now if you can explain, "I buy the product and never use it", I'll really be impressed.
love this song
Way too funny and inventive for an 80's song. I like this song a lot though....for new wave trash.
I first heard this song on an internet radio station, and thought it was great. I guess it is one of those songs inspired by a little, unimportant event that piqued the author's curiosity enough to sing about it. Anyway, it is good, and it is not often when digging through the radio dials do you get to hear Mexican Radio (there's a thought-bender for you).
I asked one of my Spanish-speaking friends what the mumbled Spanish radio clips in the song mean. He said they're hard to understand, but one sounds like "estudiante de ingles que tan necesaro es" which means " student of the English language that is very useful." He told me they sounded like clips from a "learn English" infomerical. Which would be somewhat ironic considering the subject matter of the song.
This might be a long shot, but does anyone have the lyrics for Andy Prieboy's solo material? He was the singer in Wall Of Voodoo after Stan Ridgeway, who sang on "Mexican Radio".