After first debuting it live over a year ago, Chappell Roan recently released studio version of her song “The Subway.” Today, she shared a music video for the long-anticipated release. The track is the artist’s third single since her 2023 debut album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, according to Pitchfork. The video can be found on Roan’s YouTube channel.
The video features Roan and another person, both with comically-long hair and is set in New York City. Roan chases the unnamed green-haired person across the city, running into the subway and other places familiar to New Yorkers. Spliced in between shots of Roan singing are all sorts of goings on, like Roan being dragged behind a taxi car by the hair, swept up in a windstorm and in a subway car full of provocatively dressed dancers. The latter scene, as well as the lyrics being about Roan wanting to get over a female ex-partner, come as the expected elements of Roan’s exploration of sexuality and queer themes.
On that note, the song is all about Roan’s attempts of getting over an ex and the complicated feelings of heartbreak, longing and regret; of the struggle to remove somebody from your mind who once meant everything. The ending is the best example of this, alternating between “She’s got a way” and “She got away,” bouncing between fondly recalling her ex’s personality before being brought back to the reality of their breakup. It’s a story that many (including straight and queer alike) can relate to, but Roan emphasized her use of New York to frame her individual perspective on these woes. “The cliche of ‘the girl that got away’ barely scratches the surface for me with this song,” Roan said. “I wrote it as I was stumbling around New York with a broken heart and I kept envisioning us on every street, fire escape, coffee shop, park and yes… the subway.“
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